If Minnesota follows Utah’s lead, it could grow a stealth education revenue source: its 2.5 million-acre Permanent School Fund lands.
Minnesota’s school trust lands, mostly in the state’s northern third, are from a colonial-era federal land trust that dedicated a parcel of each township to be used permanently to fund public schools.
After three years of heading a study group on Minnesota’s fund, Rep. Denise Dittrich (DFL-Champlin) told the House K-12 Education Finance Division at a March 16 informational hearing she has “formulated some serious concerns about the management and the return on investment of the school trust lands.”
Dittrich sponsors
HF3475, which would establish an independent agency to oversee the management of Minnesota’s permanent school lands, now under Department of Natural Resources management.
Revenue from the Minnesota fund is expected to generate $27 million for school districts this year mostly through mining and logging activities, according to House fiscal analysts — but it could be worth tens of millions more, if Utah’s example is an indicator.
At a second informational hearing, Margaret Bird, director of Children’s Land Alliance Supporting Schools, told the House K-12 Education Policy and Oversight Committee March 16 that Utah’s fund, after reform efforts there, transformed from a “molehill” into a “gold mine” worth $1 billion. It generates around $150 million in school revenue annually from land sales and leases for a variety of uses including oil and gas, wind power, geothermal fields, telecommunication sites, grazing and farming.
Interest and dividend income from the Utah fund is distributed to individual schools. Its use is determined by each site’s school community council, an elected group of parents or guardians and school employees. Minnesota funds are distributed to school districts as undesignated general fund revenue.
Two House committees approved the bill and sent it to the House Rules and Legislative Administration Committee.
Sen. Chuck Wiger (DFL-Maplewood) sponsors a companion,
SF3042, which awaits action by the Senate Environment and Natural Resources Committee.
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