tod701

Two pieces of budget legislation have been pre-filed and would allow the Legislature to steal all of our Nonhighway and Offroad Vehicle Activities (NOVA) funds and give them to the DNR for non-motorized purposes.

House Bill HB1094 and Senate Bill SB5092 section 961:

(5) During the 2021-2023 fiscal biennium, the legislature may appropriate moneys from the NOVA account to the department of natural resources to support programs that benefit nonhighway road and nonmotorized recreational facilities.

Both of these bills are scheduled to get a hearing next week so it is vitally important to contact your Legislators ASAP.

You can follow these links and click on the comment box and let them know what you think about this attempted theft of our Constitutionally protected gas tax refund money.

https://app.leg.wa.gov/billsummary?B...itiative=false
https://app.leg.wa.gov/billsummary?B...nate&Year=2021

dstevens

Tod, thank you for the update on the NOVA funds.

I have contacted each of my district reps and let them know that this bill is just wrong.

Has there ever been a time when DNR non-motorized funds were used to assist NOVA?

tod701

The DNR gets 36 percent of your ORV gas tax money right off the top before the NOVA grant process. That disappears into never-never land.

Most of the rest of the NOVA money is distributed via a grant process administered by the Recreation and Conservation Office.

Per RWC46.09.520(2)(d)(ii)(B) not less than 30 percent of that money must go toward nonmotorized grants.

The DNR along with a lot of other land management agencies apply for those grants.

This legislation would just give the DNR the whole thing and prohibit them for using any of it for our benefit.

Ryanthegreat1

This crap again?!

Texasl

More accurately, this waives the 30% requirement in the noted section, giving the option to spending all of the monies on non motorized recreational facilities. I will be in contact with the Chair of Ways and Means to request that this language be pulled out. While more people are opting to be outdoors with the restrictions currently imposed, many of them are opting for ORV recreation.

tod701

Jim at Smokey Point Cycle Barn is having a hard time putting dirt bike inventory on the showroom floor since it mostly sold before delivery.

tod701

In addition to being unfair, this misappropriation is unneeded.
The DNR is getting their typical ORV gas tax allocation.
That is 36 percent off the top and outside of the NOVA program.
This budget cycle it works out to almost $7 million.

To make this even more absurd, the DNR is applying for grants that that won’t be funded if this passes.

There is no DNR budget crisis, this is nothing more than an attack on motorized recreation.

Parilla125

Again? They just can not leave that money alone to be used for the intended purpose.

juanitotheclumsy

Thanks for the heads-up. In the future, can you specify the bill numbers and pertinent sections?

These are:

HB 1094, Section 961, Subsection 5 (new section).
SB 5092, Section 961, Subsection 5 (new section, same language as in the House bill).

tod701

See original post

Note: (5) is not a subsection of Section 961, it is a section of the underlying law, RCW46.09.520