N.D. legislators agree on 2 percent potash tax

Bismarck, N.D.-North Dakota legislators are putting the finals touches to a compromise agreement on how much to tax the state’s potash mining industry. Working for most of the current session on a range between 1.5 to 4 percent, the House gave its final approval last Wednesday (April 20) and the Senate was to follow suit later in the day to a levy of 2 percent on gross receipts from sales. The votes were 87-7 in the House and 37-10 in the Senate. According to Terry Traynor with the North Dakota Association of Counties, both bodies felt the need to act before adjournment instead of leaving the matter in the hands of the local entities. He expected that the measure would be signed by Gov. Jack Dalrymple without any problem. “There are still a lot of issues left unresolved” Traynor told Green Markets. “But the legislators wanted to fix a level of tax so the industry would have some level of comfort so they would know what they are going to be up against.” Negotiators from the House and Senate agreed to wait until 2013 to decide how to divide the tax money between the state and the county where the potash is located. The House supported a bigger tax share for counties than the Senate. The final bill also lets counties decide if they want to charge property tax on potash processing facilities.