On Thursday, a representative from the Wayne National Forest was at the Lawrence County Commissioners’ meeting to discuss payments to the county.

Gary Chancey, a WNF public affairs officer, told the commissioners that there were four pots of money they were entitled to.

The WNF has just over 75,000 acres in Lawrence County, and the government pays the local government payments in lieu of taxes (PILT) that they would get if the land was in private hands, as also mineral payments.

In 2017, the WNF paid a total $635,088.36.

Of that amount, $166,768 was a PILT payment, and $19,311 was from the 25 Percent Act of 1908, where the local government is given 25 percent of commercial activity in a national forest such as timber sales or grazing permits.

The second biggest pot of money was $97,942.49 from a mineral payment distributed in March and $349,066.87 from a mineral payment distributed in November.

The money comes from sales of oil and gas activities sales

“That didn’t happen in Lawrence County, it actually happened in Monroe County,” Chancey explained. “But Lawrence County, with 25 percent of it being in Wayne National Forest, is one of the biggest beneficiaries.”

The money is based on a rolling average of seven years of sales and is distributed to all 12 counties in the WNF.

Chancey said that as mineral rights are sold in WNF, the commissioners will continue to see the money from it.

WNF was established in 1935 with 43 acres in Lawrence County and has grown to 244,243 acres.