The Allen Parish Police Jury is asking the Bureau of Indian Affairs to reject trust land acquisitions being sought by the Coushatta Tribe of Louisiana.

Within the last 18 months, the Police Jury has received no less than 16 non-gaming land acquisition requests for 3,101 acres, which accounts for $44,835 in annual property tax collections, according to Parish Administrator Jacob Dillehay. The majority of the land is in the Kinder area, including La. 383 and west toward Elton.

During its meeting Monday, the Police Jury unanimously voted to oppose the latest round of trust land acquisitions being sought by the Coushatta Tribe of Louisiana for four pieces of property in the parish.

The Police Jury has objected to and appealed all recent land requests directly to the Bureau of Indian Affairs and has failed each time to successfully stop the trust land acquisitions, Dillehay said.

“So far in the last year or so, we have done a lot of work behind-the-scenes on appeals and things like that for trust land acquisitions,” Dillehay said.

The Coushatta Tribe currently pays $82,761 annually in ad valorem taxes in Allen Parish for property that is not in trust but is exempt from paying more than $1.2 million in annual property taxes on trust land property, according to information provided by the Police Jury.

“This does not include the potential property taxes on the casino facility which has never been assessed or included in the parish’s tax rolls because it is on trust land,” Dillehay said, noting that the average amount the casinos pay in property taxes in Calcasieu Parish is $1.1 million annually.

The last four applications amount to about $22,000 in additional revenue that would be exempted from the area, he said.

The deepest impacted agencies would include Road District 2 in the Kinder area, School District 25 and the Sheriff’s Office.

In addition to the negative trust land movement impacts, the parish has loss nearly $7 million in revenue after the Coushatta Tribe failed to renew its gaming compact agreement with parish officials earlier this year. The agreement provided funds to local entities for nearly three decades to offset the negative impacts of the casino and gaming in Allen Parish.

The value of the area would likely need to be reassessed if the trust land acquisitions are approved, potentially leading to increased local taxes, Dillehay said.

“So potentially, if these trust land acquisitions keep happening, there’s a chance that the taxpayers of the area would see an increase in taxes to account for the losses in property taxes,” he said.

District Attorney Joe Green said appeals have been made to regional and federal Bureau of Indian Affairs authorities, but the issue remains unresolved, with ongoing advocacy for a resolution.

“The problem is, we are dealing with federal law and federal agencies,” he said.

“We are trying to explain in our appeals that you shouldn’t just look at how much one particular property going into trust is going to affect (the parish),” Green said. “You say look at everything together.”

The Bureau of Indian Affairs has also said the trust land issue and the compact agreement should be looked at separately, he said.

Governor Jeff Landry and the Attorney General’s Office have been made aware of the situation, Green said.

“The remedy, unfortunately at this point, it just seems there needs to be a change in the law,” he said, noting that this is not a unique issue. “We will keep advocating and keep looking for a way to stop this. To us it is about fairness…”