Sponsors (2)
Revises hardrock mining claim maintenance fees to a distance-based schedule, adds fee-in-lieu and small-miner exemption, requires CPI adjustments every 5 years, and directs fee use for administration.
Official title: To amend the Omnibus Budget Reconciliation Act of 1993 to update provisions related to the hardrock mining claim maintenance fee established under that Act, and for other purposes.
Introduced December 11, 2025 by Melanie Ann Stansbury · Last progress December 11, 2025
The bill shifts mining claim maintenance to a fee-based system that generates predictable funding for land programs and discourages high-impact activity near sensitive areas, while imposing substantially higher annual costs on many claimants (with a limited small-miner exemption) and creating new administrative oversight and potential reductions in on-the-ground reclamation incentives.
Tribal residents, states, and the public: the bill directs mining fee revenues to administer mining laws and, if revenues exceed costs, to conservation, tribal historic preservation, state payments, and public-land restoration funds, providing new, sustained funding for land and resource programs.
Mining claimants near parks/monuments and nearby communities: the fee schedule uses distance-based tiers (higher fees closer to sensitive areas), which better prices claims near high-value landscapes and can discourage higher-impact activity in those places.
Mining claim holders and small operators: replacing annual assessment-work and some filings with a claim maintenance fee simplifies paperwork and standardizes a single compliance requirement for those who pay the fee.
Most mining claimants: annual fees rise substantially (up to $1,100 per claim), increasing operating costs and likely forcing some operators to abandon claims or cut activity.
Communities near national parks and monuments: higher, distance-weighted fees concentrated near those areas could reduce local mining jobs and economic activity in nearby towns.
The environment and affected lands: treating the paid fee as a substitute for assessment-work risks reducing on-the-ground reclamation or activity standards that assessment-work previously encouraged, depending on enforcement of casual-use limits.
Based on analysis of 2 sections of legislative text.
Revises federal hardrock mining claim maintenance fees by creating a distance-based fee schedule, adding a fee-in-lieu option, establishing a small-miner exemption, and changing fee-adjustment and notice procedures. It also authorizes the Interior Department to set user fees for administration, directs how claim fees are used to run mining programs, and reallocates any excess fee revenue according to a formula.