Millsfield is an unorganized township administered by Coos county. The county can only charge expenses associated with running the township and a share of the county expenses based on the property values to the propoerty owners. Most of the major landholdings are in current use, so the property tax value is very low. The large landowners dont directly subsidize the small landowners, but anyone that sells timber has to pay a tree growth tax to the muncipality (in this case the county) that generally offsets all or most of the property taxes in an unorgainized township. When the wind farm was permitted, they agreed to pay the county a flat rate for the wind farm and that goes into the county budget. There must of at one point been property taxes of some sort in Millsfield as the landowners complained that the flat rate for the wind farm wasnt credited as Millsfield revenues, rather it was credited to the county.
So if the new owner of Phillips Brook stops cutting trees, it could impact the taxpayers of the township (mostly campowners on Millsfield Pond). Dillon has pretty well stripped the remainder of the township, so I dont see a lot of tree growth revenue coming into the area except Phillips brook for many years. Generally the worst thing for most of the northern NH towns is if the federal government buys the land as they dont pay tree growth taxes. There is a federal government program called payment in lieu of taxes that is supposed to make up for the difference, but it generally is funded well below what is owed the towns. This is one of the reasons that the Coos county delegation is trying to keep the remainder of Success in private hands under a conservation easement.
I keep an eye on large land sales in Me NH and Vt on occasion and its quite noticable that large blocks of NH land rarely appear on the market and dont last long compared to ME and VT. I expect its that the cost to keep the land is low as active forest management is not required like ME and VT to keep current use status.
