H.R. 6535 — To extend the Secure Rural Schools and Community Self-Determination Act of 2000.

This section extends secure payments under the Secure Rural Schools and Community Self-Determination Act of 2000 (SRS Act) for states and counties containing federal land through FY2026 (from FY2023), including related payment distributions. (As background, the SRS Act provides stable annual payments to eligible states and counties with significant federal forest lands—replacing volatile revenue-sharing from timber sales under the Secure Rural Schools program—to fund public schools, roads, and other county services.) It also adds special rules for FY2024 and FY2025 payments, reducing SRS payments by any prior 25-percent (state) or 50-percent (county) payments already received and requiring the Secretary of the Treasury to make all such payments within 45 days of enactment. This section further modifies SRS Act payment elections by (1) eliminating the requirement for states and counties to elect a payment option for FY2024 and FY2025 and (2) extending FY2023 elections (or deemed elections) to those years. This section extends SRS Act authority for (1) resource advisory committee composition waivers through FY2026 (from FY2023); (2) special projects on federal land through FY2028 (from FY2025), with related reporting through FY2029 (from FY2026); and (3) eligible counties to expend SRS funds on certain projects through FY2028 (from FY2025), with related assessments through FY2029 (from FY2026).

This section extends the resource advisory committee pilot program through 2026 (from 2023) under the Secure Rural Schools and Community Self-Determination Act of 2000 and strikes paragraph (6) of section 205(g). (Resource advisory committees review and recommend Title II projects for restoration of forests and rural infrastructure on federal lands using county payments.)

This section makes technical corrections to the Secure Rural Schools and Community Self-Determination Act of 2000, including (1) in Section 205 on resource advisory committees, removing commas after "Secretary concerned" in subsections (c)(1) and (d)(4), replacing "the date of the enactment of this Act" with "October 3, 2008" in subsection (c)(3), and inserting "the" before "extent" in subsection (d)(4); and (2) in Section 206(b)(2) on use of project funds, removing a comma after "Secretary concerned".