Payment in lieu of taxes
Payment made in lieu of property tax by exempt entities
A payment in lieu of taxes, abbreviated as PILT or PILOT, is a payment made to compensate a government for some or all of the property tax revenue lost due to tax exempt ownership or use of real property.
Canada
In Canada, payment in lieu of taxes are made in place of property taxes on real property owned by federal, provincial, and municipal governments and government agencies to local governments and reserves. The need for PILTs arises from Section 125 of the Constitution Act, 1867 which prohibits levels of government from taxing real property owned by federal and provincial governments. Federal PILTs were introduced by the Payments in Lieu of Taxes Act of 1985 and PILTs by the Government of Ontario were introduced by the Municipal Tax Assistance Act of 1990.
PILTs are made on a volunteer basis, leading situations where local governments receive smaller payments than requested based on property tax assessments. In 2024, Ottawa City Council, the local government of the capital of Canada, estimated it received CA$95 million less in PILTs than it should have from the federal government.
United States
In the United States, payment in lieu of taxes can arise in several ways:
Land owned by the federal government is generally not subject to taxation by state or local governments. Under Public Law 94-565, enacted in 1976, the federal government began making payments in lieu of taxation to local governments affected by this reduction in their tax bases.
In some states where land owned by colleges and universities is not subject to local property taxes, the state government reimburses the local governments for part of the tax revenue that the local government would otherwise have collected. In other cases, the institution makes a direct payment to the local government (which would not otherwise be reimbursed) simply to maintain good relations.
Begin with the source’s own compact description: “Payment in lieu of taxes” is payment made in lieu of property tax by exempt entities. The dossier treats that line as a proposition to test through Payment, lieu and taxes, not as a finished interpretation.
Why this record matters
The phrase “payment made in lieu of property tax by exempt entities” supplies a clear boundary for inquiry. It also exposes the unanswered questions: who defined that boundary, when it became stable and which sources sit outside it.
The citation trail is more important than the brevity of the summary: it shows where individual claims can be examined in context. The source revision retrieved here is dated Aug 15, 2025. The linked authority identifier is Q17149755. The first chronological checks are 1867, 1985, 1990 and 2024.
The absence of detail may reflect summary conventions rather than a lack of surviving documentation. The source lead contains qualifying language; that uncertainty should survive quotation, summary and reuse. Authority statements aid reconciliation but still require their own references, qualifiers and ranks to be checked.
How to read it
Use the entry as an orientation point, then follow its citations and revision history. Names, dates and institutional relationships should be checked against the original record.
- Subject orientation
- Search vocabulary
- Locating named sources
The closest primary source, responsible institution and strongest cited specialist reference.
Three-step research path
- Establish the record: confirm the title “Payment in lieu of taxes”, its source revision and the description used here.
- Expand the search: follow Payment in lieu of taxes primary sources, Payment in lieu of taxes archive and Payment research across catalogues and specialist indexes.
- Test the account: compare the strongest cited source with the responsible institution’s current record and note any disagreement.
Questions for further research
- Which source most directly establishes the central claim about “Payment in lieu of taxes”?
- Which institution is responsible for the underlying evidence?
- Which cited source is closest to the event, object or claim?
Search terms from this dossier
This entry incorporates text from “Payment in lieu of taxes” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.