No drilling on 16th Section Land means loss of millions to Vermilion school district

It looks like oil and gas money from 16th Section Land is drying up, which is not good news for the Vermilion Parish School System.
For 50-plus years, the Vermilion school system has been getting oil and gas revenue because of wells drilled on 16th Section Land. The school system has 18,000 acres of 16th Section Land throughout the parish.
The land ranges from White Lake in Gueydan, marshlands near Pecan Island, to the land that North Vermilion Middle and North Vermilion High School sit on.
Vermilion Parish school system would make four to six million dollars a year from oil and gas revenue as little as seven years ago. But things have not been too good the last few years, and income from the oil and gas revenue has declined.
In the 2013-14 school year, oil and gas revenue from 16th Section Land brought in $6.5 million to the school system.
The school board learned not to budget oil and gas revenue because it would fluctuate each year. One year, they would get $3.5 million, but it would go up to $5 million another year.
If there were a budget deficit at the end of the school year, the school system would use oil and gas revenue to balance the budget.
Since the school system received $6.5 million in 2013-14, the checks have been getting smaller and smaller each year.
In 2017-18, the amount was down to $1.5 million. Last year, the amount was $1.1 million.
This year will be the worst the school system has ever experienced.
The school system is projected to get around $300,000 for the 2020-2021 school year.
When drilling was rocking and rolling in the 2013-14 year, the school system got monthly checks of $1.3 million, $665,000, $545,000 and the smallest was $335,000.
This year the school system received a royalty check of $1,267 and $964 for August and September.
The last two months, however, the checks have been $23,000.
The future of oil and gas drilling in the parish is projected to remain down, which means royalty checks will continue to remain low for the school system.