We're still running behind in getting our gardens in (and covering some plants in advance of last night's freeze), as well as looking at some leads requiring more in-depth research. Here's a brief digest of Minnesota and South Dakota environmental and natural resource news we think our readers will find interesting.
Roseville DFLer Jamie Becker-Finn leadership
At the Star Tribune, C.B. Bylander reports in Outdoors grant recipients try to empower Minnesotans of different experience levels, colors and ages:
Money matters.
And these days you can see its impact throughout Minnesota thanks to two grant programs that get children, teens and adults outdoors.
Since 2016, the Minnesota Department of Natural Resources has awarded 67 grants totaling $990,000 to recruit, retain and reactivate hunters and anglers. Similarly, the agency has awarded 93 No Child Left Inside (NCLI) grants amounting to $872,996 to connect Minnesotans with nature. Some of these grants involve hunting and fishing, too.
"Our Recruitment, Retention and Reactivation grant program is specifically designed to address long-term declines in hunting and angling participation by listening to the good ideas of Minnesotans, ranking them and the funding the best," said Jeff Ledermann of the DNR's Fish and Wildlife Division outreach section. "The NCLI grants take a broader approach by creating nature-based experiences where opportunities are limited."
New voices in the outdoors due to grant funding include tiny tots utilizing an urban forest at a nature-based Minneapolis preschool, teens participating in school-based fishing clubs, and men and women learning to hunt deer and wild turkey at an education center in southern Minnesota. Some new voices speak Spanish, an outcome of a marketing effort to increase Latino participation in the outdoors.
Rep. Jamie Becker-Finn, DFL-Roseville, played a key role in the 2019 legislation that provided $1.2 million in NCLI grant funds.
"We saw the value of the DNR's hunting and angling grants program but realized it was not reaching certain groups," said Becker-Finn. "That's why I and others looked at what other states were doing and developed a grants program tailored to Minnesota."
Becker-Finn said the scope of NCLI grants has been inspiring. "In many instances, organizations wanted to get people outdoors but did not have the resources to do so. Today, those groups have snowshoes, outdoor gear and the other things they need. We took a communities-know-best approach, and it's working." . . .
Becker-Finn, a suburban mother, Leech Lake Band of Objiwe descendant, and owner of a fine chocolate lab pup, has also been a leader in trying to set chronic wasting disease (CWD) policy to protect Minnesota's wild deer herd and hunting heritage.
With headlines like Wildlife officials quarantine new herds in fight against CWD in the Star Tribune, we went looking for examples of her early efforts to get hearings on CWD-related legislation in the Minnesota House Environment committee while the House was still under Republican control. We posted audio today above a March 13, 2018 photo shared by then minority lead Rick Hansen, DFL-S. St. Paul:
No video, but you can hear the audio archive here #mnhouse #CWD https://t.co/oTSbuP8Fz6 https://t.co/sP7bU2AAC1
— Sally Jo Sorensen (@sallyjos) May 28, 2021
This was but one of multiple attempts by Becker-Finn during the 2018 session. While the chair wouldn't hear CWD legislation, the committee did hear a bill about allowing hunting feral swine, although there were-and are--no feral swine in Minnesota. You know, spending time on real problems.
Appeals court and Minnesota Pinelands
Back on Tuesday, Jennifer Bjorhus reported in Minnesota appeals court: OK to skip full environmental review of Pineland Sands irrigation project for the Star Tribune:
The thirsty potato fields carved from the forest in the state's Pineland Sands region continue to sow controversy, and a new Minnesota Court of Appeals decision isn't likely to change that.
The appeals court on Monday backed up the Department of Natural Resources' decision to skip a full environmental review of an irrigation project in north-central Minnesota, affirming a lower court's decision.
The DNR adequately evaluated the Nolte family's irrigation project in Wadena County and the agency's decision that the farm project "does not have the potential for significant environmental effects" stands, said appeals court Judge Tracy Smith, writing for the panel.
DNR officials were not available for comment Tuesday. . ..
Read more at the Strib.
The EWG noted in Minnesota appeals court ignores threat to Pineland Sands communities’ water and health:
The Minnesota Court of Appeals will not reverse the state’s decision to allow more irrigation permits in the Pineland Sands region, despite the lack of full environmental review – a ruling that clears the way for the further expansion of industrial-scale potato farming that has razed forests, poisoned drinking water wells and exposed communities to aerial spraying of toxic pesticides.
“We are profoundly disappointed in the court’s ruling,” said Environmental Working Group senior vice president for agriculture and natural resources Craig Cox.
“There is overwhelming evidence that irrigated row crop agriculture – especially industrial potato cultivation – cannot be done in the Pineland Sands without polluting water,” Cox said. “This ruling puts the water and health of tribal communities and the people who live in the area at continued risk. The people of the Pineland Sands region should not be forced to drink contaminated water so the world’s biggest potato producer can sell more of its product to McDonald’s.”
For 50 years, R.D. Offutt Farms, or RDO, the largest potato grower in the world, has been the driving force behind clear-cutting pine forests in the Pineland Sands to expand industrial-scale irrigated potato-growing operations.
Independent scientific analysis found that the latest proposed irrigated potato site would increase nitrate contamination of the area’s groundwater and drinking water to more than double the legal limit under the federal Safe Drinking Water Act. A Minnesota Pollution Control Agency study found that nitrate levels in the Straight River, which cuts through the Pinelands Sands and is surrounded by irrigation wells, are now 100 times higher than in areas not harmed by industrial potato farming.
Yet the court sided with the state Department of Natural Resources’ decision that the proposed expansion would not harm the water and the people who rely on it, denying appeals from residents and advocates that the project should not proceed without a comprehensive environmental review. . . .
Read the rest on the EWG website.
Friday in MinnPost, Gregg Aamot reported in After appeals court ruling, what’s next in the Pineland Sands farming dispute?:
Earlier this week, in a ruling watched closely by environmental groups, the Minnesota Court of Appeals declined to overturn a state agency’s decision to grant water permits for an irrigation project in the Pineland Sands region of central Minnesota.
The plaintiffs in the case had argued that the Department of Natural Resources (DNR) should have ordered an environmental review before signing off on three wells for Tim Nolte, a Sebeka farmer who bought land a few years ago from Fargo-based R.D. Offutt Co., which grows potatoes in the region and had once planned to expand its operations there.
The plaintiffs claimed that Nolte was planning to grow potatoes on about 300 acres of land on behalf of R.D. Offutt, a scheme Nolte has denied. Raising potatoes and other row crops in the region is harmful because the soil is delicate and the heavy irrigation that is required washes chemicals into the groundwater, they argue. . . .
Not a new controversy
The controversy began about a decade ago when the lumber supplier Potlatch Corp. began selling its timberlands in the Pineland Sands region, which includes Wadena, Cass, Becker and Hubbard counties. Growing potatoes in the so-called “sandy soils” that are left behind after pine trees are chopped down requires a lot of irrigation, which can wash fertilizer and other chemicals into the groundwater. . . .
Read the entire article at MinnPost.
Southern Minnesota and public lands
It's nearly a week old, but Tom Cherveny's article in the West Central Tribune, Carrying a message from the grasslands to board rooms, isn't dated. Cherveny reports:
Passionate about the value of public lands, the Minnesota DNR's Southern Region Director Scott Roemhildt is as determined about getting to county board meeting rooms as he is about getting outdoors to hunt pheasants. He works to build relationships and straighten out misconceptions about how counties are compensated for public lands. . . .
His goal, he said, is to “get around the myths and misinformation” about PILT. Membership on county boards changes, and many newly elected board members arrive to their roles with a limited understanding of how it all works.
The first myth he works to bust is the biggest. “Hear it all the time. Counties don’t get anything back on the land the state purchases,” said Roemhildt.
Dating back to the 1930s, the state has compensated counties for the public lands it administers. The current version of PILT began in 1979. In most cases, counties receive an annual payment on public lands that exceeds what the property tax would be on that land, said the regional director.
Last year the state paid out $36 million in PILT to counties. It’s dispersed to counties as part of a lump sum payment of state funds to counties, so many may not always realize how much PILT represents of the total, he explained.
PILT revenues are consistent, and have never been reduced since the current program began. They are based on the county's assessed value of the land; the lands are reassessed every six years , he explained.
One of the misconceptions out there is that the state owns much more land than is the reality, according to Roemhildt. When he asks county commissioners, most say they believe the DNR owns about five to 10 percent of their land base.
Actually, 97 percent of the land in southern Minnesota is privately owned. The DNR administers about two percent of the land as public lands, mainly as Wildlife Management Areas, Aquatic Management Areas, and state parks. The amount of public lands in the 32 counties of the southern region ranges from just under one percent in some counties to just over four percent in a few. Most are around that two percent level, he said.
As for the notion that the state is gobbling up large amounts of land, the reality is this: It turns down 87 percent of the lands offered for sale to it.
Roemhildt said lands considered for purchase by the state must meet a minimum four of six goals set for acquisitions. One of the top goals is to provide close-to-home outdoor recreation opportunities. Goals also include protecting significant or rare natural resources and water resources; helping us mitigate and adapt to climate change; and expanding access to existing public lands along with creating larger, contiguous blocks of public lands for their benefits to wildlife.
There are simpler but equally important goals as well. When he was a youth, Roemhildt said he could put his BB gun across the handlebars of his bike and pedal to a place to hunt. Providing places for young people to discover the outdoors remains an important purpose of public lands.
These lands require little in the way of county services, but do benefit the county economically, he added. State parks can show the numbers of visitors coming through the gates, and that makes it easy to explain the economic spin-offs.
There is no way to track the number of visitors to Wildlife Management Areas, but the pandemic has made it clear to more than hunters just how popular these lands are. Along with traditional hunting activities, WMAs are seeing an increasing number of visitors who enjoy everything from hiking and bird-watching to snowshoeing and foraging for natural plants. Roemhildt can attest to that: He lamented that he is getting beat to some of his favorite spots for finding morels. . . .
Given the number of times we've heard rural state representatives like Jeff Backer, R-Browns Valley, kvetch about purchases of land for conservation, this piece is a relief. Part of Backer's district is in the district under Roemhildt's oversight.
Photo: Wild whitetail deer in a woods.
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