About 51,000 acres of northern Minnesota forest will be off-limits to development as part of a $12 million public-private conservation deal announced Wednesday at the State Capitol. The deal, which will still allow the landowner to cut trees on the property, will prevent the subdivision and fragmentation of the forest with hunting cabins and vacation homes, an increasingly common trend in the North Woods.
Conservation groups hailed the agreement as a major achievement that keeps large tracts of forest intact to benefit wildlife, while also ensuring jobs associated with logging and the wood products industry.
Forest Capital Partners of Boston will continue to own the property in Itasca and Koochiching counties, but it has agreed to a perpetual easement that will not allow the land to be developed, even if it's sold.
Gov. Tim Pawlenty said that the conservation easement was a "wonderful" legacy for future generations because it will continue to keep the private lands open for public hunting, fishing, hiking and other recreational uses.
"We are seizing a fleeting opportunity to consolidate ownership of land to stop the kind of hodgepodge development pattern" in northern Minnesota, Pawlenty said. Rather than have increasingly valuable forest land sold for development, he said, it makes sense to prevent "northern Minnesota sprawl" by conserving some of its larger forest tracts.
Failure to do so, said DNR Commissioner Mark Holsten, will result in "no trespassing" signs on thousands of acres that have been open to public recreation for decades.
About 1 million acres of northern forest land in the state is owned by three firms: Forest Capital Partners (which purchased nearly 300,000 acres in 2005 from Boise Cascade Corp.), Potlatch Corp. and UPM Blandin. Those and other large landowners have been selling some property that is now more valuable as real estate than as sources of wood for paper and sawmills.
Conservationists are trying to buy development rights on critical lands, especially those adjoining public forests. The goal, said Tom Duffus, Upper Midwest director of The Conservation Fund, is to protect habitat for dozens of species that require large blocks of forest to survive, including Canada lynx, gray wolf, American black duck, American woodcock and many migratory songbirds.
The latest agreement is called the Koochiching-Washington Forest Legacy Project because of the land's proximity to Koochiching and George Washington state forests. The land includes forest, about 19,000 acres of wetlands, 13 lakes, 43 miles of rivers and streams and more than 90 ponds. It is also near a state natural area and a state park. Officials said that the private easement, combined with nearby public land, adds up to protecting about 440,000 acres from development.
About $6.6 million of the easement costs came from the Department of Natural Resources through bond funds appropriated in 2006 and $5.4 million came from the Blandin Foundation and other private sources. The land will continue to be on property tax rolls, and the DNR will hold and monitor the easement, which was facilitated by the Trust for Public Land.
It is the second forest easement arranged by the Minnesota Forest Legacy Partnership, a public-private coalition created two years ago by The Nature Conservancy and the Blandin Foundation to help conserve Minnesota's north woods. The first project conserves 1,600 acres in Itasca County.
Tom Meersman • 612-673-7388
Tom Meersman • meersman@startribune.com
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