The Federal Highway Administration (FHWA) is investigating whether Minnesota's Department of Natural Resources properly reviewed environmental issues associated with a taxpayer-funded motorized trails project that the agency desires for outdoor recreation.
The proposed off-highway vehicle complex has divided the Driftless Region town of Houston while giving new life to criticism that DNR is ducking its environmental responsibilities as it shepherds unprecedented growth in trails for four-wheelers, side-by-sides, and off-roading trucks and jeeps.
"DNR leadership is violating the public's trust to protect our rare natural resources,'' said Karla Bloem, a former DNR naturalist who heads the International Owl Center in Houston.
Bloem contends that DNR Parks and Trails avoided formal environmental review and didn't heed local input from DNR field staff. She and other opponents of the so-called Houston Trail project say an influx of all-terrain vehicles and dirt bikes will create noise pollution, erode soils and disturb prime habitat for timber rattlesnakes, a threatened species in Minnesota.
But Houston Mayor David Olson and at least half of the four-person City Council have embraced the trail as a way to attract visitors and pump money into the local economy. The complex would provide a park-like experience for off-roaders to drive in, drive around and drive out. Plans call for 7.5 miles of hilly trails and a "rock crawl'' area, all on 120 acres to 200 acres of land inside city limits.
"It's my job to keep going forward with it,'' Olson said this week. "Yes, there's opposition … They're going to find every negative aspect that they can.''
The project, in the works since 2009, hit a roadblock this month when the City Council held off on hiring an archaeology study required before construction can begin. The pause was a reaction to the Federal Highway Administration's probe of DNR.
City Council Member Cody Mathers confirmed the investigation in a talk last week with David Scott, deputy division administrator for Federal Highway Administration in Minnesota. Mathers summed up his conversation in an e-mail he wrote to Houston City Administrator Michelle Quinn.