In early February the Natural Resources Board passed a rule opening the door to outdoor activity bans on local government and land trust group stewardship purchases.  Local governments and nonprofit conservation groups such as the Nature Conservancy can purchase land with Stewardship Fund dollars. 

 

In the 2007-09 budget, the legislature approved an increase in stewardship purchasing authority to over $1.6 billion through 2020.  Nonprofit conservation groups (NCG) have access to $12 million of this funding annually.  That is fully 24 percent of all annual stewardship funding authority.  Local governments have access to up to $11.5 million annually beginning this fiscal year.

 

Stewardship land is paid for with tax dollars from all Wisconsin residents.  The debt service for stewardship purchases in this fiscal year is $54.7 million.  Roughly $16 million is paid from the forestry account.  That money comes from your property taxes.  In 2007-08 the amount of money taken into that account from property taxes was $84.5 million.

 

Of the land purchased with stewardship dollars from 1990 to 2006 by local governments and NCG's only 62 percent is open to hunting.  One of the concessions to gain support for the expanded stewardship purchasing authority granted in the 2007 budget was the requirement that,

 

"all lands purchased with stewardship dollars be open to hunting, fishing, trapping, hiking, cross-country skiing, and other nature-based outdoor recreation, unless the Natural Resources Board determines that a closure is necessary to protect public safety, protect a unique plant or animal, or to accommodate usership patterns defined in administrative rule." (Wisconsin LFB 2007-09 budget summary memo)

 

I supported those requirements in the 2007 budget.  However, in the most recent budget, a proposal was pushed through the Joint Committee on Finance which would have reversed those requirements effectively allowing for unjustified outdoor activity bans on public stewardship land.  Thankfully, those changes were pulled from the final budget due to an outcry from citizens and legislators such as myself.

 

However, the Natural Resources Board passed a rule last month which allows the DNR to ban outdoor activities on stewardship lands anyway.  That move was met with 'disappointment' from hunting groups.  These groups have concerns because the department has used 'poor rationales' to ban outdoor activities on stewardship land in the past.  Lawmakers are calling for hearings on the rule.  The rule is currently in a committee chaired by Spencer Black (D-Madison) who, as I write these notes, has not scheduled a hearing on the rule to ban public access.

 

When the taxpayer credit card is being charged up to $1.6 billion and tens of millions of taxpayer dollars are spent each year on the debt service, a decision to ban outdoor activities on public stewardship land should only be made in rare circumstances, just as the statutes read.