05/30/2007 Env Bd Packet - Laserfiche WebLink

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NATURAL RESOURCE PROTECTION Minnehaha Creek Land Conservation Program Nominated by Michael Pressman, Minnehaha Creek Watershed District The Minnehaha Creek Watershed District's Minnehaha Creek Land Conservation Program is among the most pro- active efforts in Minnesota to address the link between land use and Minnesota's growing list of impaired waters. Through technical assistance programs and acquisition of conservation easements, the Minnehaha Creek Land Conservation Program works collaboratively to help promote growth and development that conserves and restores natural resources and enhances the value of previously developed areas. Project partners include: Minnehaha Creek Watershed District, Carver County Planning Department, Carver County Soil and Water Conservation District, Hennepin Conservation District, Hennepin County, Minnesota Land Trust, Public and Private Landowners, State of Minnesota, and Three Rivers Park District. Minnesota Forest Legacy Partnership Nominated by Bernadine Joselyn, Blandin Foundation Itasca County has the largest concentration of privately held landscape -scale industrial forestland in the State of Minnesota. Despite this fact, since 1999 over 400,000 of Minnesota's few remaining large tracts of working forestlands have been parcelized or sold, leading to forest fragmentation and loss of wildlife habitat. In 2005, the Blandin Foundation created the Minnesota Forest Legacy Partnership for the Itasca County Area to help ensure that these lands remain working forest landscapes open to a variety of public uses. By April of 2007, this partnership -based effort will have protected 52,000 acres of biologically diverse ecosystems and important, commercially productive timberland in Itasca and southern Koochiching counties. Project partners include: Blandin Foundation, The Conservation Fund, Grand Rapids Chamber of Commerce, Kresge Foundation, Minnesota Deer Hunters Association, Minnesota Department of Natural Resources, Minnesota Forest Industries, Inc., Minnesota Forest Resources Council, The Nature Conservancy, Surdna Foundation, and The Trust for Public Land. Pine Bend Bluffs Natural Area Nominated by Tom Lewanski 6- Karen Schik, Friends of the Mississippi River Over the past eight years, a unique collection of collaborators, from industry to government to nonprofits, have worked together to protect and restore one of the highest - quality remaining natural areas in the Twin Cities on the bluffs of the Mississippi River. The 1,800 acre Pine Bend Bluffs Natural Area has been designated by the Minnesota Department of Natural Resources as an area of outstanding biological diversity. To date this project has resulted in the permanent protection of 256 acres of land as well as the development of ecological management plans for 800 acres with extensive ecological restoration work having been completed on more than 160 acres. Project partners include: Big Rivers Partnership, Friends of the Mississippi River, City of Inver Grove Heights, Dakota County, Dakota County Soil and Water Conservation District, Flint Hills Resources, Great River Greening, Legislative Citizen Commission on Minnesota Resources, Macalester College, Minnesota Department of Natural Resources, Mississippi River Fund, National Park Service - Mississippi National River and Recreation Area, and The Trust for Public Land.