Pawlenty talks with wildlife summit

By RON LARSEN

Journal Staff Writer

NICOLLET--Gov. Tim Pawlenty brought a message of hope for sportsmen to a Minnesota Outdoor Heritage Alliance "strategy summit" of sportsmen and politicians at the Nicollet Conservation Club Saturday.

He told the group the state is signing up for another 100,000 Conservation Reserve Enhancement Program acres because "we're already starting to see an improvement in water quality and an increase in pheasant habitat in southwestern Minnesota."

The state last fall reached its goal of enrolling 100,000 acres which fulfilled the state's first CREP goal. Pawlenty promised the sportsmen that "we're going to have it in next year's bonding bill."

He also promised to continue to fight cutbacks in the state's wetlands.

"My first veto as governor, I'm proud to say, was a wetlands (cutback) bill."

Also, Pawlenty drew applause from the group when he said he and Department of Natural Resources Commissioner Gene Merriam would be meeting soon with the governor of North Dakota to work on the "North Dakota situation."

He promised to fight hard to get necessary concessions from North Dakota's governor on issues affecting Minnesota hunters.

Merriam later explained North Dakota has set a quota of 30,000 non-resident waterfowl licenses that can be issued.

"The state also has increased fees substantially on duck hunting by non-residents, as well as limiting non-resident hunting to two, five-day windows," he explained. "Non-residents can't hunt public lands on opening day, either."

The two five-day windows means that non-residents are limited to a total of 10 days' hunting in North Dakota, he noted.

As if to cement his relationship with sportsmen, Pawlenty announced the "first ever Minnesota governor's deer hunting opener this fall. We're going to have a banquet, clinics for kids on gun safety, and we'll have it up north where I'm told the deer are so thick you don't even need a gun. You can wrestle them to the ground with your bare hands."

He also promised to attack the problem of chronic wasting disease which has begun appearing in Midwestern deer.

Sen. Mark Dayton spoke in support of one of the summit sponsors, the Congressional Sportsmen's Foundation, made up of members of Congress who are sportsmen.

"It's the largest caucus in Washington. It's bi-partisan, and that's good for all of us. I'm here to tell you that because of the size of the caucus, you have got a lot of clout in Washington."