The Crow Wing County Land Services Department has initiated a project to develop a comprehensive recreation trails plan for county-managed public lands.
The plan will guide planning, development, monitoring and maintenance of recreation trails on county lands for the next 10 years.
The county is also conducting an assessment of potential High-Conservation Value Forests (HCVF) to support the planning process.
A first meeting of the project advisory group will be at 6 p.m. Tuesday, March 23, in Meeting Room 2 of the Land Services Building in Brainerd.
The plan will address existing and proposed recreation trails that serve a full range of motorized and non-motorized uses, including ATV routes, equestrian trails, biking, hiking, dog-sledding, skiing, snowmobiling and other trail based recreation types.
The county had contracted with Dovetail Partners, a Minneapolis-based non-profit, to manage the plan development project. Dovetail will also oversee the evaluation process for identifying HCVFs.
The HCVF evaluation is a component of the county's participation in forest certification. The Forest Stewardship Council (FSC) certification standard includes requirements for the protection, management and monitoring of special sites, such as old-growth forests, water source protection areas, cultural or historic sites and other unique resources.
The full project is expected to take up to two years to complete, with the preliminary HCVF findings being shared with the public in about six months and the first draft of the recreation trail plan being released by the end of 2010.
To complete a questionnaire to provide input to the trail project, go to www.surveymonkey.com/s/crowwing.
The questionnaire will remain open throughout the project and is being provided to invite stakeholders to help inform the plan's development and the HCVF assessment.
The questionnaire is also available as a Microsoft Word document at http://dovetailinc.org/files/TrailPlanHCVFRequestforInput.doc.
Answer as many or as few of the questions as you choose. There is space for general comments at the end. All responses may remain anonymous.
For more information about the project, visit www.dovetailinc.org/content/crow-wing-county-recreation, call (612) 333-0430 or e-mail info@dovetailinc.org.
