June 10, 2021 at 1:12 p.m.
Cass policy to oversee land use conversions
The board also endorsed a proposed resolution Minnesota Soil and Water Conservation Districts will be asked to endorse in December that calls for the state to monitor groundwater levels and groundwater quality where there is heavy irrigation use for agricultural purposes.
That resolution sets monitoring to kick into effect when 30 or more acres of land are converted to agricultural use.
The county's resolution calls for best management practices to be developed and implemented for forest and agricultural uses, a statewide water permitting process with reasonable enforcement, countywide land use regulations to balance public and private rights, public land acquisition of strategic private parcels when consistent with locally adopted standards and local government approval and that the county's geological atlas be completion be expedited.
Cass commissioners also voted to endorse by letter Association of Minnesota Counties (AMC) and the county soil and water conservation district (SWCD) position that Minnesota should be granted an exemption from proposed new federal rules defining and controlling public waters.
Only two states currently have such an exemption.
These new Environmental Protection Agency rules cover a wide range of wet areas as wetlands and require getting approval for work on or near and defined wetland from the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers in addition to state agencies such as the Minnesota Department of Natural Resources.
AMC, Cass County Board and SWCD contend that Minnesota's 2008 Clean Water, Land and Legacy Amendment, which dedicated several million dollars per year to protect and restore Minnesota's natural environment and waters for 25 years should be a strong enough indication that this state manages its waterways effectively without the need for federal intervention.
Environmental Services Director John Ringle said Minnesota's wetland law is more comprehensive and much less cumbersome than the federal regulations.
County Engineer David Enblom told the board this summer it took the highway department from February to October to complete the process to apply for and receive approval to cross a wetland with a highway construction project.
Laura Hadrava, construction/design engineer with Cass County Highway Department, described that application process to the Army Corps as first hiring a hydrologist at $1,000 per mile, then use staff time to determine GPS coordinates of the wetland, then delineate the wetland and prepare a plan for the project. She showed the board a one-inch thick book containing that plan.
Then, the county could apply to the Corps, which had a technical committee review the plan, give 30-days public notice, consider temporary and permanent impacts and finally rule the proposal was approved. Hadrava said that eight-month process used to take one month when the county could just apply to the state and not have to get federal approval.
"It's all about the Corps of Engineers' workload," Enblom said.
Minnesota Department of Transportation is paying for one Corps employee to be assigned to fast-track its projects, according to Enblom. If that were to be done for county state aid projects, it would cost $200,000, Enblom said.
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