June 10, 2021 at 1:12 p.m.
Cass timber sales top $1.7 million
Of the total revenue the land department receives, only 45 to 50 percent is used to operate the department. The rest is shared with local townships and schools, the county general fund and to match outside grants such as those passed through to recreational trails clubs.
These comments were part of Dahlman's and Stevenson's annual report on land department activities.
The department also includes one forest resource manager to oversee hardwoods, one for planning, one for real estate, one for regeneration and one for wildlife. Cass Soil and Water Conservation Board serves as an advisory board to the land department.
The Minnesota Legislature has approved grants to Cass in recent years from the Lessard Sams Outdoor Heritage three-eighths cent sales tax, which the county uses to purchase land. The department's focus in purchases is to buy tracts adjacent to or giving access to existing county land or which can protect sensitive areas such as wetlands.
To offset these purchases, the county offers land sales annually of existing county owned or tax forfeited properties that are not conducive to timber management or not connected to other county property or not suitable for public recreation.
The county sold 113.82 acres in 2015.
The land department shares with towns, schools and county government general fund over $1 million annually of its timber and land sales revenue derived from managing tax forfeited properties. That transfer is by far the biggest expense showing among the land department's 2015 total $3,722,928 expenses.
Timber sales revenue in 2015 was $1,738,077 of the $3,735,780 total income.
The land department sold timber from 89 land tracts on 3,914.9 acres through monthly auctions in 2015. Average revenue per tract sold ran $20,145.61. Average per acre was $457.98.
Average prices paid for timber species generally were up in 2015 over 2014 and 2013, but pulp wood was down. The pulp market has been impacted by the fact several paper mills in this region closed in the last decade.
Cass sells more aspen than any other tree species. Prices for aspen generally have averaged around $30 per cord, but have been volatile the last decade. Loggers paid a high peak of around $70 per cord in 2005 and a low of only $22 per cord in 2013. The 2015 average price paid was $29.15.
Cass is one of several counties the Legislature authorized in 1998-2000 to sell state leased lakeshore lots. The counties put the proceeds in a trust fund and can spend only interest earned on those funds for natural resource projects. In 2015, Cass used some of those interest earnings to help relocated a recreational trail away from a road by Christmas Point near Walker.
Cass land department sold 79 permits to individuals to cut firewood loggers had left after cutting timber sales. Those sales generated $1,975.
The department maintains forest access roads. As part of that program, they had the Deerfield, Bull Moose, Moose Lake-Bungo and Old Grade forest access roads graded in 2015.
There are 773 miles of designated recreational trails in the county for snowmobiling, cross country skiing, ATV riding, off-highway vehicle driving, horseback riding, mountain biking and hiking.
All paved trails in Cass County are built and maintained by the local taxing districts or the state. Natural surface trails are maintained by the state or local recreation clubs. The county assists clubs with some matching dollars for state grants and helps them bid the work.
Clubs groom and maintain the trails with state grant-in-aid dollars.
The land department completed in 2015 a five year recertification audit with the Rainforest Alliance under Forest Stewardship Council standard as a sustainable forest. County managed forests have been certified since 2001.
Cass had 7 miles of its property lines surveyed in 2015, preparatory to offering timber sales. Once these lines are identified, "Welcome to Cass County Land" signs are posted every 330 feet to encourage people to use the county land for recreational purposes such as hiking and hunting.
In other land department business at Tuesday's board meeting, the commissioners approved accepting a Polaris Foundation $46,500 grant through the U.S. Forest Service to replace 20 culverts under the Soo Line recreational trail between Remer and Cass Lake.
The county had to close that trail for a month, because a culvert washed out in 2015.
Superior Forestry Services Inc. won the contract with a low bid of $74.70 per thousand to plant 70,160 tree seedlings on county land this summer.
Precision Aviation LLC won the contract with a $15,960 bid to provide color infrared aerial photography of southern Cass County. This provides the land department with current views of timber on county land and can help identify age, insect infestations and other information about the county's forests.
The board voted to remove one tract in the city of Remer from this year's land sale until the county highway department decides whether this property might become part of that department's plans to construct a replacement highway garage at Remer.
The lot has access to city sewer and water, which the current county site does not.
The commissioners approved a $42.50 per year easement for Richard and Rosemary Dailey in Poplar Township. The county property involved in the easement is being offered for sale on this year's auction. The easement would end if the tract sells.
The Dailey's well overlaps the lot line.
Cass sold $99,051 worth of timber on six tracts at a March 31 action. Aspen sold for $30.79 per cord. Red oak continued to climb. It sold for $35.97 per cord.
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