The commissioner of natural resources has announced appointees to two newly created citizen oversight committees that monitor fish and wildlife spending by the Minnesota Department of Natural Resources (DNR). The new committees, the Wildlife Oversight Committee (WOC) and the Fisheries Oversight Committee (FOC), are the result of recent legislation aimed at streamlining and improving the efficiency of longstanding citizen Game and Fish Fund oversight committees created in 1994.
The 25 citizen appointees are responsible for reviewing the agency’s annual Game and Fish Fund report. After discussions with agency leaders and others, the citizen committees write a report on their findings of this review. The FOC and the WOC begin work soon after the mid-December publication of the DNR’s Game and Fish Report for fiscal year 2011.
The DNR’s Game and Fish Fund is the fiscal foundation for much of the state’s natural resource management. The $90 million fund gets its revenue from the sales of hunting and fishing licenses and fish and wildlife stamps; a sales tax on lottery tickets; a reimbursement based on a federal excise tax on hunting, fishing and boating equipment; and other sources. The fund pays for the fish, wildlife, enforcement and ecological management that support 54,000 jobs in Minnesota’s outdoor recreation and hospitality business.
None of the citizens appointed to the commission are from northern Minnesota. The nearest North Shore representative is Craig Pagel of Duluth, who was appointed to the Fisheries Oversight Committee. There are no North Shore representatives on the Wildlife Oversight Committee.
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