At the Lutsen Town Meeting on Tuesday, November 18, 2014, Cook County Commissioner Bruce Martinson said the U.S. Forest Service was seeking public comment on what roads the township would like to stay open. He discussed a recent request by the Forest Service to have townships identify and prioritize forest service roads that are most important to them.
“This request isn’t coming from our local forest service, it’s coming from Milwaukee,” said Martinson.
With cutbacks in road maintenance funding, the forest service is saying it doesn’t have enough money to keep up all of its roads, said Martinson. He noted that both Tofte and Schroeder townships requested that all of the Cook County Forest Service roads be maintained in their letters to the Forest Service.
Tim Goettl brought out a document with Forest Service road descriptions and road numbers on them and said, “I don’t even know where half these roads are,” based on their legal description.
“I don’t think we should pick and choose. I think we should keep them all open,” said Tim Goettl. Beavers and Storlie agreed with him and they passed a motion to send a letter to the F.S. to maintain and keep all of the local roads open. The letter must be sent before the December 12 deadline. Waters of the U.S. Act discussion
Commissioner Bruce Martinson asked the Lutsen Town Board if they would like to have the county board’s recent motion opposing the Environmental Protection Agency’s Waters of the U.S. Act (WOTUS) proposal rescinded. “I have gotten two phone calls asking me to have the motion rescinded and Frank Moe (newly elected commissioner for the east end of the county) talked to me about rescinding the motion before the new board comes in,” Martinson said.
Beavers and Goettl said they had no comment about the motion but Storlie said it looked like the resolution, “was copied off the internet,” and thought it should be rescinded. Martinson said he voted for it because the county’s highway engineer and two staff members argued that the ruling would create big obstacles for the county highway staff in doing their work and cost the county a lot of money.
The board took no action on Martinson’s question about WOTUS.
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