Passion Pit, as it has been called for more than 60 years, has been a place of recent controversy.
The Lake Superior beach resides within city limits but is owned by the county and the Minnesota Department of Natural Resources (DNR).
Fed up with the shenanigans that sometimes take place on the beach, Dave Homyak, next-door neighbor to the hot spot for hikers, picnic goers, beach strollers and late-night partiers, recently put a chain across the parking area and posted signs saying ATVs weren’t allowed and the park closed at dusk.
Homyak, who had been maintaining the road to the beach and the parking area for the last 23 years, believed he owned the property he was maintaining.
Once he found out otherwise, he removed the chain and signs. He took his concerns to the Cook County board of commissioners on Tuesday, June 23, to ask the county to place some oversight over what takes place on the public beach located near the historic Chippewa City Church.
Purchased 23 years ago, Homyak said the first- seven years he used his residence as a bed and breakfast business. Over the next 13 years, he and his family would come and stay for short-term visits and three years ago, they moved here full-time.
In recent years, the beach area has become more popular, he told commissioners. He blamed the increase in traffic because of Grand Marais being named “Coolest Small Town” by Budget Travel Magazine five years ago. And by the Lake Superior Tribe website that has 17,000 members and advertises the beach, and then cited the success of Staci Lola Drouillard’s book “Walking the Old Road,” which, he said, “is no longer an old road. It’s a driveway.”
Staci’s excellent book is about the Ojibwe settlement that once existed on land surrounding the Chippewa church and beach area where Homyak and several others now own property.
On a warm summer day, Homyak said as many as 100 people visit the beach located just off the old shore road. However, those folks don’t know where the property lines are and spill over onto his property and his neighbor’s property. Fire pits are dug on private property, litter occurs, noise issues arise, and the woods are used as a bathroom for the beachgoers, he explained.
Dave presented his petition to the commissioners, and the short version is as follows:
Post the hours from 6 a.m. to 10 p.m. and have law enforcement enforce those hours. He said 18 neighbors are negatively affected by what goes on after 10 p.m.
Install and maintain porta-potties.
Install and maintain a trash receptacle in the parking area.
Delineate the property line.
The county should take care of the 35-foot wide road in the summer by grading it and plowing it in the winter. Homyak said he had maintained the road over the last 23 years, but if it is genuinely county owned, the county needs to maintain it.
In talking with the DNR, Homyak found that it is legal to ride ATVs on the public beach, but he asked commissioners to limit ATVs because of the erosion they cause.
He finished by saying that he hopes these ideas will stop the area from being “the lawless land that it has been.”
Because Homyak presented his petition to commissioners in the public comment period, commissioners weren’t allowed to comment on it.
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