A long-simmering dispute over state lands locked inside the federal Boundary Water Canoe Area Wilderness would be partially settled under a land exchange that's up for public comment.
The U.S. Forest Service on Thursday released a draft plan, two years in the making, to acquire 31,000 acres of state land inside the BWCAW in exchange for an equal value of federal land outside the BWCAW but still within the Superior National Forest.
The Forest Service said it has identified a pool of 39,000 acres of federal Superior National Forest land to be considered for trading to with the state.
Some of the parcels originally considered have been removed based on public comments since the plan was first made public in 2015, a Forest Service spokeswoman said Thursday.
On Thursday the Forest Service released its draft environmental impact statement on the proposed exchange. The agency still hasn't formally agreed to do the exchange and would have to specifically identify the acres involved if it does.
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The exchange was approved as official state policy by the 2012 Minnesota Legislature. The final deal must still be approved by the Minnesota Land Exchange Board, Aaron Vande Linde, the state's school trust land director, told the News Tribune.
The exchange is one part of a long-term proposal to transfer all 83,000 acres of Minnesota school trust land inside the 1.1 million acre BWCAW to the Forest Service through a combination of land exchange and cash.
The school trust land is, by state constitutional dictate, supposed to be producing revenue for public education, namely from logging and mining revenues paid to the state. But the state land in the BWCAW hasn't been producing any revenue because the BWCAW is off limits to mining and logging.
Mining and logging interests and Iron Range politicians want to see a total land exchange to transfer more federal land in the national forest to the state. That would make for easier access for mining and logging companies.
But so far environmental groups and the Forest Service have opposed a 1-for-1 exchange, instead proposing the federal government buy the rest of the state land in the BWCAW - if and when federal land conservation money becomes available from Congress. So far that money hasn't been made available.
"Every year we continue to pursue the LWCF money. We know that it's a priority within the Forest Service, but it hasn't happened as yet," Kris Reichenbach, Superior National Forest spokeswoman.
The Forest Service will accept public comments on the proposal through Oct. 10. A copy of the Draft EIS is posted at fs.usda.gov/goto/Superior/SchoolTrustLandExchange.
The Forest Service has scheduled three open houses on the proposed land exchange, including Aug. 28 at Duluth's Denfeld High School auditorium from 4-7 p.m.; Sep. 5 at the Mt. Iron Community Club from 4-7 p.m.; and Sept. 7 at the DNR headquarters in St. Paul from 5-8 p.m.
