Quote:
I was at the meeting and Terry DID NOT say that!
He sure did!
Here is Terry’s responce or sorta of an apology/excuse posted on another site………..
Copy and paste.
From Terry’s Boat Harbor, Terry Thurmer:
After reading the article in the Mille Lacs Messenger, I now know why a lot of professional athletes, politicians, and people refuse to talk to the media.
I will first address the newspaper article and I will then tell you about the input meetings and issues that the input members have suggested to the DNR over the years.
I said we need to keep the fishing prostitutes away from the public access.
What I meant by this is that anytime there is a super hot bite on this lake you can go to these accesses and see the same trucks and boats fishing every single day for weeks at a time. These same people also do this on other lakes and once in a while they get caught and then you read about all of the fish they got caught with in the newspaper. As far as people spending money up here the people that use the public accesses, some do, some do not. This does not make them prostitutes. Those of you that do spend money in and around the lake I can assure all of the businesses up here are thankful for your support.
As far as closing all public accesses on the lake I never said this. The DNR at a previous input meeting had asked for ideas on how to control the amount of fish taken out of the lake. I told them that one way they do it in some of the western states is to limit the number of hours that the public access are open. This would then eliminate some of the fishing pressure, which would help reduce the number of pounds of fish being taken. Yet, it would still provide public access fishing on a daily basis.
If this had been done this year they would have not had to reduce the slot limit. I think the majority of fishermen out there would have preferred to fish fewer hours and be able to fish all summer with the same slot.
Charging a fee to users of the public accesses, this was not even my idea. One of the people who works at one of the newspapers who published the article called me a day before our input meeting and brought this up to me. His idea was to charge for admission to public accesses and that money should go to the state to pay for restocking of the lake.
Input meeting and suggestions made to the DNR:
The entire Mille Lacs Controversy, and ever changing slots began when the Treaty Bands began exercising their Treaty Rights. The DNR no longer was going to manage the lake from a Biological standpoint, but rather by pounds of fish and the lake is still managed this way today.
The idea I brought forth to the DNR at the input meeting to end the controversy was to build a fish hatchery on Mille Lacs and raise Walleyes to the 14 to 16 inch range.
When the treaty harvest was over whatever pounds of fish they took out could be put back into the lake. If they had more fish in the hatchery than what Mille Lacs needed, the extra fish could be put into other lakes around the state.
The hatchery could also raise Perch, Northern Pike, or fish for forage to keep the lake population stable. Over the years, I’ve asked thousands of fisherman if they would be willing to pay extra money for a fishing license, if that money, would go towards a Mille Lacs hatchery. The answer from all of them was, Yes. The answer from the DNR was no. I then asked fellow resorter, former politician, and at that time a consultant for the Mille Lacs Band, Ron Maddox, for help on the hatchery idea.
I told Ron that Montana had a new state of the art hatchery on the Fort Peck Reservoir and that the Federal Government had paid the entire cost for building of the hatchery. All the State had to do was pay the costs of running it. Ron checked this out and found out that this was true.
Ron then went to the Mille Lacs Band and presented the hatchery idea to then Chief, Marge Anderson and Don Weidel the Mille Lacs Bands DNR Commissioner. To the Band’s Credit, they thought this was a good idea and were willing to discuss building the hatchery.
I visited with Ron this summer and asked him why nothing has been done on the hatchery. He told me even though the Mille Lacs Band was open to discuss the idea, that St. Paul wanted nothing to do with it. I brought this same hatchery issue up at the last input meeting, but this never appeared in the newspaper article.
Another idea we brought up to the DNR in the past and again at the last meeting the possibility of purchasing the fish from the Wisconsin Bands. The Wisconsin Bands talk a lot about commercial fishing. Commercial fishing means dollars.
I suggested that they meet with the Wisconsin Bands and offer them the dollars for the fish they were allotted. This way those Bands would not have to come over here to net, which would give the state more fish for the anglers to harvest each year. The DNR promised they would do this and as of the last meeting to my knowledge, they have never even talked to the Wisconsin Bands about this subject.
The state of Minnesota pays Two Million Dollars a year to the Leech Lake Band for no netting and yet, they will not spend ten cents on Mille Lacs to improve the lake. Again you never read this in the newspaper.
The DNR makes a five year plan with Tribal Bands, this is the last year of the current plan. The input committee feels that if you have a five year plan that any pounds that you are under the allotment in a year, should be carried forward to future years where more pounds could be used to offset overages in years such as this year.
The DNR plan does not work this way. This year they reduced the slot to the point that one can hardly even keep a fish. Yet, when this five year plan is over in November, we will be hundreds of thousands of pounds under the total allotted pounds for the last five years.
The input meetings for us involved are very frustrating. The DNR does not care what we say. They have their minds made up to as what the slots and pounds are going to be before we ever get to a meeting. Because of the DNR’s reluctance to use any of the advice suggested to them by the committee, only a fraction of the people who belong to the input committee even showed up for the last two meetings.
The members of the input group and the Business Community want stability for the lake. We are tired of ever changing slots and controversy, a hatchery would accomplish this goal for stability. We need the help of all the hunters, fishermen, and sporting groups to stand up and tell our Legislators this is enough. We want a new direction for Mille Lacs to end the controversy and if they do not want to help us then they should not be re-elected.
Anyone who would like to talk to me about this or any other matter pertaing to lake Mille Lacs please feel free to give me a call.
320-692-4430
and am getting on my cell phone to make sure my fishing partners have nothing to do with his business.
