PORTAGE TOWNSHIP – A project to purchase conservation easements that began in 2009 is mostly complete thanks to a $550,000 grant from the Michigan Department of Natural Resources.

The Pilgrim River Watershed Project is a partnership of Copper Country Trout Unlimited, the Keweenaw Land Trust, Partners in Forestry, Copper Country Audubon, Northwoods Alliance, Keweenaw Trails Alliance and the Houghton Keweenaw Conservation District. The purpose of the project was to create an area where non-motorized recreational activities could take place. Activities allowed on the 1,367 acres are hiking, biking, snowshoeing and skiing on established trails, fishing, hunting and trapping.

Bill Leder, CCTU board member and fundraiser for the PRWP, said the $550,000 grant came from the DNR, which acted as a pass-through agency for the United States Forestry Service’s Forest Legacy Program funded by the Land and Water Conservation Fund.

“It’s going to be used to acquire conservation easements, which have been part of the plan since we started the project in 2009,” he said. “It should allow us to complete the project as we envisioned it.”

The land which forms the PRWP belongs to the Wisconsin-based Hovel family, who will continue to take timber off of it.

Leder said there are public access locations to the property on Paradise Road, Boundary Road and Baltic Road, but there are some requirements for use.

“All of the DNR regulations still apply,” he said.

There was some criticism of the project early on, Leder said, because some people thought once the project was complete it would no longer be taxed, but that’s incorrect.

“The land remains as a working forest, so it remains on the tax rolls,” he said.

The taxing entities are Houghton County and Portage Township, Leder said.

Leder said he’s glad the efforts to complete the PRWP are near completion.

“It’s really gratifying,” he said. “It’s a day we’ve been waiting for for a long time.”

Evan McDonald, Keweenaw Land Trust executive director, said he’s pleased the funding to complete the project has been granted.

“It’s pretty exciting,” he said. “It’s a big relief.”

There were some concerns last year when it was uncertain if Congress would fund the Land and Water Conservation Fund, McDonald said, but it eventually did.

“It basically saved our project,” he said.

McDonald said it’s uncertain if the project would have been completed if the federal Land and Water Conservation Fund hadn’t been available and only local funding would have had to be used.

“Fundraising is a challenge,” he said. “(The Forest Legacy) program makes sense for what we’re doing with this project.”

Projects seeking the Forest Legacy funding must be nominated, McDonald said, and the most recent time the PRWP was nominated, it was ranked 19th out of about 40 in the country.

“That was our strongest national ranking,” he said. “The program’s pretty competitive.”

McDonald said there are still some administrative steps to be taken, including having the property appraised. Once the appraisal is done, the Hovels and the DNR will work to come to a price for the easements fair to both parties.

“It’s all based on fair market value,” he said.

McDonald said he thinks the remaining work can be completed by the end of the year.

“It’s going to be a busy year,” he said.