Meeting convened at 8:45 a.m. 

Meeting Facilitator: John DuPlissis
Partners Present: Jason Folstad, Tom Jerow, Sally Freckman, Terry Charles, George Bartels, Arvid Haugen, Dan Trainer, Dean Kaatz, George Rogers, Rebecca Power, John DuPlissis, Jack Zimmerman, Kerrie Wheeler, Kim Grveles and Ron Dickerl.

I. Welcome/Agenda Review – The group met at the Wausau School Forest on County Road KK. 

II. Working Group Reports
The Yellow River working group has not been active for the past month as it awaits a resolution of taxation and property rights issues that have risen. The public in and around the U.S. Fish and Wildlife service's focus area along the Yellow River has become quite apprehensive about Necedah National Wildlife Refuge's plan of work. The members of the local community have formed a Yellow River Property Owners Association focused on taxation issues and private property owner's rights. The U.S. Fish and Wildlife service is planning meetings to work with this group to resolve this issue, clarify their plan and remove any misconceptions, and help create a working relationship to conserve the natural resources in the Yellow River ecosystem.

The Plover River working group is working to receive approval of their Stewardship grant application to purchase conservation easements along the Plover River corridor to help protect the land from development. The overall objective of the project is to maintain the integrity of the Plover River at its current state. The working group is opposed to having the Highway 10-bypass cross the Plover River. They mentioned that several state organizations have already sent letters of concern about the Highway 10-bypass crossing the Plover River. George Rogers mentioned that he would like the Partnership to also show some local support opposing the Highway 10- bypass by sending a letter of concern to the DOT.

III. Creation of a Two Co-chair advisory committee.
The idea of creating an advisory committee that would help out the partnership by filling a leadership role has been talked about in the past but action was never taken. With the Highway 10-bypass letter the partnership wants to write, the issue of who would sign the letter came up. After a detailed discussion and some compromise a Two-Co Chair panel was created. The main duties of the Two Co-chairs would be to give their approval on the agendas, act as signatories on letters for the behalf of the partnership and lead the partnership meetings. One of the Co-chairs is going to be a DNR team leader and the other co-chair position will be filled voluntarily. A coin was tossed between Tom Jerow and Arvid Haugen determining who would be the Co-chair and Tom Jerow was chosen. A consensus was made that the DNR leaders would only be one of the Co-chairs for one year, then the other leader would take on the Co-chair position. Only one person volunteered for the other Co-chair, George Bartels, and the attending members of the partnership had no rejections to Mr. Bartels becoming the other Co-chair. The partnership agreed that George Bartels and Tom Jerow would work together to bring back to the partnership a model for an executive committee for action at our next meeting. Tom & George will look at other partnerships for models of executive committees and bylaws.
It was decided that the partnership would send out the letter of concern for the Highway 10-bypass crossing the Plover River will on Partnership letterhead created by John DuPlissis and Jason Folstad. Just for the record the DNR was not involved in the decision-making process and acknowledges no support for the letter being sent for the Highway 10-bypass crossing the Plover River. 

IV. Proposed New Projects.
Help to improve the overall water quality on Mill Creek
· Currently data is being collected on Mill Creek to determine the TMDL (Total Maximum Daily Load) the creek is able to tolerate 
· Current studies are determining who is adding the majority of the nutrients and organic materials to the creek 
· The three main sources for the organic materials and nutrients being placed in Mill Creek are: Urban Runoff, Farmers within the watershed and Point sources located along Mill Creek corridor. 
· Actively involved parties to this date are Golden Sands RC&D, DNR, Mill Creek Coalition and the Land Conservation Department. 
· The role the Partnership could play is through education and getting increased public participation and awareness.
Reduce the break up of large parcels of land in Adams County.
· Large tracts of land in Adams County that are currently owned by Georgia Pacific are being broken up and sold. 
· Most of the land for sale is marginal timberland i.e. wetlands, along flowages, and stream and lake corridors). 
· The county is unable to obtain grants for purchase of this land. 
· With very little recreational land in Adams County, loosing Georgia Pacific’s land, which was open to public recreational activities, would pose quite a dilemma. 
· The partnership could work with the Paper Mills and WPS to determine what land usage would best suit them. We could also try to get easements on the property before it is sold. The Conservation Fund, which is able to work quickly on getting funds in place to obtain valuable land that is ready to be developed or broken apart into smaller parcels, could also be contacted.
Preventing and reducing the spread of exotics in Wisconsin.
· Golden Sands RC&D conducted a survey on what types of exotics people have energy to work with. 
· Actively involved parties to this date are Golden Sands RC&D, DNR, Wild Ones and the State Botanical Society. 
· This type of program could be done on a countywide or basin wide status. 
· The partnerships role in this project would be quite large, some of the actives that would be involved are:
· Creating demo plots showing the methods used to remove exotics, costs associated with the removal and the long term effects of the removal. 
· Start educational training sessions on when to mow, treat and plant other species to help reduce the different types of exotic in your area. 
· Determine if removal of exotics in an area effect the overall diversity of the landscape. 
· Find out if there are any funds that would be able to be tapped into for reducing exotics in our basin.
Maintaining the water quality and quantity of the Little Plover River.
· The Village of Plover has several conflicts pertaining to the water usage of the Little Plover Watershed. 
· Some of the stakeholders in the Little Plover Watershed are Village of Plover, several industries, the state, agriculture, and surrounding landowners. 
· Actively involved parities to this date are the Village of Plover, DNR, Plover River Alliance, River Alliance and UWSP. 
· Possible partnership activities would be developing a working group to stay on top of the different ongoing projects on the Little Plover River to make sure they are reaching their goals. Also to work with all the parties involved creating a better understanding of what each group requires and needs from the Little Plover River Watershed. Then try to develop a plan that would allow each group an equal but limited use of the watershed. 

I. Our Guest Speaker was Sally Ellingboe
Sally Ellingboe is the Public School Environmental Education Coordinator for the Stevens Point School District. Her topic of discussion was making school forests a better tool for educating our youth in the school districts. Sally mentioned some of the concerns and problems that school forests face today. For example, with land gaining value and schools receiving smaller budgets, the sale of school forestland for additional school funding is becoming a reality. She talked about how making a school forest successful takes a developed curriculum and standards that show how a forest will benefit not only the children but also the community. The Wisconsin School Forest Educational Alliance has sent out a program booklet on "How to Grow a School Forest" to every school district in Wisconsin to help them better utilize their school forest. Sally stated that our largest fear is with school budgets starting to decline, school forests may be one of the first things to vanish. 
II. Van Der Geest Dairy
We took a tour of Wisconsin’s largest dairy farm located just a few miles north of Wausau on County Road A. We were able to see how they were able to milk a little over 3,000 head, three times a day. They showed us how the milk is never exposed to the air, is able to be cooled from 102 to 34 degrees, and is on the semi tanker within three and a half minutes. We learned they produce 187,000 pounds of milk (three and half semi loads) a day which is used to make cheese and butter. We viewed their manure storage facility a 12 acres pond in size capable of holding over 46 million gallons. We also learned about their storm water runoff retention pond capable of holding over 4 million gallons of water in one rain event. The Van Der Geest Dairy is a family run operation with every family member playing a role in running the dairy farm. Guided tours are available Monday – Saturday from 8 a.m. to 6 p.m. year around.