April 30, 2025

In 2024, the Minnesota Legislature adopted language to provide clarity and reinforce DNR’s longstanding interpretation that a specific waterway could be a public water even if it was not listed on the Public Waters Inventory. The language reinforces the DNR’s and Court’s interpretation and affirms that it is the statutory definition that defines the scope of the State’s jurisdiction over public waters. 

The Senate Environment Policy bill (SF 2781) contains a provision (Ar1. Sec. 15) that would make which waterways are protected under state law less clear by repealing the clarification adopted last year. This repeal would most certainly result unnecessary ambiguity and lawsuits.

The bill is being heard May 1, 2025 at 8:30 AM and we need you to contact members of

the committee to tell them to remove this

CONTACT MEMBERS OF THE SENATE ENVIRONMENT, CLIMATE, AND LEGACY COMMITTEE TODAY AND TELL THEM:

• Senator_______. I am a trout angler from [insert town], Minnesota and I am concerned that public waters, including many trout streams, in Minnesota will not receive the protections they should if there is a rollback of the 2024 clarification of public waters.
• I OPPOSE the rollback of the 2024 clarification of public waters in SF 2781 (Art.1, Sec. 15) because it introduces unnecessary ambiguity into the public waters statute, which the Legislature fixed just last year.
• When Minnesota became a state, its waters were transferred to the state government to be held in trust for its citizens. And in Minnesota, where water is central to our identity, the legislature has taken an expansive view of what counts as a public water. That view is expressed in the statutory definition that was reaffirmed last year.
• Thank you for ensuring protection of our trout streams today and for future generations by OPPOSING the rollback of the 2024 clarification of public waters.

FIND THE LIST OF SENATORS IN THE COMMITTEE AND THEIR CONTACT INFORMATION HERE

READ MORE ABOUT PUBLIC WATERS AND WHY THEY ARE IMPORTANT