The Plan will be authorized and implemented through legislation that will be introduced in the near future. This would return management of Minnesota's wolf population to the state.
Legislative approval is required to implement the plan in Minnesota.
The public planning process began in January 1998 with a series of 12 public information meetings attended by over 3,000 people around the state. The Roundtable took on the most difficult issues regarding wolf management, and through a consensus building process was able to reach agreement on a series of recommendations to the DNR and the Legislature in developing the Wolf Management Plan. DNR staff took the recommendations from the Roundtable and developed the Plan based on those recommendations. After reviewing the work done by DNR staff, and especially the Wolf Roundtable in the past year, I am assured that the major concerns of wolf management have been addressed and that a process has been established to make sure concerns continue to be addressed in the future. In addition, the wolf population numbers are based on sound science that has been scrutinized and approved by outside reviewers.