Please
mark the February Banquet date on your calendar
Coulee Region Chapter of Trout Unlimited Annual Fundraising Banquet
Friday, February 26
6:00pm
Cedar Creek Country Club
2600 Cedar Creek Lane
Onalaska, Wisconsin
Ticket information will be sent out in mid-January. Or check our
website for updates. If
you have some items you would like to donate for the banquet,
please contact Rick or Eric
Rauch.
Rick Kyte
(608) 782-5652
rlkyte@viterbo.edu
Important
Chapter News
Dear Coulee Region TU Members: Our
next meeting is Wednesday, March 18 at Forest Hills at 6p.m.
The meeting this month will consist of a strategic planning session
for our chapter. As
you know, our chapter has grown considerably over the past couple
of years, attracting quite a few new members and also receiving
numerous large grants for conservation projects. However, our
chapter governance structure hasn’t changed over the years,
and as a result it is often difficult for new members or occasional
attendees
at our events to know how they might help out with various projects
and activities or have a voice in what our chapter devotes its
energies to.
So
our March meeting will focus on generating ideas and laying
out a general framework for our chapter’s future
direction and organization. Some of the key questions we will discuss include:
- What
should our key areas of focus be: stream restoration, education,
recruitment of new anglers, conservation initiatives?
- Who should make the key decisions: an elected board, chapter officers,
whoever happens to show up at a monthly meeting?
- What kinds of meetings should we have: monthly for chapter members,
occasional events for a broad audience, joint programs
with other area conservation groups?
This
will be an important meeting for determining our chapter’s
immediate and long-term future. So, even if you can
only attend one meeting this year, please make it
this one.
We value your
voice and insight.
Coulee Chapter Announces Major Project
The Coulee
Region Chapter of Trout Unlimited will coordinate a major stream
restoration project in Vernon County involving
federal, state, county agencies beginning
in the spring of 2008. The $240,000 project will be completed
over a four year period and restore 6,000 feet of stream banks
on Coon Creek and Spring Coulee Creek, located just northeast of Coon Valley
near County Highway P.
Coulee Region
TU, a local conservation group with 190 members, recently received
a $180,000 Wildlife Habitat Incentive Program (WHIP) grant from the Natural
Resources Conservation Service of the United States Department
of Agriculture. WHIP is a program that provides technical assistance
and up to seventy-five percent cost sharing to develop and improve
wildlife habitat. The remaining $60,000 for the project will
be contributed from other sources, including local fundraising
efforts.
According to
Sam Skemp, District Conservation Officer for the NRCS Viroqua
Service Center, the project proposal ranked
very high with the NRCS because of the number
of at-risk species that the project will be able to benefit. Skemp
added, “This is the largest WHIP funded project
ever in the state of Wisconsin.”
Eric Rauch, Coulee Region TU Vice President & Conservation Chair, noted
that “the overall goal with this project is to increase the water quality
and species habitat in
the Coon Creek/Spring Coulee
Chapter
Report:
Elections were
held at the November meeting. Eric Rauch was elected
to serve as Vice President; Rick Kyte and Bob
Hubbard were elected to serve another term as President and
Treasurer, respectively.
During
the November meeting we discussed the possibility of
teaming up with the Gateway
Area Council of the Boys Scouts of America to support
a Venture Program dedicated to fishing and conservation.
Venturing
is an activity open to young men and women between
the ages of 14 and 20. As the plans develop, we will
be looking for volunteers to help with this program.
In
November our chapter received a $500 gift from Spring
Creek
Partners to be used on the Hornby Creek restoration
project. Spring
Creek Partners is a program that raises funds for
stream restoration projects in the Driftless Area. If
you
are interested in donating to the program, contact
Eric Rauch,
our chapter’s conservation project coordinator,
or visit the Spring Creek Partner’s web-site
at www.springcreekpartner.org
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