The recommendations are in addition to the 17 land acquisition projectsrecommended by the Board last October. The Board intended to make its 2002 development project recommendations at this meeting. However, after the October meeting the DNR completed its accounting of the year's revenues and found that investing the Fund in higher-interest opportunities provided by the statewide passage of Proposal 2 in August had produced more revenue than had been anticipated.

Included in the Board's recommendations were two DNR development projectstotaling $579,375 and one land acquisition project for $850,000 in Fundassistance; 21 local government development projects totaling more than $5million, and three land acquisition projects totaling nearly $2.4 million inFund assistance.

Key among the Board's recommendations was $1.7 million to acquire about 23 miles of abandoned railroad corridor for development of a paved trail. Local grants ranging from $15,000 to $1.7 million to city, township and county governments across the state to create and expand local parks, natural areas and trails.

In reviewing the recommendations, the MDNR director made note of thecritical role of revenues from state-owned oil and gas resources in bothstate and local natural resources and recreation efforts.