CROSBY — The Cuyuna Country State Recreation Area will be fully open at the end of the spring thaw, despite an ongoing land dispute that has many concerned about access.
The Department of Natural Resources said Wednesday, April 15, that it intends to open all roads and trails within about a week, depending on weather.
Business owners who depend on Overburden Road, a key route on the west end of the rec area, have been worried about access since the DNR posted a closure notice for the road and parts of the Galloping Goose mountain bike trail in early March.
But a few weeks later, the agency said it had posted the notice in error. The notice stated a private party was asserting its right to close the area.
Tim Prinsen, part of the private party in question, told the rec area’s Citizens Advisory Council on Wednesday that he would not immediately put up “No Trespassing” signs, as he had threatened in a February letter to the DNR.
The letter was part of a yearslong back-and-forth between Prinsen and the DNR, as Prinsen sought an easement to access landlocked parcels he and his wife, Dawn, want to build rental cabins on.
The DNR denied the easement request in December. Now, Prinsen is seeking a legislative fix, with a bill that would require the DNR to grant the easement.
“As this plays out through the legislation and through our continued conversations with the commissioner [of the DNR], we will not be posting it [no trespassing signs],” Prinsen said.
CAC consternation
For over an hour Wednesday night at Crosby City Hall, members of the citizens advisory council, Prinsen and community members went back and forth about the project.
The council, known as the CAC, took issue with how Prinsen has characterized their position on his project.
The Minneapolis-based Prinsens, through their company June Lake LLC, have been working since 2024 on plans for a series of small rental cabins on acreage they currently lease on the southern shores of June Lake.
Chair Paul Kirkman said that Prinsen overstated the CAC’s support in the media and during testimony in support of the easement bill the day before. Rep. Josh Heintzeman, R-Nisswa, who authored the House version of the bill, also testified that the CAC supported the project.
In October 2024, the CAC passed a resolution encouraging the DNR "to engage with the Prinsens on the establishment of a permanent easement ... that fulfills the project goals to establish overnight cabin options to ... visitors while continuing and expanding the silent sports legacy” of the rec area.
“At the time, concerns involved unknown environmental factors, concerns about commercial ventures within the rec area and a lack of detail regarding the number of housing units involved in the project,” Kirkman said.
“ ... The only thing the CAC supported was opening up discussions with the DNR. To state otherwise was overreach at a minimum and outright deception at the worst.”
Prinsen told the Council he has been careful with his wording not to overstate the support.
In his easement application to the DNR, Prinsen stated “the proposed project has garnered overwhelming local support,” and listed the CAC among the supporters, including the exact resolution language.
“No less than five times yesterday, you said, ‘This community supports this. This is explicitly supported by the CAC,’” said committee member Johnna Johnson. “You didn’t say, ‘the project.’ You didn’t say, ‘the discussions.’ You said, ‘this.’ And the only reason you were at a hearing yesterday was for that easement.”
“I understand that that may have come across that way, but that was not my intent,” Prinsen responded.
Addressing community concerns
Around 20 people attended the Council meeting, which typically has little, if any, public attendance.
Prinsen answered questions from community members about his plans for the project.
“It seems your approach was, ‘I’m going to shut down the road,’ which put everybody in a panic. That was not respectful, not the way to go about trying to get approval on something like this in the first place,” Karen Fetzer said. “But secondly, it raised everybody’s red flags, like ‘What is this guy really after?’”
Tim Prinsen has been coming to the area for decades, first to his parents’ cabin on Lake Ossawinnamakee in Breezy Point, then to his own cabin on Gull Lake. He told the House committee he and his wife love to bike at Cuyuna.
Materials from Prinsen show a series of cabins in groups of three, with 21 in total across some 50 or so acres, though the final amount will be determined by soil conditions, he said. The cabins would be small, about 800 square feet, and the project would honor Cuyuna’s silent sports culture, according to Prinsen.
“The homes that you are surrounded by [outside City Hall] are 800 — some are less, some are 600 square feet,” Patrick Ryan, owner of Red Raven in Crosby, said. “So, I call those homes, and I call that a housing development, and I feel that would directly impact the rec area negatively.”
Doug Arndt, a property manager in Crosby, said based on his decades in real estate development, Prinsen is a long way from beginning development.
“We cannot see how on earth you could have a viable project with what you proposed, unless you won the lottery and didn’t tell anybody,” he said.
In an interview after the meeting, Prinsen said the viability will be determined by soil conditions and a multitude of other factors on the site.
“The question is, do you spend money to do all of that before you have access?” he said. "And the decision that we have made is, don’t do that until you have access.”
'What will our future be?’
During their back-and-forth with the DNR, the Prinsens said in exchange for their easement, they would give the DNR their interest in the parcel of land Overburden Road and Galloping Goose cross, thereby giving the agency full ownership.
Prinsen has also said that the June Lake development would be a public-private partnership, allowing the DNR input on the size and number of cabins.
As written, the easement bill includes neither of those elements. Prinsen told the CAC he was supportive of amending the bill, so the DNR would get full ownership of the contested parcel.
“As long as that road is not 100% owned, and that section of Galloping Goose is not 100% owned by the DNR, which is what we have proposed, that is always going to be a concern, that somebody will close down that road,” Prinsen said. “Somebody will do that, and our proposal stops that discussion.
“ ... There’s one person that controls this situation. The commissioner, the DNR commissioner, can grant an easement tomorrow.”
As the community has debated the closure and project over the past weeks, protecting property rights has been a common refrain. Republican legislators repeatedly hit the point during the easement bill hearing.
At the CAC meeting, rec area Manager Barry Osborne of the DNR Parks and Trails division recounted the history of Cuyuna Country. After the mining companies abandoned the area in the 1980s, the land began to heal itself. The land was a free-for-all, with camping, rope swings, all-terrain vehicles — but also pollution and safety concerns.
“A community cry started and got louder,” he said, “to protect the pristine areas that nature was producing. To stop the destruction, erosion and land abuse. The cry got louder to bring economic relief to a downturned community.”
While a board worked on a plan for the land, it banned construction, ATVs and firearms.
“All could be perceived as stepping on individuals’ rights,” Osborne said. “But they needed time to stop the destruction that was going on. These ordinances were created for the greater good of the community.”
The state recreation area was created, with not quite the funding of a state park, but more local input in its management. The CAC, Osborne said, put in countless hours to plan, support and preserve the unique area, focused on non-motorized recreation and largely maintained by local volunteers.
“What will our future be, is my question,” he said. “But it should involve the benefit of the community and honor and respect the past history and all the work that people have put in.”
News Director Chelsey Perkins contributed to this report.
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