St. Paul - When there's $70 million in funds to spend on conservation and habitat, time spent discussing the definitions of three words - protect, restore, and enhance - might seem a waste.

Not so, according to those who say properly defining them is a necessary part of ensuring funds created by the constitutional amendment voters approved last fall go where they're intended.

The terms were set to be discussed at a Tuesday meeting of the House committee - the Cultural and Outdoor Resources Finance Division - that oversees the dedicated funds.

Some sportsmen are concerned about definitions of the words that were part of legislation passed last year - specifically, how they compare to definitions the Lessard-Sams Outdoor Heritage Council approved last January, early in the process of developing its first set of funding recommendations.

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"The No. 1 issue is always diversion of the money," said Garry Leaf, executive director of Sportsmen for Change. "What these definitions do is begin to expand what had been a decade's worth of work to areas that were unintended."

The definitions the L-SOHC used in arriving at its funding recommendations, and that it will use in making its next set of recommendations, are these:

� Restore: action to bring a habitat back to a former state of sustaining fish, game or wildlife, with an ultimate goal of restoring habitat to a desired conservation condition.

� Protect: action to maintain the ability of habitat and related natural systems to sustain fish, game or wildlife through acquisition of fee title or conservation easements.

� Enhance: action to increase the ability of habitat and related natural systems to sustain and improve fish, game or wildlife in an ecologically sound manner.

The definitions approved by lawmakers and that now are in state law read like this:

� Restore: "Restore" means renewing degraded, damaged, or destroyed ecosystems through active human intervention to achieve high-quality ecosystems.

� Protect: "Protect" means protect or preserve ecological systems to maintain active and healthy ecosystems and prevent future degradation including, but not limited to, purchase in fee or easement.

� Enhance: "Enhance" means to improve in value, quality, and desirability in order to increase the ecological value of the land or water.

According to the state constitution, the money in the Outdoor Heritage Fund "may be spent only to restore, protect, and enhance wetlands, prairies, forests, and habitat for fish, game, and wildlife."

Tom Landwehr, The Nature Conservancy assistant state director, planned to testify at the meeting and tell committee members the definitions will guide the type of work that gets done. As a result, they must be workable, he said, and not "conceptual definitions."

"My suggestion is going to be that the only way to get a usable definition is to bring in your experts and bring in your practitioners and let them help in developing these definitions," Landwehr said.

He believes the L-SOHC should be the forum for such a discussion, and that the council then can recommend definitions for consideration by lawmakers.

Effect on the DNR

DNR officials have been working with the council and legislators to fine-tune the definitions and decide what should be included in each, said Dennis Simon, DNR_Wildlife Section chief.

The agency is doing its best to comply with the definitions from the last session, but "we're very interested in getting better direction on those definitions and how we can comply with them," he said.

"It's pretty important," Simon said. "When the council and the Legislature are reviewing and approving projects that meet the definition of enhance, protect, and restore, they are going to try to pigeonhole proposals - is it protection? Enhancement? Restoration? We need to make sure the projects we are proposing meet those definitions." Joe Albert