Photo by Deb Gau This photo shows the main entrance area to the Upper Sioux Agency State Park, near the Upper Sioux Community and the city of Granite Falls. The park is at the center of a land transfer request from the Upper Sioux Community, which will be discussed at a public information meeting Wednesday.

GRANITE FALLS — An informational meeting on the proposed transfer of Upper Sioux Agency State Park lands to the Upper Sioux Community will be held in Granite Falls on Wednesday.

State Sen. Gary Dahms, R-Redwood Falls, and Rep. Chris Swedzinski, R-Ghent, will host a panel discussion including representatives of the Minnesota Department of Natural Resources, the Upper Sioux Community, and Granite Falls city and Yellow Medicine County government.

“The purpose of this community meeting is to give the public an opportunity to ask questions about this possible land transfer,” Dahms said.

The meeting will be held at 7 p.m. at Minnesota West Community and Technical College cafeteria in Granite Falls. People attending the meeting should enter through the door to the AG Bush Student Center on 11th Avenue.

This spring, two bills to authorize the transfer of the state park lands to the Upper Sioux Community were heard by committees at the Minnesota Legislature. The bills would require the DNR to report on any potential legal barriers to transferring the park lands by Dec. 15, and recommend legislation to eliminate those barriers. According to the bills, land without any barriers would be transferred to the Upper Sioux Community by Dec. 1.

In a Monday statement, the Upper Sioux Community Board of Trustees said transferring the state park land to the Upper Sioux Community would acknowledge “a historic wrong inflicted upon the Dakota people.”

“After 160 years the land can be treated with the respect it deserves, as a prominent place in history prior to European contact and all the events leading to the present day,” the statement said. “The land carries painful memories from our earliest contact with the United States and the state of Minnesota.”

Granite Falls Mayor Dave Smiglewski said Monday he was “disappointed” by how the proposed land transfer has been handled. Smiglewski is also the chairperson of the Friends of the Upper Sioux Agency State Park.

“There has been hardly any transparency about what action is being taken in regard to this, and consequently the public is being left to wonder what will come about if or when the park is given to the Upper Sioux Community,” Smiglewski said. “A few statements about intent and about what will happen would have avoided much conjecture and many rumors.”

Smiglewski said he had heard many comments about the proposal from members of the public.

“A few have been positive, but many more have been negative and some very angry,” he said. “That too is disappointing and could have been avoided with more transparency in the process, and an outreach to the community and the stakeholders who come to the park for its beauty, historical significance and setting.”

The Upper Sioux Community Board of Trustees did respond to the outreach concerns with a statement.

“The narrative being put forth by the local units of government is without merit,” the statement said. “As a sovereign nation with federal recognition by the United States of America, we have been in contact with the state of Minnesota and their duly elected officials regarding the ongoing request of returning our historic treaty lands. As a federally recognized tribe, we are not subservient to the state of Minnesota and as such it is not incumbent upon us to engage local units of governments in this matter. As it is a state asset, we have engaged the state of Minnesota directly in accordance to our government to government protocols.”

The statement said the requested state park acreage “pales in comparison” to the land ceded by the Dakota in treaties with the U.S. in 1851.

“As a Tribal Nation, we have made it known to our state counterparts over the last 18 years of our intent to request the land back,” the statement said.

The board said factors like a sinkhole making Highway 67 impassable in the park, and deterioration of the main park building, led them to make the formal land transfer request this legislative session.

“It is our hope that the town hall meeting helps to clarify things and create some understanding of what is to come,” Smiglewski said. “I have said from the start that I hope there will be a way to form a collaboration between the Upper Sioux Community, the Minnesota DNR and the Minnesota Historical Society to jointly operate the park and teach about the complex and difficult history that happened there to help the community heal. The cultural heritage and the natural environment at the park are priceless and irreplaceable.”

Dahms and Swedzinski will moderate Wednesday’s meeting, and a panel of speakers will be available to answer questions, a news release said. Confirmed panel members include Upper Sioux Community Tribal Chairman Kevin Jensvold; Dave Smiglewski; Scott Roemhildt, Region 4 director of the Minnesota DNR; Ben Leonard, senior director for historic sites and facilities operations at the Minnesota Historical Society; and Yellow Medicine County Commissioner John Berends.