Gov. Tim Walz on Wednesday signed a closely watched bill at the State Capitol in St. Paul that clears the way for the University of Minnesota to return roughly 3,400 acres of forest to the Fond du Lac Band of Lake Superior Chippewa. Tribal leaders stood beside Walz as he signed the measure, a symbolic milestone in a multi-year push to reclaim land the Band says was taken under 19th-century allotment policies.
What the law does
The new law orders the commissioner of administration to hand over state-owned parcels within the Cloquet Forestry Center footprint to the University of Minnesota, so the university can then transfer the entire 3,400-acre tract to the Fond du Lac Band. It also sets aside $1.3 million to prepay and defease outstanding state general-obligation bonds tied to improvements at the forestry center, a financial cleanup step meant to smooth the transfer, according to revisor.mn.gov.
The land in question
The Cloquet Forestry Center is the University of Minnesota’s primary research and education forest, sitting entirely within the boundaries of the Fond du Lac Reservation and managed by the university since the early 1900s. University materials outline the site’s complex history and note that returning care and control of the land to the Band has been the focus of multi-year discussions, according to the University of Minnesota.
How the transfer would work
In March 2025, university and Band leaders signed an agreement in principle that sketches out how the handoff would work while preserving ongoing research and teaching on the property. Under that framework, the University would "continue to operate and maintain the Cloquet Forestry Center grounds for research, education and outreach" under cooperative terms with the Band, the joint statement says, according to house.mn.gov.
At the signing
Walz put pen to paper on Wednesday and was photographed shaking hands with Fond du Lac tribal chair Bruce Savage in a Capitol ceremony in St. Paul. MPR News covered the event and published images from the signing.
Next steps
On paper, the job now shifts to the state bureaucracy. The law tells the commissioner of administration to transfer any remaining state parcels to the Board of Regents so the university can finish the closing process and clear title to the land for the Band. The bill filed at the Legislature lays out the legal descriptions and the conveyance steps in fine-grained detail, including the attorney general review required before any transfers move forward, per revisor.mn.gov.
Legal and political context
Backers of the transfer describe it as a corrective response to land taken under federal allotment laws and a concrete attempt to follow through on recommendations from university and tribal reviews. The move comes after years of reporting and debate over how universities and government entities obtained reservation lands in the first place, coverage that has been chronicled by the Star Tribune.
Why it matters
If the transfer is completed, the Cloquet deal would rank among the largest land-return efforts in Minnesota in recent years and could serve as a template for other institutions that control property inside tribal boundaries. Smaller returns and agreements earlier this year have already helped build momentum for returning lands and resources to tribal nations, MPR News reported in March.
