Section 55-11-09 - Department - Powers and duties - PenaltyIn furtherance of the purposes of this chapter and in implementation of the powers and duties provided in this chapter, the department has the following additional powers and duties:
1. To formulate policies for the selection, acquisition, use, management, and protection of nature preserves.2. To determine, supervise, and control the management of nature preserves and to make, publish, and amend reasonable rules necessary or advisable for the use and protection of nature preserves and for the business of the department.3. To encourage and recommend the dedication of natural areas as nature preserves.4. To acquire land adjacent to any nature preserve when necessary to serve as a protective buffer or service area, or both, for the nature preserve. No such buffer or service area is a nature preserve unless an estate, interest, or right therein is thereafter dedicated as a nature preserve under this chapter.5. To cooperate and contract with any agency, organization, or individual.6. To accept, administer, and use for the purposes of this chapter, gifts, grants, devises, and bequests of money, securities, and other property, conditional or unconditional, but the department may refuse any gift, grant, devise, or bequest which is upon terms or conditions unacceptable to it.7. To make surveys and maintain registers and records of nature preserves and other natural areas within the state.8. To promote, and to conduct or contract for, research and investigation of nature preserves and other natural areas within the state.9. To carry on interpretive programs and publish and disseminate information pertaining to nature preserves and other natural areas within the state.10. To promote and assist in the establishment, restoration, and protection of, and advise in the management of, natural areas and to foster and aid in the establishment, restoration, and preservation of natural conditions within the state elsewhere than in the system.11. To design and control the use of official state nature preserve signs and to recommend to the department of transportation locations for such signs.12. To submit to the governor an annual report on or before December thirty-first of each year which shall account for each nature preserve in the system and make such other reports and recommendations as the department may deem advisable.13. To adopt suitable rules relating to the protection, care, and use of any state nature preserve or state-owned or state-managed natural area. Enforcement of these rules shall comply with the powers granted in chapter 55-08.Amended by S.L. 2011 , ch. 440( SB 2117 ), § 5, eff. 4/20/2011.