Cottier, Larsen Honored By NGPC For The Governor’s Pine Ridge Wild Turkey Hunt

     The Nebraska Game and Parks Commission has honored two long-time Chadron leaders for their work in creating, running, and resurrecting the Governor’s Pine Ridge Wild Turkey Hunt.

     Northwest Nebraska Development Corporation Executive Director Deb Cottier and former mayor Carl Larsen were presented with plaques at the commission’s meeting last Friday at Fort Robinson State Park. 

     The Governor’s Wild Turkey Hunt started in the mid-1990’s when Ben Nelson, a hunter, was governor. 

      Larsen, an executive and lobbyist for Northwest Bell, came up the idea of the invitation-only guided hunt and Cottier, Nelson’s western representative and a former executive director of the Chadron Chamber of Commerce, quickly came on board.

    One of their goals was to use the governor’s involvement to showcase Western Nebraska’s unique public and private natural resources and recreational facilities and increase the access and use of them.

     The other main goal was to strengthen the relationships between state officials and business leaders from Eastern Nebraska and the leaders and property owners in the Chadron area through “Boots-on-the-Ground” interaction.

    Larsen’s connections through the phone company to the Lincoln-Omaha business community resulted in several state senators, business executives, and state officials coming to Chadron for the hunt.

     The hunt remained popular for several years, but then was allowed to end because Nelson’s successor as governor, Mike Johans, wasn’t a hunter. Cottier, working with Larson, brought it back under the NNDC in 2010. The Chadron Community Foundation took it over this year..

    During the presentation of the plaque by the Game and Parks Commission, Cottier called the Governor’s Wild Turkey Hunt “one of the most rewarding things I’ve done.”

     She and Larsen praised each other for their work on the hunt and both said the event would be impossible without the generosity and involvement of the landowners who allow their property to be used for the hunt and who often serve as guides.