Michigan ‘Outlaw’ Hero to Property-Rights Movement : Land use: Richard Delene created a wildlife preserve in the Upper Peninsula, but created a tempest as well. The state calls him the worst-ever individual violator of environmental laws.

COVINGTON, Mich. —  Richard Delene says when he bought his 2,400 acres 13 years ago, it was dotted with scrub brush, stunted trees and gooey peat that even birds and animals found inhospitable.

Today--thanks to his efforts--songbirds, ducks, geese, woodcocks and sandhill cranes flock to his preserve on Michigan’s Upper Peninsula. The ponds teem with fish and other aquatic life, he says.

But to the state of Michigan, Delene is no hero. Officials describe him as perhaps Michigan’s worst-ever individual violator of environmental laws--despoiler of wetlands, flouter of authority.

He is a hero, however, to the national property-rights movement.

In defense of his right to do what he wanted with his land, Delene has spent thousands of dollars on lawyers, faced down police outside his backwoods cabin, hidden for months to avoid arrest and stood in handcuffs as a judge threatened him with jail.

“I intend to win this, no matter how long it takes, no matter how much money it takes,” Delene said.

“If we lose, the state may as well confiscate all the private land. That’s what they want--dictate and confiscate.”

The state said it merely wants to protect wetlands. Department of Natural Resources officials say Delene is attracting birds from other places, not boosting their population. They’ve described his ponds as “sterile.”

“He has taken one type of natural area that he didn’t think was productive and replaced it with one that’s more . . . visually spectacular but not nearly as valuable ecologically,” agency spokesman Ann Wilson said.

Unlike many developer-vs.-regulator squabbles, this doesn’t involve a moneymaking venture such as a resort or shopping center.

Delene, a 56-year-old construction subcontractor, bought the remote tract in 1981, hoping to build a wildlife preserve where he and his wife, Nancy, could retire to pastoral isolation.

He obtained U.S. Army Corps of Engineers permits to dig several small ponds. For several years he drained swamps, cleared land and planted a variety of native trees, shrubs and grasses.

Delene ran into trouble after seeking permits in 1990 for a more ambitious project: ponds covering 90 and 18 acres, with surrounding vegetation. By then, the federal government had given the Department of Natural Resources authority over wetland regulation in the state.

Under state law, the DNR has 90 days to reject a permit application. Delene said he got no answer before the deadline and, on advice of an attorney, began digging the ponds.

State officials said they delayed rejecting Delene’s permits because his paperwork was incomplete.

He refused to stop work, and the attorney general’s office filed suit in November, 1992. Circuit Judge James Giddings ordered Delene to halt construction until the case was resolved.

Delene complied, said his attorney, Dominic Andriacchi. But officials said he denied them access to his property, refused to answer questions about his project and didn’t attend court hearings on the suit.

Finally, state police and sheriff’s deputies went to his house last December to serve a warrant. They cut a padlock on his driveway gate as Delene napped and his wife wrote Christmas cards.

Delene said they brandished firearms. Chris DeWitt, spokesman for the attorney general, said one trooper “may have had his gun drawn for a brief moment.”

Delene wouldn’t leave the house. The standoff lasted several hours until his attorney persuaded the officers to back off.

The couple then slipped into northern Wisconsin, where they hid nearly three months in a tiny cabin to “find some peace and quiet,” Delene said.

The siege of his homestead infuriated many property owners in the Upper Peninsula, where the land regulator is as unpopular as the tax collector.

Richard Delene came out of hiding for a March 8 hearing in Lansing. He was booked, cuffed and brought before Giddings, who didn’t buy Delene’s explanation that a previous attorney had advised him against appearing sooner. The judge warned him to obey future court orders or “this is just a minimal taste of what happens.”

Since then, Delene has grudgingly accepted DNR inspections. The two sides recently settled a dispute over a sediment trap.

Delene defaulted on the suit last year by failing to appear in court and could be fined more than $1 million. The state is demanding that he restore his land to its previous condition.

Delene, ever defiant, said he must continue the fight on principle.

“Lots of landowners are calling me up about their problems with the government,” he said. “The state has got to change its attitude. They think they can intimidate people, break them down.”