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-n o - a. ND ! .0 ro' Z1 Er t-o -t CD ' CD dtn HU CD r42 RP-! CD° Retiring Forest Preserve Director Jon Duerr stands on top of the hill at ;U Oakhurst Forest Preserve Wednesday afernooñ In Aurora. Waubonsee Community College. He taught biology- - DIJERK As one of the few ecologists with an From FageAl advanced degree in the Chicago area c_CD at the time, he was approached three tIII the uses they engender, such as the years later to help put together pro-- !JiIIN day-care kids frolicking in nature on grams for the first Earth Day. g - a sunny day - than for holding the Duerr says he has been happy to. :trflt o't stuffy title of director. see the world come around to a more 'Tve always been concerned about ecological viewpoint during the past C being seen as a bureaucrat," he says. 30 years, something reflected in the li 'We're just holding this land for the 13,500 acres of forest preserve land L4 CD citizens of Kane County, bringing Kane has been able to purchase and i_ •LartGD_o. r tca oa' t. itt some expertise to manage it Some- preserve. He saw the change in atti- CDQ '< • CD how our society as come to treat gov- tude expressed dramatically in the -t ernment as something separate- Peo- mid-1990s, when Kane residents over- ' ple will say, 'your land ...' Well, it isn't whehuingly voted for a referendum to EP -t my land. It belongs to the people of spend money on preserving land at a (ft Kane County" time when residents were voting fleD CD It is a philosophy Duerr comes by, downother ballot questions. Wt ° He also sees it in what people tell (D(D ër, naturally. + ct& 'nt. It was ingrained in him at an early him they want in their preserves, o °' CI p-t age as a boy in the 1950sand'60sin "there is more general acceptance St Charles, when the 10th Avenue of doing original habitat restoration," CD house he grew up in was only three Duerr says. 'That has been very suc- uhitntt cessful in our preserves. I think that — blocks from the edge of town, but still 0 I Ii1i!J'flu CI) close enough to the flora and fauna has been home out by the popularity along the Fox River. of our system-" He would take his dog with him to Duerr is quick to give the creditfor j hunt along the river or the railroad that popularity to both the disifictem- O-%-- tracks, observing the natural plant life ployees, and the politicians who over- and the birds. see the district at the Forest Preserve It is Duerr's familiarity with that Comxnission Kane County which n-iade him a good in the time since Duerr became di- choice to direct the preserve today, rector, the number of district employ.: says Forest Preserve President John ees has almost doubled, from 35 to 63. Hoscheit -- At the top, there has been more spe- "One of his biggest attributes is he cialization, with directors of opera- was born and raised in the area," says tions, planning, finances and public in- Hoscheit R-St.Charles. "He has a formation, separate from the execu- sense of history?' tive director. Duerr points out there was no envi- They all deserve the credit," ronmental movement as such, when Duerr says "One screw-up really re- he was young- It was his own love of flects on all of us," nature that drove him to get a bathe-- So, Duerr now retires from a job of br's degree in biology from Coe Col- stomping around fens, bogs, wet- lege in Cedar Rapids, Iowa, then re-- lands, forests, eskers and kames to a turn closer to home to get a master's life of... well, doing about the same degree in ecology from Northern Ilb thing, except "on his own schedule," nois University. 1-loseheit says. In 1967, Duerr was one of the first "That's my life," Duerr says, with a teachers hired by the then-fledgling smile. 'To be stomping around here." '2 1IG3 bOt'O 4-i c U'- 8 trd US8E. E t C.Oa, Ø wV 4. TM 'vVc V) $ ow U fi In o>. u,iC 4)Z.o ct "nflja to jctfl o'fl U . 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This, after all, is a discussed her plans for St Charles District person who says the key to problem 303. The new superintendent was referring solving is to 'act like human Drano," and to a district free of crippling dissension so it who refers to staff planning sessions as can return to excellence - no easy task by 'tiger" meetings. "Nobodyleaves a tiger any measure. However, after spending meeting until the problem is solved," she some time with her, I believe she's the one said bluntly who can pull it off. As good a resume that Barbara Erwin Born in Chicago and raised in brings to the district, and as happy as I am Hammond, hid., Erwin brings a solid she is here, she does have one glaring Midwestern view of life to her job. Some of character flaw. Under intense questioning, the phrases she uses, "You need to treat and after hemming and hawing, she finally people the way you'd want to be treated," cameclean with me and admitted the and "Citizens who give up theft time to awful truth: She's a Sox fan.