May 22nd Social Hour Event

We've got the date saved and the presenter lined up...and should have the location nailed down in the next day or so. This month's event will be in the western 'burbs. The current contenders for location are in Lisle and Downer's Grove. (Near the intersection of I355 and I88, for those of you not familiar with that area). I'll be finalizing tomorrow or Fri and posting another note then. The plan is to start the networking at 6p and have the presentation begin at 7p.

In the meantime, here are some details on our presenter, Jim Kleinwachter from The Conservation Foundation.

Jim grew up in Warrenville, where he currently lives with his wife and three children. His passion for the environment led him to sell his successful business and join the staff at The Conservation Foundation in January of 2004.

He is no stranger to The Conservation Foundation. In his volunteer efforts, Jim has helped organize the annual DuPage River Sweep since its inception in 1991. In fact, he was organizing local river clean ups in Warrenville prior to the Foundation's involvement. Since then, he has worked on prairie and wetland restoration projects at Warrenville's Johnson School and on several educational endeavors of the Foundation. Jim is also the recipient of the 1999 Paul Butler Memorial Award presented by The Conservation Foundation for outstanding volunteer service.

Jim now works to preserve land as open space for The Conservation Foundation. In that duty, Jim works with government agencies and private landowners to negotiate open space purchases, facilitate land donations and conservation easements. He created the Conservation@Home program in 2004 to help educate homeowners and initiate positive changes in our landscape choices.


And here is a bit of additional detail about the topic of the night, the Conservation @ Home program.

This program is an extension of existing homeowner education and watershed protection efforts, and encourages and recognizes property owners that protect and/or create yards that are environmentally friendly and conserve water. This includes planting native vegetation, such as prairie and woodland wildflowers, trees and shrubs, create butterfly and rain gardens, and remove exotic species of plants.

We're not talking about digging up your entire yard and planting prairie, although that would be okay if you want. Conservation @ Home promotes planting areas almost like "flower beds" or "mini nature havens" in your yard that utilize native plants, such as prairie and woodland wildflowers. In addition, this could include water gardens and planting native species of trees and shrubs for wildlife cover, food and habitat. For fun, these areas can be created for butterfly and songbird gardens, and rain gardens that help capture rainwater and return it to the ground instead of allowing it to runoff. It could also mean simply preserving areas that are already "natural habitats" on your property such as stream corridors, wetlands and wooded areas.

More details on the location to come. Hope to see you all there...