If you are a resident who is concerned about maintaining what is left of GLen Ellyn's beautiful parks and trees, you already have Kinzler, Creech, & Nephew to thank for preserving Ackerman Woods last year, and you now owe them three votes in Tuesday's election.

I watched these three concerned citizens take on the current park commission in a diligent, respectful, highly informed, efficient, and effective manner in the long campaign to save Ackerman Woods last year. Yes - a long campaign was necessary in 2008 to convince the current commission members that indeed the citizens were serious about preserving open spaces, even though preservation came out as a high priority on the 2005 resident survey.

Kinzler, Creech, and Nephew volunteered their efforts on the behalf of all park distrct residents, not just those who might live near Ackerman Woods or just those with children. They raised a wake-up call that garnered over 1400 signatures against the actions of the commission and village board. Their experience shows that they are in touch with the voice of our citizens and residents.

With due respect for the dedication of the current commission, I maintain that in the past year, Kinzler, Creech, and Nephew have set a new standard for park governance and responsiveness to citizens. Their election is the next step to put that standard in place.

To: Cory Atwell
CC: Current GEPD Board, Kathleen Talenco (communications and marketing coordinator)

I'm following up on my email to you and the current GEPD board from Friday, March 27 regarding some clarifying statements from the GEPD.

I understand from statements from current board members that they feel the GEPD could do better in creating transparency and communications with the Glen Ellyn public. I was hoping to see a quick response from the GEPD staff or current board candidates to our open letter. A quick response would demonstrate the GEPD's commitment to sharing information relevant to these important issues that have surfaced in this year's board election. To date, I have not heard from GEPD staff or any of the current board members and am concerned that the absence of any communication to my inquiry is further evidence that the GEPD needs to change in this area regardless of which candidates are elected to the GEPD board.

I expect to hear from the GEPD no later than noon on April 2, 2009. Otherwise, I will presume the GEPD will not respond to the public regarding these questions.

Thank you again for your assistance in helping educate the public on these important issues facing the community.

Editor - GlenEllynLife.com

I read your recent open letter to the Glen Ellyn Park District regarding the new Ackerman Sports Complex and the GEPD 2005 survey.

I am currently a candidate for the GEPD, and along with my fellow candidates Jay Kinzler and Julia Nephew, I have spent a great deal of time researching Park District issues. I can provide some of the information you have requested from the GEPD. I have attended almost every GEPD meeting since March 2008 and I have many GEPD documents that are not easily available to the public. If you would like to see copies of the documents I refer to below please let me know and I can provide them to you. A small amount of GEPD documents are available online- I have included links to those documents. Additionally, some of the documents are available on-line through the Save Ackerman Woods website and I have provided links to those as well.

Photos of the on-going construction at the Ackerman Sports complex and drawings of the project are available on the GEPD web site. http://www.gepark.org/par_AckermanComplex.html

The GEPD has stated a need for additional gymnasium space for many years. I am not aware of any facilities usage study that demonstrates this need. The 2003-2008 GEPD Comprehensive Plan shows plans to add 35,000 sq ft. in indoor recreation space (pg. 2). The facility under construction at Ackerman Park is 88,000 sq.ft. and is estimated to cost $9.2 million (October 4, 2008 meeting minutes). The referendum funded only $7.4 million of this cost.

The decision to build the Ackerman Sports Complex can be traced through the minutes of several meetings:

In the minutes for the October 4, 2005 meeting, the Board discusses the 2005 survey results and decides to propose the following projects for the referendum (priority indicated in parentheses): open space (1), renovating the Boathouse (2), constructing washrooms and a shelter at Ackerman Park (3) and razing MSRC (5). Preliminary discussions of a new MSRC include building a 12,000 sq ft or a 5,400 sq ft gymnasium.

After discussing capital improvement projects for referendum for many meetings, the GEPD board decided to ask the voters to approve a $12.5 million referendum on March 21, 2006. Fact sheets produced by the GEPD advertise the 2005 survey results as a selling point for the referendum. The proposed facility at Ackerman Park for shelter and washrooms is 1,250 sq. ft.

After that March referendum failed, the GEPD discussed a November 2006 referendum. The May 10, 2006 meeting minutes showed that the Board discussed funding the Ackerman Park washrooms and shelter out of their regular budgets (it was a small cost), renovating or reconstructing MSRC and possibly not renovating the Boathouse.

At the June 14, 2006 meeting the Board takes a tour of the White Sox/Bulls training facility in Lisle. http://www.bullssoxacademy.com/gallery/

After this field trip, at the July 19, 2006 meeting, staff recommends that the Boathouse not be renovated and instead an athletic facility be built at Ackerman Park. By July, staff had already met with architects to design a sports facility at Ackerman.

The Board went to referendum again on November 7, 2006 for $11.9 million. This is advertised as money for renovating MSRC, acquiring open space and constructing a multi-purpose facility at Ackerman Park. Fact sheets produced by the GEPD for this referendum make no mention of the 2005 survey results, which ranked the indoor soccer facility last out of thirteen projects.

If elected, Jay Kinzler, Julia Nephew and I plan to stop spending on facilities construction that does not have community support, including the planned amphitheater for $300,000, platform tennis warming hut for $350,000, and refrigerated ice rink for $1 million. After cutting budgets for the expected drop in revenues, we would redirect this money towards projects that we need. The Boathouse at Lake Ellyn should be renovated, not razed. We want to put a priority on acquiring open space for new parks and fields. The drop in the real estate market may give us new opportunities at reasonable cost.

We also want to improve our athletic fields and neighborhood parks. Our current fields are native soil based, draining poorly and are easily damaged. We have consulted with experts on athletic fields and found that we can renovate our existing fields affordably by adding drainage and incorporating sand into the soil. The GEPD incumbents have recently spoken of a report, found here, that they say shows that this would cost $600,000 per field. Reading past the first page of this report shows that it recommends a similar approach to ours: adding drainage and sand to the soil the reasonable cost of $36,000 - $75,000 per field. We can identify fields that need upgrades and plan for these expenses in the long-range budget. With these changes, we can increase the time that the field is available for play and decrease maintenance costs, making more of the land we have.

We think that these projects are a more sensible use of the Park District budget than what is found in the current 5-year plan. By soliciting and listening to input from the community, we can make sure that Park District priorities are correct and that residents aren't surprised by new projects.

For more on our goals for the Park District, see our website, www.vote3fortheparks.com, or email us at vote3fortheparks@gmail.com.

Thank You,
Melissa Creech