Funding for four, college summer interns who participate in weed control, seed production, planting plugs, education functions, and other miscellaneous conservation issues as part of a native habitat restoration project to return the Flint Creek Savanna, and other critical properties in the Barrington area, to their original (pre-1840) condition of tall grass prairie, oak and hickory savannas, sedge meadows, and wetlands as a habitat for bluebirds, bob-o-links and sand hill cranes.

DeKalb County Community Gardens empowers DeKalb County residents to choose healthy, sustainable foods through community education and participation. Funding supports a prairie restoration program at Walnut Grove Vocational Farm, a place providing agriculturally based training and employment for people with disabilities in an integrated supportive setting. In addition, funding supports the needed materials to build a bridge connecting prairie paths and cross streams. The path allows individuals with multiple physical limitations to enjoy the restorative therapy benefits of the prairie.

ELPC is the Midwest’s leading public interest environmental legal advocacy organization. The Driftless Area is a beautiful scenic landscape of rolling hills and blufflands, meandering valley streams and small town and family farms straddling the Mississippi River. It’s also the Midwest’s premier biodiversity and habitat hotspot. ELPC is exploring ways to protect clean water, wildlife habitat and important natural areas in the Driftless Area which is threatened by agricultural runoff. The volume of pollution spilling into waterways from livestock and farming operations continues to grow each year. Excess nutrient pollution can result in toxic algal blooms that choke drinking water supplies, and contribute to downstream low- or no- oxygen dead zones. ELPC will conduct a thorough analysis of available and effective methods for controlling nutrient pollution and develop initial policy recommendations for making those methods more accessible and attractive to farmers. This grant builds on a prior grant in support of the 2015 Confluence Conference in which the Driftless area was established as a priority.

The Forest Preserve Foundation dedicates energy and resources needed to connect people with nature in Cook County. This grant builds upon previous work at the Shoe Factory Nature Preserve in Hoffman Estates – funded, in part, by the Oberweiler Foundation. Shoe Factory is one of Illinois’ oldest and most biologically significant nature preserves receiving 15,000 to 20,000 visitors each year. The small site provides habitat for rare plants and insects including little bluestem, northern dropseed, porcupine grass and over 100 other prairie species. Vulnerable to encroachment, the site is in need of care including the removal of trees shading out the prairie and reseeding.

This is the first year of a two year grant ($25,000 per year). Friends of the Chicago River’s mission is to improve and protect the Chicago River system for people, plants, and animals. The MWRD Land Leasing project aims to protect thousands of acres along the Chicago and Calumet rivers thereby expanding forest preserves, connecting trails and providing important connected green healthy open space along the river. Friends will identify and recruit partners who will lease, protect, and manage priority MWRD parcels in ways that meet the goals of increasing conservation and recreation opportunities.

First year of a three-year grant ($10,000 in 2016; $40,000 in 2017 and 2018). The Land Conservancy works with individuals and communities to preserve and restore natural scenic and agricultural land resources for the benefit of current and future generations. Grant supports the purchase of a 30 acre parcel of land between McHenry and Woodstock. The property contains, along with key elements of McHenry County’s natural heritage, a 350-year old Wolf Oak visible from the road. Preservation of the property will create an “Ambassador Site” for TLC. It will be used to raise awareness and community engagement in TLC’s work, the issue of oak woodland conservation, and the ecological relationship between oak woods and wetlands in the McHenry County landscape.

Second of a two year grant ($10,000 in 2015; $16,300 in 2016). Headwater streams are a dominant feature in our landscape. But, headwater streams and their often unique and rare habitats are left unprotected and subject to loss or degradation. Over the past 6 years, the Oberweiler Foundation has funded through Openlands a number of headwater stream inventories. This put Openlands in a unique position to influence the habitat protection and restoration focus of a large number of local conservation agencies throughout the Chicago Wilderness region. With this grant, Openlands will prepare a major report that will give the guidance and motivation to conservation agencies so that headwater streams becomes a new priority habitat of concern and preservation.

A three-year grant ($10,000 in 2014, $20,000 each in 2015 & 2016) to support the acquisition and restoration of the Dixon Waterfowl Refuge at Hennepin & Hopper Lakes in North-Central Illinois, one of only 36 wetlands of international importance in the country. TWI will restore 288 acres to an extremely rare grouping of native habitats, including globally imperiled oak savanna and sand prairie, benefiting many birds and wildlife. The parcel of land is regionally, nationally, and internationally recognized for its excellent biodiversity and critical importance to migrating waterfowl and breeding wetland birds.