Director's Message

By Steve Hobbs, Executive Director, Belwin Conservancy

As I was driving home the other day, the radio announced that Dawn Wells (the actress that played Mary Ann on "Gilligan’s Island") was turning 73 years old. Mary Ann is 73 years old. If that isn’t a wake-up call to one’s mortality, I don’t know what is. I was always a Mary Ann kinda guy. She was the fun-loving, well-scrubbed girl next door that you could relate to. Ginger scared me.

Funny where ideas originate, but Mary Ann’s birthday really got me thinking about how the choices we make can have such a lasting impact on so many. It got me thinking about our place in the world and the legacy we leave behind. How will we be remembered? What have we done to make the world, even just our small corner of it, a better place?

It allowed me to reflect upon all that the Belwin Conservancy has done over the past 40 years. Belwin has been the quiet respite, the walk in the woods or the peaceful spot next to a bubbling brook for literally hundreds of thousands of people. No one’s life is quite the same after a visit here. The people that have created and sustained the Belwin Conservancy have made such an incredible impact on the lives of so many.

I’ve been lucky enough to witness how Belwin transforms people in the four years that I’ve been here. It’s easy for us to take the beauty and quiet for granted, but all you need to do is to look at the face of a child that sees a wild turkey for the first time or an adult shedding their worries with each step along the trail. That’s when you realize that there is something truly special here. You know, we might be on to something with this nature deal.

These past four years have been some of the most rewarding of my life, so it is very difficult for me to say that I am leaving the Belwin Conservancy for new adventures beginning in January. I have taken a position with what I consider to be the premier conservation organization in the nation, The Conservation Fund, as their Minnesota Program Director. I will be working to conserve land throughout the state.

It was not an easy choice, but I believe that this new opportunity offers me the best chance for making my corner of the world a better place.

I won’t be gone entirely. In fact, part of my job will be to continue the good work we are doing to conserve land in the Valley Creek area like the incredible opportunity we have right now to protect the trout of Valley Creek (see page 4). And I will always come back for the bison release and the fun we have rounding them up in the fall!

I wish I could call each and every one of you to thank you in person for giving me the chance to work with you. You are what makes the Belwin Conservancy a positive force for conservation, for education, and for inspiration in this chaotic world. Thank you from the bottom of my heart for all that you’ve done and all that you continue to do. I know that with your help, the Belwin Conservancy will continue to achieve great things!

Take care,

Executive Director, Belwin Conservancy

With Steve’s departure, the Belwin Conservancy is currently engaged in a search for our next director. That director will take the reins at the Belwin Conservancy as it celebrates its 40th anniversary, and guide Belwin through some of the organization’s most exciting years.

In the near future, the Belwin Conservancy will see some of its greatest conservation opportunities within the Valley Creek watershed and beyond. The Belwin Conservancy is also on the cusp of some very exciting new things with its art and nature program that the new director will have the opportunity to guide and shape.

For the time being, Tara Kelly, the Belwin Conservancy’s Director of Ecological Restoration will act as Interim Director. Tara came to the Belwin Conservancy in 2007 from Prairie Restorations, Inc. where she was the manager of their Scandia office for several years.

Tara will certainly do a fantastic job as Interim Director no matter how long or short her tenure may be.