In April, the Illinois General Assembly confirmed Joel Brunsvold, a longtime state representative from Rock Island, as the new director of the Illinois Department of Natural Resources, overseeing one of the most important land management, research, and conservation education agencies in the Chicago Wilderness consortium.

Photo courtesy of Illinois Department of Natural Resources.

Brunsvold, 61, had represented the 72nd District of Illinois for 20 years. He is an avid hunter and fisherman, a founder and chair of the Sportsmen's Caucus in the legislature, and a former mayor of Milan, Illinois. He also served as co-chair of Governor Blagojevich's Environment, Energy, and Natural Resources Transition Policy Committee.

Brunsvold assumes leadership of an agency that has lost one-fifth of its staff through early retirements and that faces additional budget cuts. "We had two state parks where everybody retired," he noted in early April. Brunsvold acknowledged that the state budget crisis has compelled his department to reassess every program and evaluate what is working and what is not. Next year's budget allots $103.5 million from the general revenue fund, a $31.7 million reduction in program and operating costs from the current fiscal year. Brunsvold admitted that some license and permit fee increases are likely but he has resisted imposing entrance fees for state parks.

Though funds for the Conservation 2000 grants program have remained in the current budget (as this issue went to press) — these have supported a range of management, education and planning projects for many groups and ecosystem partnerships in Chicago Wilderness — key funds for land acquisition in the Open Land Trust program were cut from $36 million to $5 million in FY04, significantly hampering acquisition efforts.

"We have to grab what we can grab to save it for our children," Brunsvold said. "But we have to find a revenue source to drive some dollars toward acquisition and conservation."

Longtime legislative colleague and fishing buddy Senator Denny Jacobs (D–Moline) said, "Joel is really a conservationist. He fully understands that if you don't have good open spaces, you really have nothing."