Manya Brachear PashmanContact ReporterChicago Tribune
At a recent community forum to discuss plans for the Obama Presidential Center, Karin Droegemueller stepped up to the microphone and introduced herself as an "angry birder."
She is among a flock of birders who fear that the proposed $30 million Tiger Woods golf course and expanded driving range tied to the development of the Obama Center will ward off the millions of migratory birds that stop in Jackson Park, and displace the nearly 300 species that have helped make the park a favorite Chicago birding destination.
Droegemueller, a retired public school teacher, says it's frustrating to watch the golf project "take a little piece of this and little piece of that" out of Jackson Park. "We're going to turn it into Obamaland," she said. "It started as a library, now it's a center. ... The fact is that they're encroaching on everything."
Many birders — including amateurs and eagle-eyed experts — appreciate the Obama Foundation's promises to preserve green space. But not all open land is equal, they say. A manicured golf course or an outdoor amphitheater is not the same as natural habitat.
"Myself and many of my neighbors really enjoy Jackson Park for the natural aspect of it," said Jennie Strable, a Hyde Park resident who helps lead the Wooded Island Bird Walk every Saturday morning in Jackson Park. "It's a place of quiet repose to spend time in nature, and I really don't want a jungle gym right next door to it."
But other park advocates say measures are being taken to preserve as much natural habitat as possible throughout the 542-acre park while also offering other forms of recreation.
"We're very lucky we have one of the finest places for birds in the country," said Louise McCurry, the president of the Jackson Park Advisory Council. "We're going to safeguard carefully anything that would affect the natural area. The park is not just for any particular group of people. It's for everybody."
Birders say they have an important natural legacy to preserve. For migration seasons throughout the centuries, warblers, thrushes, finches and more than 100 other species of birds have blanketed the skies along the shores of Lake Superior and Lake Michigan, down what's called the Mississippi Flyway. When the inventions of the electric lightbulb and skyscraper made that trek more treacherous, Jackson Park became a refuge from the city's ever-widening expanse of glass and concrete.
Doug Stotz, a senior conservation ecologist with the Field Museum, estimated at least 15 million migratory birds pass through Chicago annually. Meanwhile, 299 species — some residents, some just passing through — have been spotted over time in Jackson Park, according to the National Audubon Society.
Protecting those winged travelers has even become part of the city's dogma. In March 2000, then-Mayor Richard M. Daley and the head of the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service signed an "Urban Conservation Treaty" in which they agreed to maintain and improve bird habitats.
Earlier this year, Chicago's Department of Planning and Development incorporated guidelines for bird-safe buildings into its sustainable development policy. Such guidelines include limiting and strategically locating bright lights and reflective glass.
While Stotz and birders commend the amount and positioning of glass in the architects' initial renderings of the museum tower, he isn't convinced the city is abiding by the spirit of the conservation treaty in Jackson Park or that the center's proposed footprint upholds President Barack Obama's environmental legacy.
"My hope is that we can maintain those environmental values and use them as something people who come to the library can take advantage of, rather than obliterating them so we can have a South Side Bean," Stotz said, in reference to Obama's recent remarks that he envisions remaking Jackson Park into a space like Millennium Park.
The Obama Foundation insists it is revising its plan based on feedback from the community and intends to come up with a concept that addresses "such complex issues as bird habitat and bird life."
"The Foundation is aware that Jackson Park is a destination for birding, and is committed to integrating the campus into the park as sensitively as possible," a foundation spokesperson said in a statement. "Of course — preserving habitat and not disturbing migration patterns for birds is a big part of that."
In particular, birders are asking that Wooded Island remain a secluded nature sanctuary, without any new man-made structures. They ask that designers planning new lawns and landscaping consider what can be useful habitats for birds. They caution against Obama's suggestion to allow paddle boats on the East and West Lagoons and recommend that off-trail dead trees, dubbed snags, should remain as habitat for cavity nesting birds.
Rather than expanding a driving range next to Bobolink Meadow, a combination meadow and woodland on the east side of the Jackson Park Lagoon, they propose moving the range and expanding the meadow instead. Many blame the existing golf facility for chasing away the meadow's namesake, a striking black and white bird with a golden shock of feathers on its crown.
McCurry, of the Jackson Park Advisory Council, said the driving range, which has been there since 1978 and replaced a Nike missile base, had nothing to do with the disappearance of bobolinks, which have been in decline across the U.S. for years.
Brian Hogan, co-founder and director of the Chicago Parks Golf Alliance, said he welcomes a meeting with birders to hear their concerns but insists that they're prematurely presuming the worst.
"We want to enhance the ecology and habitat through the golf course," he said, referring to the addition of native grasses and trees to replace those that are cleared. A tree census is still underway to determine how many trees will be cut down, he said. "Golf courses can be harmonious with nature."
Heightening the tension for birders are messages coming from the current White House administration. President Donald Trump has threatened to undo decades of conservation triumphs with budget cuts that some fear will endanger migratory bird conservation programs.
That political climate is what brought Dan Hostetler to Jackson Park for the first time Saturday to participate in the Wooded Island Bird Walk, a two-mile stroll that has taken place rain or shine every Saturday for nearly 44 years.
"My wife and I are becoming more interested in climate change, climate change denial, and we're thinking this seems to be on the fringe," he said. "Birds can't defend themselves, so we've decided this is something we're going to embark upon."
With binoculars drawn, Hostetler and about a dozen other birders set off on the weekly treasure hunt. Caspian terns and cormorants soared overhead, patrolling the lagoons. Eastern kingbirds, cedar waxwings, black-capped chickadees and warblers flitted from limb to limb. A woodpecker and hummingbird brawling in the branches were undeterred by the rubberneckers below.
But the real victory of the day included a couple of great blue herons wading in the lagoons, a nest of four baby green herons by the Museum of Science and Industry and a black-crowned night heron hiding in a tree. "The trifecta," exclaimed Droegemueller.
Stotz, of the Field Museum, said birds can signal broader environmental threats. He points to how a decline in bird population led scientists to reconsider the once-common pesticide DDT. It wasn't just poisoning birds, but people too.
"I do think they are a good indicator of what we are doing to the landscape and that affects us too," he said. "I'm hopeful we'll take advantage of the opportunity and mitigate the threat."
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