Forest preserve plan ruins good thing

On April 17, D "Dewey" Pierotti, president of the Forest Preserve District of DuPage County, released a letter to the editor excoriating a planned cell tower on Naperville land adjacent to the Springbrook Prairie Forest Preserve, while at the same time the forest preserve district is proposing a 26,000-square-foot, 36-foot-tall fleet maintenance facility within yards of the McKee Marsh Bird Sanctuary in Blackwell Forest Preserve near Warrenville, Winfield and West Chicago. In his letter, Mr. Pierotti states that the proposed tower would "possibly prove detrimental to the rare grassland birds that nest at the preserve. Given that the forest preserve district is entrusted by its citizens and subjected to legal mandates requiring the preservation and protection of habitat, we simply cannot support Naperville's efforts to erect a structure that would have such a detrimental effect on a forest preserve we have worked so hard to build and restore."

I ask that Mr. Pierotti and the forest preserve district board apply the same standards to their own construction projects that they are attempting to apply to the projects of others. McKee Marsh and its bird sanctuary, which also provides habitat to many other wildfowl and animal species, was a gift from the McKee family to the residents of DuPage County. The actions Mr. Pierotti and the board are taking in attempting to ruin this unique setting are wrong.

Robert C. Whitney

Winfield