Lake Co. forest district ready to buy in Wauconda, Wadsworth areas

The Lake County Forest Preserve District board on Tuesday is expected to approve land deals worth about $8.5 million that will create one new preserve and expand another.

If the purchases are approved, two adjacent sites will be combined to create a new 128-acre preserve in the Wadsworth area. The land being eyed is north of Route 173 and west of Kilbourne Road. It's not far from the existing Van Patten Woods preserve but would be its own preserve, officials said.

Plans already are in the works to name the site the Oak Hickory Forest Preserve, after trees found on the property.

The landowners would receive a total of $4.5 million for the properties. It will be the district's 57th preserve and the first created since voters agreed in November 2008 to raise $185 million for land purchases and projects.

"It's the first of many parcels of land that we will be purchasing and protecting (with that money)," forest board President Bonnie Thomson Carter said.

Elsewhere, officials are looking to expand Ray Lake Forest Preserve near Wauconda with a 77-acre purchase. The deal, valued at nearly $4 million, covers land on Fremont Center Road that's southeast of the Ray Lake preserve. It would bring the preserve to 489 acres.

The deals were approved by various forest district committees last week.

The forest board is expected to vote on the proposed purchases at a meeting scheduled for 11:30 a.m. or immediately after the county board meets Tuesday. Both sessions will be held at the county government center, 18 N. County St., Waukegan.

Forest district committees approved a fourth purchase last week, one that would slightly expand the Greenbelt Forest Preserve in the Waukegan area, but the deal is on hold at the owner's request, Carter said.