Letters from our Leadership

Ioften say that what makes the Anne Springs Close Greenway so special is its ability to be a different experience for everyone. Some folks enjoy just a casual walk or sitting in a rocking chair by the Greenway Gateway. Others log countless miles on our trails, hiking, biking or running. We even have a small but loyal contingent that use our horse trails the way they were intended, on horseback.

As we look to the future, we look forward to welcoming people from all walks of life and engaging in whatever ways recreation looks like for them. As an organization, we want to ensure that the outdoors is accessible to everyone, our green space included.

Weekdays on property can often be surprisingly busy. The nature-based preschool program is bustling with our youngest students, busy learning about the seasons or that interpersonal relationships can be best understood through examples found outdoors. You will often see school buses parked at any of our entrances when elementary and middle school students are visiting to learn more about aquatic ecology. You will also witness a range of ages, whether volunteering in the PAR Garden, helping to count Eastern bluebirds, or taking classes through our Master Naturalist program. Some may even be so lucky as to see our Exceptional Equestrians therapeutic riders gain confidence in themselves and others during a trail ride or after a few weeks in the riding ring.

Regardless of what brings you to the Greenway, together we are developing a community that cares for the outdoors. Young, old, from all walks of life, we can gather in our mutual appreciation and need for nature. In the following pages, you will see what we have accomplished this year with your help. It takes a village, and I am proud that I call this one ours.

We celebrate together another milestone year at our beloved Anne Springs Close Greenway. We enter 2023 with more than 17,000 member households, equating to over 53,000 people in this region that consider the Greenway to be an important part of their lives.

Serving as board chair has been a great privilege and honor. As my tenure winds down, I cannot help but reflect on all that has been accomplished in the last few years thanks to your support.

The past year was filled with successes and firsts for the Greenway, including the groundbreaking at the Crandall Bowles Children’s Farm, which promises to bring more youth to the property than ever before, and fulfills a longheld wish of Ms. Close and her eldest daughter, Crandall, to improve and expand our existing petting zoo, in keeping with Ms. Close’s desire to keep thinking of ways to continuously introduce children to nature.

Visitors flocked to the Greenway by the hundreds of thousands this past year. As stewards of this beautiful property, we have doubled down on our effort to mitigate the environmental impact created by our own growing visitor footprint and added amenities, including construction of the stormwater retention pond near the Greenway Gateway and other mitigation efforts near Steele Creek.

Our staff and volunteers continue to cultivate the federally endangered Schweinitz's sunflower and Piedmont prairie habitat, embracing new resources techniques and best practices to ensure we are providing the best land stewardship possible in the acres restored to prairie.

We look forward to another year of continued growth and enhancement at the Anne Springs Close Greenway, ensuring that our mission to connect people to nature and keep this special place at the heart of our community continues forever, just as Ms. Close intended.

John Gordon, CEO of Leroy Springs & Co.

Alex Sullivan, Board Chair