Non-stop Learning

After a decade of planning, Jasper County Conservation is finally going public with the details of its Environmental Education Center in development on the former grounds of the county care facility on Newton’s southeast side.

Conservation staff said the facility to be a gateway for outdoor learning for both young and adults.

“To miss out on the biological functions and history that are going on around us, it’s something we need to put into perspective,” said Keri Van Zante, county conservation director. “We can’t forget about our environment because that leads to everything that’s happening around us. ... We’ve worked on this for a long time. We’ve put a lot of planning in it. We’ve been through such as process to get to where we are. I feel really good about it.”

The Caring for Conservation Auction will be the first public fundraiser for the $2.5-3 million education center. Runnells Auctioneer Bob Heemsbergen will preside over the Feb. 23 event, set from 6 to 9 p.m. at Sugar Grove Vineyards west of Newton.

“It doesn’t seem fair to keep it a secret anymore,” Van Zante said.

The auction will have both live and silent segments. The silent auction will feature handmade home accent pieces, designer sunglasses, a movie night gift set and much more — all donated. The live auction will see several “advenutre-themed” packages such as a kayak adventure: Pelican one-person kayak, life jacket, water bottle and a personal kayak excursion for the winner and five other people with Jasper County Conservation.

Sommer Kibbee of Art Junkie is also going to be painting live throughout the evening, and the piece will be the final item of the live auction. County Conservation will have a life Facebook poll so the community can decide what they want Kibbee to paint.

Near the county sheriff’s office on the south side of Interstate 80, the education center will feature two ponds — one of which is already built, indoor exhibits, 19 acres of pollinator habitat, a soft surface trail system and a proposed sculpture walk — playing off of Newton’s existing public art displays.

The building will be Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design (LEED) Platinum Certified and include both solar and geothermal energy. According to Van Zante, it will be asked to operate off the grid.

The land for the education center was a donation approved by the county’s board of supervisors. The center has also been the recipient of a Jasper Community Foundation Grant, and Van Zante and conservation staff have been soliciting funds from individual donors. Feb. 23 will be the education center’s first public push for donations.

The project began nearly 10 years ago, when county conservation hired Iowa State University Natural Resource Ecology and Management Professor Jim Pease to do an analysis of the departments’ outreach and programming priorities. A feasibility study followed. It showed a with aggressive fundraising, the education center was possible but for county conservation workers, the study revealed something a little more troubling.

“People had no idea who we were, people had no idea (Jasper County Conservation) was something different from the DNR. They really didn’t know what we did,” Van Zante said.

Conservation naturalists and employees asked Newton and Jasper County parents if they felt student activities, such as county water testing at Mariposa Park and investigating the Prairie at Jacob Krumm Nature Preserve, were worthwhile. They did, but Van Zante said many of their interviewees thought those programs were executed through local school districts.

“Nobody knew (there were conservation programs). It was very heartbreaking (for) us. We couldn’t believe it. We’ve been here for 50-plus years. We couldn’t believe in that much time, people still didn’t know who we were.”

So as conservation staff began designs for the education center, they also created a new logo and a new marketing push — including press releases and social media outreach.

But the education center has been a pipe dream of local conservation leaders for 25 years. According to Van Zante, about 75 percent of county conservation departments in Iowa have a physical learning center for programming and learning. This project, she said, will finally bring that amenity to Jasper County.

“It’s fulfilling an obvious goal and dream for people who have been leading conservation in this community for so long,” she said. “They always wanted to do it. I just don’t know if they had the funding or the ideas of how to make it happen. There have been so many good leaders from Jasper County in the conservation field. ... I wish it could have been done then, but there is no reason why we can’t do it now.”

Jade Read is an environmental education assistant with Jasper County Conservation and has spent nearly eight months planning the auction/fundraiser. In addition to the bidding, games like wine ring toss and a DJ, Read said a 50/50 raffle at the event will help support “mini scholarships” county conservation is creating to offsets public schools’ transportation and chaperoning costs associated with getting students to the county parks for conservation programming.

“We’re noticing schools are turning down our programs due to busing and when there are not enough substitute teachers to fill absences,” Read said.

Van Zante said the center will provide outdoor learning experiences for the public of all ages and activity levels.

“We want to provide a vision of the future for the youth of Jasper County,” Van Zante said. “We don’t want them growing up and not knowing about our land, the legacy we have here and not being able to teach their kids. It feels like that could happen with as much screen time as they have today.”

Contact Mike Mendenhall at 641-792-3121 Ext. 6530 or mmendenhall@newtondailynews.com