University of Iowa to end 66-year lease of Macbride Nature Recreation Area

IOWA CITY — Disappointing local conservationists, the University of Iowa on Thursday announced plans to exit its 66-year lease of the 485-acre Macbride Nature Recreation Area when it expires July 1, 2029 after an in-depth review found maintaining the historic property will cost an immediate $14.8 million in repairs and upgrades.

A recent report on that review additionally tallied nearly $1 million in annual expenses to maintain the area — an ecologically-significant habitat owned by the Army Corps of Engineers, which for generations has hosted thousands of UI researchers, naturalists, and students young and old.

“This was not an easy decision,” UI President Barbara Wilson said. “But after extensive analysis, we determined that the long-term financial requirements are not feasible given the university’s current resources and the need to stay focused on our highest priorities, which include educating 30,000 students, supporting cutting-edge research, and delivering world-class patient care.”

Iowa’s three public universities in the last Legislative session saw no increase in general education state appropriations for the new budget year — despite the governor’s recommended 2 percent bump. And they saw only targeted increases in special purpose funds — well below the $25 million the universities requested.

At the same time, the University of Iowa — a top research institution with an academic medical center — is facing federal funding cuts and threats.

Although the corps doesn’t charge the university to lease the Macbride Nature Recreation Area — located north of Iowa City near Lake Macbride State Park — UI is responsible for maintaining its landscape, structures, and roads.

  Buy Photo

In exchange for that upkeep, the university for decades has experienced broad benefits via its UI WILD programs, like the Iowa Raptor Project, Iowa Wildlife Camps, Lifetime Leisure Skills classes, and School of the Wild — a 26-year-old program that brings more than 1,200 elementary and middle school students into the “wild” every year.

“School of the Wild, Wildlife Camps, and Iowa Raptor Project will continue,” UI officials said in a news release Thursday, clarifying, “Two of the university’s programs, School of the Wild and Wildlife Camps, will continue beyond the MNRA lease expiration.”

The College of Education and UI WILD program leaders are “actively working to secure new locations that can host their outdoor learning experiences for Iowa’s K-12 students,” officials said.

“We are deeply proud of the impact School of the Wild has had across the state,” College of Education Dean Daniel Clay said in a statement. “It will absolutely continue — just in a new home.”

  Buy Photo

Without specifying potential new locations, officials said, “Likewise, the Iowa Raptor Project will continue in a new location.”

As the UI lease continues for another four years, through 2029, officials Thursday said they’re working with the Corps of Engineers to determine next steps in the wind-down of MNRA operations — with plans anticipated “sometime this fall.”

‘Declined the opportunity’

A 2023 plan for the area had the College of Education funding land management positions and other budget needs “with the goal of having funding responsibilities taken over by the University of Iowa’s general fund in coming years.” But that never happened.

Dean Clay last year informed his team that UI administrators denied him funding help — a decision he called “disappointing but understandable given the institutional priorities and limited resources.”

With rumors swirling at the time of UI intentions to end its Macbride lease with the Corps — dating back to 1959 — administrators launched a “standard institutional review.”

A 10-member committee was charged with evaluating the finances, academics, and external programming involved in the university’s use of the nature area — which features native woodlands, flood plain ecosystems, remnant and reconstructed prairies, along with rare plant and animal species.

“I very much appreciate the work of the committee and their outreach to potential partners as we explored numerous options,” President Wilson said Thursday.

Members of that committee reported reaching out to “community organizations” to gauge interest in collaborating with the university at one of three levels:

“These community organizations declined the opportunity,” according to the report.

UI officials have not answered The Gazette’s questions about how many community organizations the committee reached out to and which ones specifically.

  Buy Photo

Brad Freidhof, director of the Johnson County Conservation Board, said a committee member reached out about partnership opportunities that came with “some pretty steep costs.”

“From my perspective, the mismanagement that had occurred over the years had led to a lot of those issues,” he said. “Instead of dealing with those issues as preventive maintenance and annual upkeep, they were allowed to degrade. And then it was going to cost a lot of money to make the improvements that were necessary.”

So Johnson County Conservation passed.

“We're not interested to be shackled by the financial burdens that have been created through previous management,” he said. “And so we weren't willing.”

‘That was a push’

Freidhof also questioned the nearly $15 million figure the report laid out as necessary investment — including $6.6 million in road and walkway repairs and more than $800,000 for site-wide cellular coverage.

“The absence of data, phone, and internet service has been identified as a challenge for potential UI student use of MNRA,” according to the report.

But Freidhof said with all the emergency and weather service upgrades, cell service seems like a luxury rather than a need.

“What is the point of going out into a wild area, a natural environment, and being on your phone all the time?” he said. “Society has survived for a lot of years, cellphones are a very new piece of technology, and we probably have some of the best weather service warnings than we ever have had in our history. So I thought that was a push.”

The same goes for the asphalt road, he said, noting, “We also survived for a long time on a lot of gravel roads in the state of Iowa.”

The report could have offered a lower-end of a range of upkeep costs, according to Freidhof.

“It's just like looking at vehicles, right?” he said. “You can get the full package with all of the bells and whistles, or you get the economy package. And I don't think they do anything on the economy basis, usually. And so that's what we're seeing here.”

To the promise to keep programs going, Freidhof said he’ll be interested in what that looks like and where it happens.

“There’s still a lot of questions out there,” he said. “The Johnson County Conservation Board does host some of the schools in our part of the county, at Kent Park, but we don't have the capacity to take on that entire program or the Wildlife Camp programs.

“So I will be interested to see who does have that capacity.”

Vanessa Miller covers higher education for The Gazette.

Comments: (319) 339-3158; vanessa.miller@thegazette.com