From Crain's Detroit Business:

Belle Isle groups considering merger


Belle Isle nonprofits are exploring collaboration in the hopes of attracting more public and private support for the island park.

The Belle Isle Women's Committee, Friends of Belle Isle, Belle Isle Botanical Society and Friends of the Belle Isle Aquarium—which closed in 2005--- are looking at ways to collaborate, including merger, said Sarah Earley, founder and president of the Belle Isle Women's Committee.

"Together we can be stronger than we are individually and get more private and public support," she said.

Since its founding six years ago, the Belle Isle Women's Committee has raised about $2 million through an annual luncheon — which attracted 480 people in May 2010 — at the Belle Isle Casino and two fundraisers at The Henry Ford in Dearborn in conjunction with the Belle Isle Grand Prix in 2007 and 2008.

In the fall of 2009, the group completed its first project on the island's western tip, a two-and-a-half-year effort to tear down a concrete-block comfort station and install sidewalks, a garden, trees, benches, tables and grills.

It's now working on restoring the clay tile roof on the 1800s-vintage horse stables building near the middle of the island, Earley said.

Going forward, the group envisions bicycle rentals on Belle Isle, kayaking and canoeing on its inland canals, a reopened aquarium and horticultural programs for what Earley says is the country's only island park.

The 2.5-mile-long, 985-acre park was designed before the turn of the 20th century by renowned landscape architect Frederick Law Olmsted.

Founded in 1973, Friends of Belle Isle promotes the preservation of natural beauty, restoration and preservation of historical sites and the adaptive use of existing structures on the island.

The group--which has made headlines more recently for opposing a plan by Detroit City Cellars to build a 10-acre vineyard and winery on the island--has opposed numerous developments that didn't comport with the master plan it supported for the island since its founding.

They included construction of an ice/roller rink and a three-pool swimming complex with viewing stands for up to 3,000 people and parking lot in 1976, the use of the island for the Grand Prix in 1989 and placement of gambling casinos there.

By 2007, Friends of Belle Isle had changed tactics.

Instead of fighting the return of the Grand Prix to Detroit after a six-year hiatus with a Belle Isle race, it chose to work with Roger Penske and the Downtown Detroit Parternship to make sure the island's best interests were considered in race planning and that profits would go directly to improve the island.

Subsequently, Detroit Belle Isle Grand Prix Inc., a subsidiary of the partnership, made infrastructure improvements totaling $5.5 million on Belle Isle for the race.

Since then, Friends of Belle Isle has worked on numerous efforts, including those to save the Belle Isle Boat Club and the maintenance building next to the island's "White House."

The Belle Isle Botanical Society raises funds to restore and maintain the Anna Scripps Whitcomb Conservatory, which opened in 1904 and features plants indigenous around the globe as well as an outside Lily Pond Garden and formal perennial gardens.

Those three Belle Isle nonprofits have already worked together with the Detroit Recreation and General Services Departments to remove an invasive plant endangering native plants and the old growth forest on the island.

Friends of the Belle Isle Aquarium formed in 2005 to prevent the city from closing the aquarium.

It remains active despite the building's closure in 2005—101 years after it first opened.

The group hopes to renovate, reopen and operate the historic aquarium.