Dinelli earns national environmental award
The Golf Course Superintendents Association of America (GCSAA) board of directors has selected Dan Dinelli, GCSAA certified golf course superintendent at North Shore Country Club in Glenview, Ill., to receive its 2009 President’s Award for Environmental Stewardship.
Dinelli, a third-generation golf course superintendent, has been at North Shore Country Club for 34 years. He is a staunch supporter of integrated pest management (IPM) and an advocate for new practices to reduce the inputs needed to provide competitive golf turf conditions. Dinelli is also involved with developing means of measuring the value of a golf facilities’ ecological and economic value of carbon sequestration.
“Dan is known by his colleagues as a critical thinker and continually works to apply practical environmental management to golf,” said GCSAA President David S. Downing II, CGCS. “He is committed to the science of golf course management and is on the forefront of many advances in the business. He is highly respected by his peers and is very deserving of this award.”
The award will be presented during the Opening Session at the 2009 GCSAA Education Conference, Thursday, Feb. 5, 2008. The conference (Feb. 2-7) will be held in conjunction with the Golf Industry Show (Feb. 5-7) at the New Orleans Morial Convention Center.
The GCSAA President’s Award for Environmental Stewardship was established in 1991 to recognize “an exceptional environmental contribution to the game of golf: a contribution that further exemplifies the golf course superintendent’s image as a steward of the land.”
A 26-year GCSAA member, Dinelli has served on the association’s Environmental Programs Committee for the past five years and as chair of the IPM Task Group. A portion of this work resulted in a research proposal to create a national IPM template. The project began in 2007 and is expected to be available for use in 2009. Dinelli is also working with GCSAA on the Pesticide Characteristics Project – a tool that will allow superintendents to assess the environmental characteristics of pesticide products.
Dinelli has also provided two case studies for GCSAA’s online database, EDGE. One describes a pond restoration project at North Shore Country Club. The other is about an innovative program through the American Forests organization called CITYgreen software that provides an evaluation of the carbon storage and sequestration, stormwater runoff reduction, and energy conservation via the cooling effect and air quality improvements due to the forest areas of a golf facility, calculating dollar benefits for the services provided by the trees and other green space.
Dinelli holds two associate degrees from William Rainey Harper College in Palatine, Ill., one in park and grounds management and one in horticulture, as well as a two-year turfgrass management certificate from Michigan State University. He is a past president of the Chicagoland Association of Golf Course Superintendents and is also an active member of the Midwest Association of Golf Course Superintendents (MAGCS). A three-time winner of the MAGCS’s Ray Gerber Editorial Award for excellence in journalism, Dinelli is a frequent contributor to Golf Course Management, Club & Resort Business, Green Section Record, Golf Inc., Golf Course Industry, TurfNet, Golfdom, and various GCSAA chapter and state golf association publications.
He has co-authored several technical research papers that have been peer-reviewed and published, and contributed to many more. Dinelli has assisted with the production of upcoming environmental programming on the Golf Channel and is a regular presenter at conferences and colleges. Dinelli has won multiple GCSAA/Golf Digest Environmental Leaders in Golf Awards, as well as several regional environmental stewardship awards. He earned his Master Gardener designation from the University of Illinois and he has achieved Audubon Cooperative Sanctuary Program certification for North Shore from Audubon International.
Dinelli is also a registered falconer and breeds red-tailed hawks, donating them for educational programs to be free flown in front of an audience. Some of his hawks are located at Disney World’s Wild Animal Park, Dollywood, Six Flags Over Texas, the Minnesota Zoo, a Birds of Prey show in Wisconsin and an exhibit in Germany.
The GCSAA Education Conference, held in conjunction with the Golf Industry Show, is the largest educational conference in the turfgrass management industry. More than 120 seminars and 60 additional hours of educational sessions are offered, covering all ranges of golf course management, including agronomics, communication and business management.
GCSAA is a leading golf organization and has as its focus golf course management. Since 1926, GCSAA has been the top professional association for the men and women who manage golf courses in the United States and worldwide. From its headquarters in Lawrence, Kan., the association provides education, information and representation to more than 21,000 members in more than 72 countries. GCSAA’s mission is to serve its members, advance their profession and enhance the enjoyment, growth and vitality of the game of golf. The association’s philanthropic organization, The Environmental Institute for Golf, works to strengthen the compatibility of golf with the natural environment through research grants, support for education programs and outreach efforts. Visit GCSAA at www.gcsaa.org.
-30-
GCSAA President’s Award for Environmental Stewardship past recipients
Contact:
Greg Lyman, GCSAA director of environmental programs, at 800-472-7878 or glyman@gcsaa.org
Dan Dinelli, CGCS, North Shore Country Club, at 847-724-4963 or ddinelli@aol.com
