Editor’s Note: This article was updated on Sept. 15, 2025, to remove the name Discovery Woods. That is how former park officials referred to the forest. That is not what the park will be named.
MOUNT VERNON — With the stroke of a pen, an endeavor 30 years in the making came to fruition last month, enriching the Knox County Park District by 165 acres.
The old-growth forest surrounds the Mount Vernon Developmental Center on the north, east, and south.
“It would certainly be considered one of the oldest forests in Knox County. My understanding is that it has been state property since the state became a state, so it has never been in private hands,” park district director David Heithaus said.
“I’m certain that it was timbered at least once, but probably back around the time Ohio became Ohio. So you have trees that are easily 150, 200, 200-plus years old. Oaks, hickories, beech, maple — the heart of the old growth — is pretty special.”
Discussions to acquire the forest from the Ohio Department of Developmental Disabilities began in the 1990s. On Aug. 27, Heithaus handed over a $1 check and took possession of the deed.
Heithaus said he expected the transaction to occur as part of a bulk land transfer. Instead, it was a single item included in House Bill 497, signed by Gov. Mike DeWine on Jan. 8.
“I think that’s been the whole holdup. You need an act of the legislature,” he said. “You need to get it into a bill that’s actually going to pass the House and the Senate, and then the governor approves it.”
‘The stars just aligned’
While Heithaus said he is happy his signature is on the land transfer, he credits his park district predecessors and local land conservationists with doing the work to acquire the forest.
“A lot of it had to do, if I’m reading it correctly, with who was in what [legislative] position at what time,” he explained. “That kind of dictated what the appetite for actually going through with this was.”
He credits former park director Lori Totman, who retired in December 2023, along with other key people with “getting the right people in the room.”
“I think it’s important to stress that the current park district administration is standing on the shoulder of several giants. I’m grateful to the people who brought us to this point.”
David Heithaus, director of the Knox County Park District
“They got our elected representatives out to the property, got them to see it with their own eyes,” Heithaus said. “I think everybody saw the value in the space as a natural resource and the value of the space as a public park.
“The stars just aligned under Lori’s watch,” Heithaus added.
‘A phenomenal public park’
Forests of this size and age are rare in the state and provide critical habitat for a variety of plants and animals.
“This is going to be a phenomenal public park with resources we just don’t have anywhere else,” Heithaus said.
“What makes it so special for me is the age more than the variety, and the age reflected in size. It has a healthier understory than a lot of forests that have seen more frequent timber management.”
The understory is everything underneath the tree canopy. Heithaus said a healthy forest has oaks, hickories, or beech trees growing to replace older trees that are losing limbs or dying.
“Not all forests are equal in Knox County when it comes to that kind of recruitment, and this one is better than most of them,” he said.
Although he has not conducted a detailed survey of the understory plants, Heithaus said some areas would be conducive to spotted salamanders.
The oldest section is close to the Mount Vernon Developmental Center. Heithaus said the park district will do its utmost to ensure privacy for the center.
“We want to focus public use in the park-appropriate areas so that we don’t have people accessing the property through the developmental center campus,” he said.
“We want to be the best possible friendly, agreeable neighbors that we can, and so far, all of these interactions have been very positive.”
The park district will maintain a buffer zone between MVDC and park district property. It will not develop trails or facilities in that zone, nor will any prescribed deer management take place there.
Planned park improvements
The main entrance will be north of the developmental center off of Vernonview. Visitors can access the park via a smaller entrance on Upper Gilchrist Road.
Heithaus said the first step is the Vernonview access, which involves building a bridge over a creek.
Heithaus hopes to have the driveway and parking lot completed in time for an October event recognizing the park’s 30th anniversary.
He acknowledged the timeline is ambitious, but not impossible. The park district is already discussing development with other community organizations.
The park features an existing 1-mile trail that an Eagle Scout developed in the 1990s. Plans call for a second trail approximately 1.25 miles in length.
Eventually, the goal is to pave a portion of the trail.
According to the legislation, “the park developed at the site must be accessible and inclusive to persons of physical and mental disabilities.”
“The trick is to get people who are mobility challenged back to the old section of the forest. But who knows. If we find the right partner in the community who’s interested in helping facilitate that kind of project, anything’s possible,” Heithaus said.
“It’s great to protect a little bit more land … and open it for the public to see it. That’s what it’s all about: letting anybody who can walk, run, wheel, or crawl get in there and see some of the oldest trees they’re likely to see in the state.”
The land reverts to the state at the sole discretion of the directors of the Department of Administrative Services and Department of Developmental Disabilities if it is no longer being used exclusively for park purposes.
The park district will manage it as a low-impact, natural resource destination.
