About Us

Biographical Info

Don Owen grew up in Michigan and attended the United States Naval Academy receiving a degree in Management and Technology. He was commissioned as an Ensign in the United States Navy in 1978, attended flight school, and was designated a Naval Flight Officer a year later. During is Naval career, he received five promotions to the rank of Commander, was awarded seventeen personal and unit decorations, and amassed over 1800 flight hours and 500 aircraft carrier arrested landings.

Since joining the Village of Glenview in 1995, Don has worked on a variety of high profile projects in the community. Initially, he was assigned as Director of Economic Redevelopment and directed the conversion of the 1121-acre former Glenview Naval Air Station, now known as The Glen, from military to civilian use. His responsibilities included coordinating six work divisions for the project: environmental remediation, land conveyance, master planning, infrastructure design and construction, finance, and marketing. The Glen is nationally recognized as a “model” for base closure success and contains approximately 2,200 residential units, 1 million square feet of retail, 1 million square feet of office, and over 400 acres of open space. The Glen is now home to over 5,500 new residents and provides over 5,000 jobs.

In 2005, Don was promoted to Director of Capital Projects and assumed additional responsibilities for developing and implementing the $70+ million 5-year Capital Improvement Program for the Village of Glenview, which includes all public roads, utilities, and facilities. In 2007, he was promoted to his current position of Deputy Village Manager and assumed additional responsibilities including performing Village liaison functions with the Glenview Public Library for a $28.3 million new library project, developing and tracking legislative initiatives to pursue state and federal grants, and co-chairing the Village-wide process evaluation and efficiency team (PREET). The PREET is responsible for studying various functions and processes in the six Village departments (Police, Fire, Administrative Services, Development, Support Services, Capital Projects, and Public Works) and making recommendations to the Board of Trustees for improvements. For him, the best part of working for the Village of Glenview is the ability to affect the type of community that Glenview is: he influences the quality of public services, the types of businesses that locate in Glenview, and the relationships with the other public organizations in the community.

Visitors to the Village of Glenview will see how municipal government is organized and functions. They will get to see several types of jobs and how they help provide a safe and wonderful place to live.