The Town of Gardiner mourns Jean-Ann McGrane, a community leader with a passion for preserving land and open space. She died on March 16 at Vassar Brothers Medical Center in Poughkeepsie. She was 73.

A Rhode Island native, she was born August 1, 1950.

McGrane was the Chair of the Gardiner Open Space Commission for the past five years and recently spearheaded the Community Preservation Fund campaign to raise funds for open space preservation in Gardiner.

“She advocated for the protection of the environment and treated everyone with respect and kindness,” read a post on the Town of Gardiner’s website. “She was a powerful force with great shoes to fill and she will be dearly missed.”

McGrane served as Newburgh City Manager from 2006 to 2009, becoming the city’s 44th manager and – to date – the only woman to hold the position. In Newburgh, she saw the city’s vast waterfront as an asset, and empty buildings as potential. She sought to attract more artists and developers to fill these voids.

It would lead to her downfall. Critics accused her of funneling grant money earmarked for the city’s homeless, into waterfront development.

She oversaw environmental regulation, natural resource conservation initiatives and campground management for the Hudson Valley as the regional director of the New York State Department of Environmental Conservation.

She was the president of her consulting organization, J.A. McGrane and Associates in Gardiner for more than 10 years specializing in conservation and economic development issues.

McGrane also became the CEO of the Girl Scouts of Rhode Island in 2011, which served 11,900 girls, grade K-12, and 3,400 adults in Rhode Island, Pawcatuck, Conn., and 13 communities in southeastern Massachusetts, according to Providence Business News.

She obtained her bachelor’s degree from Wellesley College, a master’s degree in public health from the University of Illinois and a juris doctor from Rutgers University.

“She was such a go-getter, she got things done, she got people organized. She really knew how to bring people together to accomplish whatever it was that we needed. She certainly was a champion for Open Space in Gardiner,” said Joan Parker, Chairperson of the Gardiner Environmental Conservation Commission and member of the Modena Trucking Terminal and Warehouse Study Committee, where McGrane was also a member. “She will be surely missed. I don’t know who’s going to fill her shoes. It’s the community’s loss. She did so many great things and we have that to continue to build off of.”