Standing by the side of a winding, two-lane road in northern Baltimore County, George Perdikakis looks over miles of nature's green cathedral known as Worthington Valley.
Such a vista could be transplanted from Perdikakis' native Greece, where as a youth he learned to love the land and its bounty while pruning and harvesting in the small olive grove owned by his yia yia on Crete.
For nearly four years as head of Baltimore County's Department of Environmental Protection and Resource Management, he has drawn upon those roots as he walks the often delicate line between land preservation and development.
"He has an Old World, realistic love of the land," said John Bernstein, director of the Maryland Environmental Trust, a state preservation agency that holds easements on 9,728 acres in Baltimore County and 63,700 acres in Maryland.
Politically savvy and well-connected, this perennial bureaucrat, who has held a trifecta of city, state and county jobs, stands out as a colorful advocate for Baltimore County, this year seeking nearly two-thirds of the $25 million available in state Rural Legacy grants to be awarded in September.
"We are committed to preservation," Perdikakis recently told the Rural Legacy board as he lobbied for $16 million on behalf of four diverse parts of the county -- Piney Run, Long Green Valley, a coastal region along Back River Neck and the Gunpowder River watershed.
"We really believe we are models for Smart Growth here in Baltimore County," he explained, referring to the statewide initiative to direct tax dol lars toward areas where roads, sewer and other public services exist.
By whatever name, Perdikakis says he has been living with smart growth for most of his 51 years.
The concept -- a centerpiece environmental issue on the national political agenda -- was part of the culture in Greece where thousands of small villages and towns have maintained their rural character and the country's business activity is focused largely in Athens and Piraeus.
Little did Perdikakis know when he immigrated to the United States at age 18 that his professional legacy here would be set by promoting a way of life that came so naturally in his native land.
"My job is just beginning to put the pristine areas into conservancy," he said. "It's like the appreciation of a tree, an olive tree that you see grow and fill with olives. Then you strip it and make olive oil and the cycle starts again. It needs some loving care that says, 'If you take care of me, I will take care of you' -- and that's what it is all about."
Respect from both sides
Such a mission has earned Perdikakis respect outside Towson, though his boss, County Executive C. A. Dutch Ruppersberger, has a mixed reputation as a conservationist.
"Preserving rural areas as a whole seems a much larger challenge given the county's current political priorities," says Bernstein.
Preservationists and developers agree that Perdikakis listens.
"The best way to characterize him is tough, but he will always give you an opportunity to be heard, which is unique in the environmental community," said Stuart Kaplow, a Towson attorney who frequently represents county developers.
"He has an open door approach to things," said C. Victoria Woodward, a community activist from Upperco and member of the Piney Run Preservation Association.
In addition to rural and agricultural preservation, Perdikakis' office routinely tackles other environmental demands that have included a potentially costly federal Superfund cleanup in Rosedale, extension of public sewer lines into Back River, border spats with Carroll County over sewage discharged by a county treatment plant into the Piney Run watershed, and erosion problems on the Patapsco River near Catonsville.
He also helped initiate a sweeping, three-year study of the Gunpowder River watershed that is nearing completion.
Hands-on style
A busy agenda, coupled with his tenacious hands-on, get-out-of-the-office style, leaves Perdikakis at times stretched thin.
He's known for mood swings that include boisterous temper tantrums that reverberate from his small office filled with family photos, Greek and American flags and a wall of diplomas from the University of Rhode Island, the Johns Hopkins University and Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Arriving there each day about 7: 30 a.m., he is never far from a telephone, especially his constantly chirping cell phone.
"He's truly an American success story," said Baltimore Circuit Judge John C. Themelis, who serves on the parish council of St. Nicholas Greek Orthodox Church in Highlandtown, where Perdikakis has been board president for six years.
"As impatient as he is, there are people on the board who are less patient. He's able to calm everybody down and get consensus through old-fashioned Greek politicking."
John Paterakis, the politically connected owner of H&S; Bakery, helped Perdikakis get his start in public service by recommending the young engineer with a master's degree from Hopkins to then Mayor William Donald Schaefer for a job in the city Department of Recreation and Parks.
"You can pick up the phone and say, 'George, I need your help,' and he'll take care of it. Why? I think he's got a lot of friends and, in most cases, he's doing it for friendship," Paterakis said.
That sentiment is echoed by the Rev. Manuel J. Burdusi, pastor of St. Nicholas, where Perdikakis is working on plans for a multipurpose center on Ponca Street, a project deemed crucial to the urban renewal quest under way in Greektown.
"His love for his church and his heritage drive him," Burdusi said.
Launching career
Perdikakis arrived in the United States and settled with his mother in Cranston, R.I., in 1966. He had no high school diploma and knew one English word: Liberty.
Two years later, his father arrived in the United States, and then his brother immigrated. A fiercely patriotic American, Perdikakis still has a "Love It or Leave It" poster on his wall at home.
He and his wife, Zoe, moved to Baltimore in 1972 because, of a dozen job offers, "Baltimore was closest to Rhode Island."
Since then, he has tried to adhere to the advice of his father, now 86.
"He taught me to work hard and be honest -- to live by the Greek saying, 'Do something right and throw it to the river. Let it go, and eventually it will come back.' When I left Greece, my father didn't have a lot to give me except $50 and those words."
Perdikakis spent 15 years in city transportation and public works offices, becoming director of transportation before being fired by Mayor-elect Kurt L. Schmoke in 1987 in a purge of some of Schaefer's department heads. He moved to the state Department of the Environment as a program analyst.
As a city bureaucrat, he's best remembered for his spirited work to clear roads during the blizzard of 1984 and doubling the traffic fines for speeding on the Jones Falls Expressway.
"He was a real strong, do it now, high standards performance person," said Joseph T. "Jody" Landers III, a former city councilman now with the Greater Baltimore Board of Realtors.
During a stint as director of the nonprofit Maryland Environmental Service, he helped to extinguish the 1992 stump dump fire in Granite by sending in bulldozers to bury the smoldering blaze that had burned for 19 months.
Rebuilding trust
For Ruppersberger, widely considered a likely contender for the Democratic gubernatorial nomination in 2002, Perdikakis is the perfect ambassador.
"I was looking for someone who would get out of bed in the morning and start running, because there has been a lot of distrust between environmental groups and the county," Ruppersberger said. "He has a tremendous ability to communicate and pull people together."
Jack Dillon, head of Valleys Planning Council, an influential Towson land preservation group that frequently has been at odds with the Ruppersberger administration, said:
"He has been surprisingly supportive -- more so than we expected on some issues. He always talks about his roots and says, 'You gotta love the land.' "
While the compliments are flattering, Perdikakis says he can't stop. More work lies ahead.
"The Liberty Reservoir, Prettyboy, the Gunpowder, forests and agriculture -- a $500 million business here annually," he said. "There are pressures, and natural resources are precious. You cannot reclaim a resource. When you lose it, it's gone forever."
Pub Date: 7/12/99