Politics & Government

Vacant Corner Development Gets Another Year

The Downers Grove Village Council will allow more time for the construction of a BP station planned for 75th and Lemont.

The Village Council is giving the owner of a vacant corner another year to transform the property. The council unanimously approved an ordinance Tuesday that gives  a one-year extension for the development of a BP gas station, convenience store and car wash at the currently vacant corner of 75th Street and Lemont Road.

The council granted an identical extension in March 2010 after the planned development was originally approved in March 2009. Without Tuesday’s ordinance, the planned development amendment and special use would have expired Wednesday.

“It’s important to me that we have a good look at this piece of property because it’s one of the entryways into our village,” Commissioner William Waldack said March 1 during the ordinance’s first reading. “It’s a sad statement that it has not progressed because of the economic times.”

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In a Jan. 26 letter from Atlas Oil's Daniel Soltis to Damir Latinovic of the Community Development Department, the extension was requested and credited to the property’s change of ownership in December 2010 from BP to Atlas. Despite the sale, the planned station will remain a BP station.

According to the letter, the development will not change aesthetically, but will be 2,400 square feet, not 2,900 square feet as originally planned.

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The January letter also said construction is expected to commence early this summer and be completed by the end of the year.

During first-reading discussion, Waldack suggested shortening the extension to keep a shorter leash on the developer.

“If something happens on this property that bothers us—if it is looks embarrassing or if there’s a problem—if it doesn’t break code there’s nothing we can do,” Waldack said.

Commissioners Geoff Neustadt, Marilyn Schnell, and Mayor Ron Sandack all vocally approved of the extension for one year—a time frame Village Manager Dave Fieldman called typical.

“We’ve had a few of these,” Sandack said of the extension, “and they all stemmed from a change in the financial and economic conditions that were totally unanticipated…  It makes no sense to me to deprive a landowner of an improvement they wish to make but are unable to make as expeditiously as everybody would have liked.”

Fieldman said the one-year extension is the maximum allowed by the village code. Tuesday’s action item brought no public comment or council discussion.

Traffic sign inventory:

Commissioner Bob Barnett voiced criticism during his end-of-meeting report Tuesday about a motion in Tuesday’s unanimously passed consent agenda that awarded a $44,100 contract to Mid-West GIS, Inc. of Quincy, IL, to begin the process of meeting federally mandated retro-reflective requirements for all traffic signs.

According to the motion, by January 2012, to meet new “minimum retro-reflectivity requirements” for most traffic signs by January 2015, and to meet the same requirements for street-name signs by January 2018.

 “[In recent years] we’ve seen a lot of angst up here, genuine angst, about items in the $20,000 and under range because we’ve struggled,” Barnett said. “This item basically is a federal mandate for us to spend about $50,000 to try and analyze how reflective our signs are in town.”

Barnett said safety is an important issue for Downers Grove.

“But I also suspect that of the priorities of Downers Grove, retro-reflectivity in 2018 is probably a little down the list,” Barnett said. He admitted there’s nothing the council can do about it.

Waldack also addressed the item in his report, but in support.

“We seem to forget that some of these mandates, some of these things that should be done, just don’t get done because local governments take on this evidently don’t push these things,” said Waldack, who emphasized that the mandate will make for safer driving. “I totally agree that this is a good mandate.”

Sandack sided with Barnett and against what he labeled an “unfunded mandate.”

The first step of the process, according to the motion, is compiling a traffic sign inventory, which is what Mid-West GIS has been hired for.  

In other council action:

  • The council heard the first reading for a resolution authorizing the village to enter an agreement with the Rotary Club of Downers Grove for the “second annual” Grove Fest June 23-26. The Rotary Club will be responsible for paying the estimated $30,480 it will cost to put the event on after it takes place. The festival, according to the resolution, will include “amusement games and rides, food vendors, a beer garden, one stage for musical entertainment, space for not-for-profit organizations, a car show and a craft fair in Fishel Park.” A vote on the resolution is planned for the March 15 council meeting.
  • The One Community 99 slate of District 99 school board candidates—Mike Davenport, Cliff Grammich and Keith Matune—stepped to the public-comment microphone at the beginning of the meeting but were halted by Schnell, who chaired the meeting because Sandack participated electronically from Springfield. Davenport said they only wanted to express their looking forward to working with the council if elected, but Schnell said she felt it was on its way to political campaigning, which is not allowed at a Village Council meeting.
  • The council unanimously approved as a part of its consent agenda a motion to award a contract for watershed improvements at 2nd Street and Cumnor to V3 Construction Group, Inc. of Woodridge. The project necessitated the voluntary village buyout of five homes that will be demolished and will include the construction of a detention basin after the elimination of a portion of Cumnor between 2nd Street and 3rd Street. The winning V3 bid was for $96,550.


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