The City of Warrenville has published a tentative schedule of events before potentially approving the supply of City services to the proposed Forest Preserve Fleet Maintenance Building industrial complex at the intersection of Williams and Mack Roads. The final approval meeting – if it gets that far – is tentatively scheduled on May 21, 2012; see the “Potential 2012 Forest Preserve District IGA” item on Warrenville’s website. We appreciate the efforts of the City – its Mayor and Staff – to follow through on their promise to keep the public informed and to maintain an improved level of government transparency … especially when compared with our many years of our experience with the Forest Preserve on this issue. Please read the schedule, and voice your opinions at all of the upcoming meetings.
This may be our last chance, short of legal action, to stop this industrial complex planned for our neighborhood. An affirmative decision by the Warrenville City Council could have long lasting detrimental effects on the Williams and Mack Road areas – including the immediate construction of a 29,000 square-foot 3-story industrial-style Fleet Maintenance building, the expansion of a recently completed compressed natural gas station at the intersection, as well as the eventual construction of two more buildings south of the intersection in the area currently occupied the Forest Preserve Nursery.
The construction of water (and perhaps sewer) lines from Batavia Rd. to Mack Rd. could lead to the eventual annexation of the Williams Rd unincorporated areas into the City of Warrenville with its increased real estate tax levy. While the City says it is not their policy to “force annex” anyone, this is only a policy, and can be changed at any time based on the whim of the incumbent politicians without citizen vote. There was recently such a case near Herrick Road in 2002 as reported by the Chicago Tribune. So unless the City of Warrenville has an Ordinance against forced annexation the policy could change without notice. The current north-Williams Road area is just beyond the forced annexation limit of 60-acres and is therefore in danger of forced annexation as permitted by State law.
We also request the City of Warrenville to conduct public (both incorporated and unincorporated) Citizen input and hearings after a tentative “Memorandum of Understanding” is formulated with the Forest Preserve. We feel that we should be afforded more than the 48-hour State mandated notice to study any proposed agreement. We believe a period of at least 2-weeks should be allotted after notification for citizens to study and comment. This is similar to what the Warrenville Staff and Council Members have to study documents. We believe this is the appropriate process and mirrors the many public meetings and hearing afforded the Citizens of Warrenville on recent development and tax increase issues. We trust that the City of Warrenville will not “railroad” the unincorporated citizens to the advantage of the incorporated citizens – especially if you wish to “court” the unincorporated citizens to eventually join the City of Warrenville.
We applaud the efforts by the City of Warrenville to be open and transparent. We believe that if the City does its “due diligence” and weighs the financial incentives offered in the “quid pro quo” from Forest Preserve vs. the selling out of it’s unincorporated residents, and increased Forest Preserve real estate taxes for its residents, that the City will do the right thing. Does the City really think that the Forest Preserve will install “improvements” for the City of Warrenville without raising taxes on the Warrenville and DuPage County Citizens? It can’t happen – the money has to come from somewhere – especially since the cost of approximately 1.5 mile water line will have to be absorbed totally by both DuPage County and Warrenville Residents (and not by the mostly unincorporated residents along the route). The City should require the Forest Preserve District to disclose its funding plans.
Has the City polled its residents that will be impacted by these bike trails next to their property offered by the Forest Preserve and understand if they want these “improvements”?
As we have documented many times on this website, there are alternative properties for the proposed Fleet Maintenance Building that have ready access to full water and sewer facilities, within Forest Preserve owned properties, and that are already zoned for commercial/industrial purposes and that are not adjacent to residential properties. The City of Warrenville and/or the Forest Preserve will have to pay for a 3/4-mile water line extension from the Morris Ct. intersection on Williams Rd to the Mack Rd. and the Williams Rd. intersections and the another approximately 3/4-mile spur-loop to the west on Mack Rd. to Rt. 59 to complete the necessary water-line loop to assure fire protection. So it is obvious that this 1.5-mile Warrenville water line extension will have to be paid for by the City of Warrenville and/or the DuPage County residents in general. Very few of the residents along the 1.5-mile path have expressed any interest in City water.
The question for the City of Warrenville should be is “where is the Forest Preserve going to come up with the money for this multi-million $ project? The Forest Preserve has offered “quid pro-quo” improvements for Warrenville “park” improvements. We urge the City to consider the long-term maintenance cost … i.e., which cost more, the maintenance of a bike trail, or the maintenance of water and sewer lines? You can not estimate Forest Preserve water line maintenance costs based upon their water usage … their usage will be small since they are basically asking for water based on fire protection needs. Therefore, maintenance costs for long extension can not be recovered by water usage cost alone. The Forest Preserve Fleet Maintenance Building water usage will be small until they build the deer processing plant facility. We trust that the City of Warrenville has the financial cost analysis resource professionals available on their staff to make these cost/benefit decisions.
While this proposal from the Forest Preserve may seem like “free money” for the Citizens of Warrenville the money will actually come from the Citizens of Warrenville via their Forest Preserve accessed real estate taxes … there are no “free ride” options available … taxes will ultimately be increased for the Warrenville residents to support the Forest Preserve unjustifiable request.
Please attend the next Warrenville City Council Meeting on this subject. The Warrenville City Council Meetings are a breath of fresh air and you will be respected and your comments will be recorded … and hopefully listened to. Their meetings are on local cable channels and are available on the web for later viewing. Just check out the Forest Preserve weekly meeting comments and video’s ….. OOP’s, sorry, they don’t exist, even though they spend a lot more of your taxpayer dollars than does the City of Warrenville. Go figure. The Forest Preserve does not summarize Citizen comments from their public comments portion of the meeting. The City of Warrenville gives a detailed synopsis.
“Houston … we have a problem” … with the Forest Preserve. Hopefully the City of Warrenville will be able to cut through the opaque and muddy explanations of the Forest Preserve with respect to the Blackwell Mack Road plans for the future. A simple automobile drive to the intersections to view the gas station in the midst of a pristine open area should at least produce some questions.
The Forest Preserve will respond “it was already a disturbed” area when we began installing industrial buildings. Ask who disturbed it? … The answer … the dinosaurs, a woolly mammoth excavated from McKee Marsh and now displayed in a Chicago museum, the Native Americans whose extensive arrow head collections were collected by the Mack family, an American family that farmed the area and passed on the land to the Forest Preserve, and finally “disturbed” by the Forest Preserve of DuPage County that has constructed industrial-style buildings, and who have dumped building materials on the site …. so who has “disturbed the area? … YES, the woolly mammoths, the Native Americans, the American farmers who farmed the land, and the Forest Preserve, you be the judge. The area that has been “disturbed” by Forest Preserve can easily be returned to its initial condition, probably within several weeks.
The bottom line: we request that City of Warrenville hold public hearings to solicit public comment on any proposed “memorandum of understanding” for an Intergovernmental Agreement (IGA) with the Forest Preserve District regarding extension of Warrenville City services to the Forest Preserve Industrial Complex at the intersection of Williams and Mack Roads and that its citizens and the citizens of the surrounding communities be given more than the 48-hour statutory notice requirement.
[Since websites frequently remove and change their information and links, you can find the original Warrenville schedule of events as published on their website here for historical purposes. Please check current City of Warrenville website for current information. See The City > Community Development > Related Services Pages > Current Development Projects > Potential 2012 Forest Preserve District IGA]