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Politics & Government

Village Board Addresses Golf District and Blizzard

On Monday evening the Village Board of Trustees meeting becomes quite spirited with talk of the Blizzard of 2011 and the potential sale of the Golf District School.

On a night most couples reserve for romantic dinners and candlelight, the Village Board of Trustees had their regular Monday meeting, sans valentines but with some emotion from the audience.

Village President Dan Staackmann read a press release stating the village board’s stance regarding the controversial issue of whether of not the Golf School District 67 should choose to sell Golf Middle School.

“The village has no jurisdiction over selling the school district or the property. The village does have the ability to assist the school district if they do decide to sell,” Staackmann said.

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Having proactively looked into the possible outcome of the school district selling the property, Staackmann said that the new business could conservatively generate $200,000 in real estate taxes and $500,000 in sales tax revenue each year for the village.

"With this kind of revenue opportunity the village would be negligent if it did not look at those benefits,” he said. “It is not the job of the village to sell the school. However, the village has taken on the job of doing the research and presenting the facts to hopefully help the school district make a rational and informed decision.”

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Several residents stood up to made comments in response to the press release.

Some audience-members said they first heard of this plan on Jan. 27 on the page five article of the Morton Grove Champion.

A resident claimed that the village board made a statement about the sale of the Golf school early on by offering to pay for the full cost of the study if the school goes through with the proposed deal, but only half if it remained in its current location.

“We are not promoting the sale, I have never promoted the sale and I don’t think anyone up here [has],” Trustee Bill Grear said.  

“If they wish to sell that building and consolidate as I said in this press release, the village has somebody who wants to buy the property,” Staackmann said. “Whether it’s a car dealership, a grocery store or a shoe store, whatever it may be with the tools that we have at hand, if we can offset the costs to the school district – which would save the school district, taxpayers' money and ensure quality education – we’re here to help. If they decide not to do it, they decide not to do it.”

“We’re not trying to sell 67’s property,” Grear said. “You should be talking to 67 about this issue.” Please refer to Patch coverage on the proposed sale, such as this on the most recent meeting last Thursday.

Department of Public Works Director Andy DeMonte also addressed the board and broke down the Blizzard of 2011 for public works.

Blizzard of 2011 by the numbers

  • 20.2 inches of snow
  • Worked 4 a.m. Tuesday to 6 p.m. Wednesday – 38 straight hours – with three two-hour breaks
  • Plowed the entire city five times; alleys two and a half to three times
  • 3894.5 miles driven
  • 440 tons of salt at a cost of $26,668
  • 1,795 gallons of gas, $5,505
  • 540 overtime man hours at cost of $40,096  -- 20 percent of 2011 budget

DeMonte also noted that the village may be reimbursed in total or part of the total cost of the cleanup by the Federal Emergency Management Association. The department was asked to provide an estimate for their highest 48-hour time period which DeMonte told the board cost $142,330 for the cleanup.

One of the problems, DeMonte said, was misunderstanding about public works policies and procedures, especially regarding the plowing of driveway aprons.

DeMonte said they received numerous calls for this issue.

Officials said that they had no policy of clearing out these areas, but that it has occurred in the past.

The department also experienced some equipment breakdowns, but nothing out of the ordinary for fighting a storm on this nature, DeMonte said. He added that the department was still cleaning up the streets after the blizzard on Feb. 12.

“We didn’t have one vehicle collision, accident, 1050,” Fire Chief Tom Friel told the board.

They did receive an EMS call during the storm that required extra help from the Public Works Department.

“Our ambulances just are not made to penetrate that amount of snow,” Friel said. 

According to Friel, as the ambulance geared up to leave the house, it got stuck. They made one phone call to DeMonte’s public works, and a plow quickly arrived to clear the road for the bus. 

“Less than a minute later a public works plow got them unstuck and got the patient off to the hospital,” Friel said. “They probably didn’t even know it, but now they do.”

At the meeting Morton Grove resident Janice Cha was appointed to the Community Relations Commission.

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