Proponents of public buildings scattered throughout DuPage and Kane Counties were thinking about ground-breaking ceremonies Wednesday after voters in Batavia, Bartlett, Itasca and Bloomingdale gave them the go-ahead to begin multimillion-dollar improvements.
But in many other communities, officials were left to ponder their next moves after voters rejected tax-rate increases that would have funded those improvements or improved services.
In Bartlett, voters approved a $16 million bond issue to begin construction of a community center, while Itasca voters overwhelmingly approved a $10.5 million bond issue to help tackle the village’s estimated $20 million need for infrastructure improvements.
In Batavia, voters agreed to tear down a vacant 83-year-old school building in the heart of downtown and replace it with a 45,0000-square foot library. Bloomingdale voters approved a $4 million request to build a 24,000-square-foot fire station.
Itasca residents agreed to pay for water and wastewater treatment plant improvements with their property taxes, rather than a 51 percent increase in water rates that had been threatened if the bond issue were rejected. Taxes will rise about $103 a year for the owner of a $150,000 home, officials said.
“I don’t like having higher taxes, but there’s nothing we can do,” village resident Pat Tardi said during a recent forum on the matter. “I know the improvements have to be done.”
In Bartlett, 53 percent of the voters agreed to fund a community center that will be built next to the village’s aquatic center. The 129,000-square-foot building, which officials said is needed in part to give adolescents a positive outlet for their energies, will cost the average homeowner an extra $75 a year.
The fate of the old Batavia Junior High School had loomed over that city for years, but it was doomed Tuesday when voters narrowly passed the Batavia Library District’s $8.8 million bond measure to demolish the school and build a library.
Voters, however, turned down a proposed 6-cent tax-rate increase to operate the new facility.
“We are pretty pleased,” said Library Director Margo Cooper. “Obviously, we lost one part, so it’s not undiluted joy, but it certainly feels good to get one of the issues under our belt, so to speak.”
The old school had been vacant for about five years, but some preservationists had hoped to renovate the building. Its fate became a rallying cry for referendum opponents, but voters approved the library proposal by a margin of about 230 votes out of more than 8,000 ballots cast. Construction could begin in 1999, Cooper said.
“Basically, this is the first major referendum the library district has ever passed,” said Cooper, who added the district likely will return to the voters with another rate-increase proposal in two or three years.
Although building bonds fared relatively well in DuPage and Kane, Batavia voters weren’t alone in rejecting rate increases.
More Top Picks Best Folding Electric Wheelchairs
In DuPage, voters in Addison Township, Winfield Township, Bensenville, Glen Ellyn, Bloomingdale and Oakbrook Terrace soundly rejected requests for increases, as did those in the Sugar Grove Park District and the Town and Country Library District in Kane.
It was the second such rejection in as many tries for the library district, which includes Elburn and surrounding areas in central Kane. The district was seeking an increase to equip and operate a new $2.95 million facility that voters approved last year.
For the fourth time in three years, voters turned down more money to expand park operations and hire staff in Sugar Grove. Park District officials had hoped that this time they had reached the voters about the need for a 25-cent hike that would have added about $160 a year to the tax bill of a $200,000 home. But 70 percent of voters turned thumbs down.
In Glen Ellyn, voters turned down a 20-cent tax increase to raise Park District funds that would have gone, in part, toward purchase of the old Maryknoll Seminary property. Park officials had hoped to use the space to build additional playing fields, but they have not ruled out making a similar request during the April municipal election.
In St. Charles, voters agreed to maintain a 28-cent tax rate, instead of lowering it once bonds are paid off.
Elsewhere, Oak Brook voters narrowly approved sale of 3 acres of village-owned property to fund improvements at Oak Brook Golf Club; Wood Dale opted to keep its elected treasurer, rather than swap the position for an appointed one; Clarendon Hills rejected a $4.9 million Park District request to acquire property; and Oakbrook Terrace voters turned down an attempt to turn their city into a village.
And beer drinkers in Sugar Grove Township were hoisting a toast Wednesday after voters approved the sale of alcohol in the township, overturning a 1941 law.