An eight-foot-tall chain link fence near Highland Park that some are calling unsightly has become a matter of contention between Lake County officials and the company that manages military housing near Fort Sheridan.
Lake County officials say the fence needs to come down because it’s unsafe and unattractive. But representatives of the public-private venture that owns the property say the fence protects the private land they hope to soon sell.
“It looks like an industrial zone and it creates a no-man’s land between military housing and our community,” said Steve Mandel, the Lake County board member representing Highwood and Highland Park. “It’s ugly as heck.”
Though still standing, the fence appears to be in disrepair, with sections dog-eared, leaning and overtaken by climbing vines.
It extends about two-tenths of a mile along both sides of Patten Road, a private roadway that connects the town of Fort Sheridan and the 209-home military subdivision managed by Midwest Family Housing, a partnership between the U.S. Navy and the private corporation Forest City Enterprises.
While the road and surrounding land are private, they’re considered part of the unincorporated area of Lake County. Last week, the county issued a warning to Forest City Enterprises that the fence both violates the height limit of six feet in a residential area and was built without a permit, said Eric Waggoner, Lake County’s director of planning, building and development. .
If the matter’s not resolved soon, it could lead to violations, fines and, if all else fails, circuit court, Waggoner said.
“As far as we’re concerned, this is a simple fix,” Waggoner said. “If they feel the need to have a fence there, they have to comply with the height restrictions in the zoning code.”
Mandel also said the lack of a sidewalk or a walking path along Patten forces pedestrians to walk in the road. The county could help pay for such an improvement, he said, but first the fence needs to come down.
“It’s a very unsafe situation,” Mandel said.
No money is budgeted to take down the fence, said John Hoyt, vice president of development for Forest City Enterprises. As for pedestrians, they can walk along the trails in the adjacent Openlands Lakeshore Preserve if they’re hoping to travel parallel to Patten Road, he said.
The fence serves an important purpose, Hoyt said.
“We need to protect that asset and keep people from dumping there,” he said. “We did not intend to keep the fence up this long, but unfortunately the market crashed.”
When Midwest Family Housing formed to provide military housing near Fort Sheridan in 2006, Hoyt said, the 32 acres that remain undeveloped along Patten Road were earmarked for sale.
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The proceeds, he said, would have gone toward the operations and management of Midwest Family Housing, which includes about 1,700 housing units in Illinois, Indiana and Tennessee.
But since the recession, the property has languished on the market.
Now, Hoyt said, Midwest Family Housing is in “various stages of negotiations” with multiple developers and he’s asking for patience. A project could be coming soon, he said. If the land were to be sold and developed, the project would need to be approved jointly by Highwood and Highland Park, as per an agreement made in 1996.
“The future has never been brighter than right now,” Hoyt said.
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