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player ready...In a move that caught dozens of opponents by surprise, Loyola Academy on April 6 postponed its request for approval of the parking lots it wants to build on two small fields adjacent to its campus.
The last-minute delay came in the wake of charges by project opponents that Loyola has repeatedly violated a 1993 village mandate that its enrollment not top 2,000. The village is investigating those claims this week, according to a Wilmette official.
More than 80 people from neighborhoods near the west Wilmette school – many of them wearing matching green T-shirts – filled the Wilmette Village Hall boardroom to capacity for the night meeting, only to hear Loyola attorney Chris Canning request a case continuation from the Zoning Board of Appeals until May 18.
That prompted a complaint from someone in the audience.
“Obviously, we were unable to get notice to a lot of the people who were interested in this matter,” said Cal Bernstein, who identified himself as “representing some of the objectors.”
“We’d appreciate moving forward that if the applicant decides that they want to continue the matter, that they give us more notice than an hour and a half or two hours before the hearing,” he said.
“That’s all the notice we got,” said Patrick Duffy, ZBA chair.
Canning didn’t say during his brief statement why he’d requested the delay, but said moving the case to May 18 ensured it was the only thing on the Zoning Board’s docket. However, school spokeswoman Robin Hunt said in an email sent shortly after 5 p.m. April 6 that it was to give Loyola officials time to prepare a “formal response” to Wilmette about the alleged enrollment cap violations.
North Shore Citizens to Preserve Green Space, Inc., a group comprised of some residents of neighborhoods west and south of Loyola, sent letters last week to John Adler, Wilmette’s community development director, charging that Loyola has violated the enrollment cap and asking that the village revoke the 1993 zoning permit Loyola won for agreeing to that limit.
Adler said last week that village officials researched the claims and contacted Loyola about them.
“We need to hear back from them, to hear what their explanation is,” he said then.
Project foes say the alleged violations, as well as other issues, should convince Wilmette to deny Loyola’s request to build two parking lots on the fields where two school-owned houses now stand.
Some neighbors living on Manor Drive, Illinois Road and the short east-west cross streets that dead end next to the school have opposed the project, saying the lots will bring more congestion to the area, lower their property values and potentially cause more flooding.
Ariel Weissberg, a spokesman for the North Shore Citizens group, said after the case was continued that turnout by group members would have been double had there not been a concerted effort by neighbors to get word of the postponement out.
New Trier Court resident Sheryl Swibel said after the meeting that concern about the project extends further than the immediate neighborhood, to parents of children who attend Avoca West Elementary School, south and west of Loyola across the Wilmette-Glenview border in Glenview.
“There is in an interest south of Lake Avenue,” because the traffic concerns could impact parents of students who go to Avoca West, she said.
Twitter: @pioneer_kathy