The La Grange Village Board rejected a special use permit that would allow a medical services company to operate on the first floor of a building in the downtown business district.
The decision came in a 4-2 vote at the board’s March 9 meeting.
Chiropractor Alex Georgiou sought the special use permit to operate a health-focused retail business with accessory medical services including intravenous treatments, hyperbaric oxygen therapy and vitamin B-12 injections in a storefront at 110 W. Calendar. While retail sales would be permitted under the village’s C-1 zoning code, the medical services are not.
“It’s an easy decision,” village President Mark Kuchler said in opposing the proposal. “I don’t believe we should be changing our zoning code for our central business district. Our central business district is only from Sixth to Ashland, Burlington to Cossitt, and in the center is a large parking lot. There’s not that many businesses that are in the central business district. Boards previous to us said we really want to keep this retail and restaurant.”
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Trustees Lou Gale, Peggy Peterson, Timothy O’Brien and Shawana McGee voted against the proposal. Beth Augustine and Glenn Thompson dissented.
Kuchler would only have voted in the event of a deadlocked board, but he made his opposition clear.
“We have a lot of other areas in the village that don’t have those same requirements,” he said. “We’re doing it just for the central business district. It has worked well for the village.
“We have won the awards for having the best suburban downtown. … I don’t see why we would ever change. What’s before us today, we have someone coming in and saying ‘change your whole code in the central business district to allow my business. That’s not how we should be going about the zoning code.”
Kuchler said the move wouldn’t stop Georgiou from operating his business as intended on the second floor of a building in the central business district.
Trustee Shawana McGee agreed, saying the village shouldn’t “change zoning codes just to appease one person.”
Trustee Lou Gale said it’s important to preserve the district’s “retail, restaurant, entertainment core.”
But Trustee Beth Augustine argued that the proposed business fit the village code and was “appealing” to the village’s Plan Commission.
“It’s absolutely retail,” she said, adding that the commission thought the village could “make this fit without damaging existing businesses.”
Augustine pointed out that the village had previously allowed gyms and exercise businesses that had little or no retail components.
“We’ve been making exceptions for years, and one of the reasons we’re making exceptions is that our code is very old,” she said. “It was written when many of these buildings were filled with genuine old school, old fashioned retail. We rarely get applicants anymore that look or feel retail.”
Resident Randy Valenta told the board the medical business would be “a great addition to the La Grange environment.”
“These businesses are growing in the last couple years and becoming very popular,” he said.
Others agreed with the board majority during public comment.
“There’s a hundred other places in the village that that business can go,” said resident Jonathon Robinson.”
Sarah Boyce, former president of the La Grange Business Association, was also leery of the plan.
“I’m a chiropractor that is within 50 feet of that space, and I’ve been in La Grange for over nine years,” she said. “I was told that I could not be on the first floor as a service-based business nine years ago, and I abided by those rules all these years.”
Georgiou declined to comment after the vote.
The next La Grange Village Board meeting will be at 7:30 p.m. March 23 at the La Grange Village Hall, 53 S. La Grange Rd.
Hank Beckman is a freelance reporter for Pioneer Press.