The size, scope, cost, impact and even the need for a proposed Ackerman Park construction project were questioned Thursday, April 10 as a half-dozen Glen Ellyn Park District and village staff members tried their best to respond.
But there was one question for which there was no immediate answer: What can residents do to stop it?
Close to 100 people, undaunted by rain showers, attended the public meeting to discuss and largely oppose this summer’s Ackerman Park project.
Plans call for constructing two soccer fields on less than 3 acres of wooded area in the southwest corner of Ackerman Park. One would be a full-sized, full-time soccer field, and the other would double as a dry detention pond that would funnel rain water out of the area.
The construction of that soccer field-cum-detention pond would free up the area’s current target of rain runoff: a plot of land north of the Walgreens, 840 N. Main St.
After the Ackerman project is finished — tentatively set for the end of July — the village would look to sell the plot near Walgreens, the revenue from which would offset the cost of building the two soccer fields.
Thursday’s informational meeting was convened after some residents, with letters to public officials and newspaper letters to the editor, made their disapproval known in the last few weeks.
Those who spoke at the meeting aired doubts about many aspects of the plan, but their opposition boiled down to concerns about clearing a swath of forest that includes about 340 trees.
Post-construction plans call for 108 “trees and shrub clusters” to be replanted, and the Park District intends to add an additional 250 trees and shrubbery to Ackerman Park in the next five years.
But many Thursday night were unconvinced that the new plants would be enough to replace the naturally developed copse.
“It’s not an abandoned gas station (that the village is clearing); it’s woods,” said resident Melissa Creech.
Cost estimates also came under fire, particularly the village’s assurance that taxpayers would not bear the financial burden.
The project pricetag is $467,000, and the sale of the Walgreens plot would fetch $465,000, according to a 2007 appraisal.
But, resident Liza Sury said, anyone who has sold a home knows that the actual sale price can fall short of estimates.
“This ‘no cost to the community’ is really a red herring,” Sury said.
For more than 90 minutes, the village and Park District officials tried to respond to questions, but some of the issues were beyond their grasp.
Broader questions — like those about Glen Ellyn’s philosophy on conservation, for instance — were better suited for village decision-makers, said Public Works Director Joe Caracci.
Resident Jay Kinzler noted this in what was the night’s penultimate comment.
The officials responding to questions were staff members, not policymakers, and they have no say to halt the project, Kinzler said. Instead, it is the elected officials who should receive residents’ ire, he said.
Kinzler, an unsuccessful candidate for village president in 2005, rattled off the names of village board members who he thought would be sympathetic to the residents’ cause — especially, he said, “if they see you all show up at a village meeting.”
Four residents took Kinzler up on his suggestion and spoke about Ackerman at Monday’s, April 14 Village Board meeting.
The messages were reiterations from last week’s public meeting: doubt about whether the need for soccer fields and a detention pond outweighs the importance of naturally developed trees.
Village President Vicky Hase said that not only would the detention pond address the area’s needs for at least the next 25 years, but it also has the added bonus of not requiring a tax hike.
“One of our biggest complaints that we receive is of stormwater problems,” she said.
Hase added that the village’s interest is in creating a detention pond; concerns about the need for soccer fields should be directed to the elected officials on the Park District Board of Commissioners, she said.
