The River Forest Zoning Board of Appeals voted 6-1 against adopting proposed zoning code changes at an April 11 meeting at Concordia College.
The changes, recommended by the EDC and proposed by Houseal Lavigne Associates, which conducted a study of the village’s zoning code, were intended to attract developers by changing zoning requirements in the Village’s C1 (North Avenue,) C2 (Madison Street,) and C3 (Central Commercial) districts.
Among the changes proposed were increasing the maximum height of buildings, changing parking requirements and increasing density in the three districts.
Village Administrator Matt Walsh said that the April 11 meeting, the third meeting that allowed for public comment on the issue, was held at Concordia College to accommodate the number of residents who wanted to attend.
Walsh said that it was the best -attended meeting he’s seen in his tenure in River Forest.
Roughly 160 residents attended in person with at least 50 more attending via Zoom. Walsh said that of the roughly 20 residents who made public comment, “the overwhelming majority were in opposition, with 3 or 4 in support,” of the proposed changes.
Debbie Borman, who organizes the Lathrop, Ashland, Franklin Neighbors Group, said that the group has placed more than 300 yard signs and gathered more than 945 signatures on a petition opposing the changes.
The zoning board will codify its vote at their May 9 meeting. After that, the village board could consider the recommendation at its May or June meeting.
At that meeting, the board could choose to agree with the findings with no changes, tinker with the changes based on feedback, or go ahead with the proposed zoning changes as originally proposed.
Walsh said that the hope would be to have the board’s position available before the meeting so that residents would be aware of the direction the board was going ahead of time.
“We’ll make a point to give notice, and in all likelihood, we will be at a larger venue given the level of public interest in this,” he said.
Village board meeting agendas and packets are available on the village’s website at: www.vrf.us