Oak Park’s village board won’t get the chance to weigh in on one of Oak Park’s hottest topics until after the municipal election.
The village board will not review an updated plan for the construction project that will move the Oak Park Police Department into a new building and make updates to Village Hall until a special session sometime next month. The discussion had long been scheduled for Tuesday, March 18’s board meeting, the body’s final meeting before voters head to the polls.
With the village president’s seat and several trustee seats up for grabs in April 1’s local election, the special meeting will be a lame duck session for at least one member of the current board.
Village President Vicki Scaman said the scheduling change is “disappointing,” but necessary. Village staff wanted more time to review the architectural consultant’s report so that they could fully understand the impact that the proposal would have on property taxes before bringing the proposal before the board, Scaman said.
“I’m proud of the fact that we’re a board that does its due diligence, and that nothing that’s not fully thought out would be acceptable to us,” she said. “I think it’s important that the seven people that are sitting at the board table right now still be the ones to get to vote on the project that they have been working on for the last year.”
The date for the special session has not yet been set.
The village hall debate has become a central issue for the village president election, as Scaman and her opponent, Trustee Ravi Parakkat, have presented dramatically different pictures of what the construction project would cost the village. Scaman holds that it’s been her priority and the will of the entire board that the total cost of the project be kept as close to $100 million as possible, while Parakkat contends that the project would balloon to at least $140 million if continued under Scaman’s leadership.
The discussion of the project has dominated several candidate forums between the two.
Parakkat said that he’d excepted Tuesday’s meeting to be well attended by prospective voters.
“This issue is incredibly significant to every single person living in Oak Park,” Parakkat said. “It has the potential to price people out.”