Village President Cathy Adduci is presenting the Madison-Ashland approval as a settled success. Her message is merely damage control for her deciding vote.

On my first day in River Forest, July 2021, my neighbor asked, “Did you know our homes are in a TIF?” I did not. I soon learned I had bought one of the 22 TIF-designated single-family homes in River Forest. It is highly unusual for suburban homes not located in an abandoned or blighted area be included in a Tax Increment Finance District.

That question began five years of forced civic education. I learned the village had purchased two family-occupied, TIF-designated homes around me at below-market value and slated them for demolition. I formed a neighborhood organization to protect our property values. We questioned the demolition of historic property, fought the village over a contractor that exposed neighbors to asbestos, violence, noise, and filth, challenged proposed rezoning and won.

We wrote memos, testified, and commented at every stage to explain what development could work at the edge of our neighborhood. We built the record the Village now wants to gloss over.

And now, after a five-and-a-half-hour board meeting where we again spoke in great numbers, the 4-3 vote revealed that only three trustees listened. The next morning, Village President Adduci sent a self-congratulatory approval announcement full of assurances the record does not support.

The email cited an “extensive review process” covering traffic, density, zoning, and parking. A long process does not equal a sound result. The DRB acknowledged major departures from village zoning codes and “allowances,” i.e., zoning variances in all 11 required categories.

Nine promised conditions are unfinished and untested. Window washing, street cleaning, sidewalks, and construction parking are maintenance and cosmetic mitigation. They do not address the lasting impacts of height, density, shadows, mass, and setbacks that will burden our family homes for life.

A resident traffic committee is a fluffy substitute for serious research. A traffic study only after occupancy, followed by talk of speed bumps and private alley gates, is working backwards. Residents challenged the traffic analysis before the DRB approved the project.

A $300,000 “neighborhood impact fund” contradicts the DRB’s repeated finding of “no adverse effects.” If that is the official position, residents inside the TIF deserve a straight answer: what harm is this fund meant to fix, who gets paid, and why was approval granted before those answers were settled?

The tax promises are just as thin. The announcement says the project will support schools and “stabilize our property taxes,” but gives no projected net fiscal benefit after TIF incentives, school set-asides, and public costs. TIF residents should not be asked to accept vague reassurances instead of solid numbers.

PR-speak such as “certainty,” “renewed energy,” and “vibrant and welcoming” glosses over unresolved zoning, traffic, fiscal, and neighborhood-impact questions.

We do not now and never have opposed development of the Madison-Ashland property. The village called for appropriate development in its 2010 Corridors Study and 2017 Expression of Interest. We asked for the right development at the right size, coordinated with the neighborhood and were compliant with village standards.

This decision affects the quiet enjoyment of my home and my neighbors’ homes. It uses my taxes to build a looming rental structure that permanently and negatively alters the neighborhood. The village swept 22 homes like mine into this TIF, then asked residents to trust a process that minimized what we could see, hear, and prove from our own front porches. The village president’s email shows no humility in her deciding role and disregards constituents who created the record, offered solutions, and still have not received honest answers.

Sources:

Deborah Borman
River Forest

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