Regarding “A modest proposal for our zoning pilot” [Viewpoints, Josh VanderBerg]: the satire is well-aimed, but it points in the wrong direction.
The letter mocks residents who support Ravi Parakkat’s call for a pilot study by imagining they’d only accept change if it landed on someone else’s block. But that’s not the objection critics of village-wide rezoning have actually raised. The objection is that we’re being asked to rewrite zoning for all 4.7 square miles of Oak Park at once, based on a consultant’s recommendation, without the kind of staged, evidence-based rollout that responsible policymaking usually requires — and without ever putting the question to voters directly, a referendum the board rejected 5-1.
A pilot isn’t a dodge. It’s how you find out whether “missing middle” housing actually produces the affordability, diversity, and accessibility its advocates promise, before you commit an entire village to it. If a pilot in one neighborhood shows the promised benefits, that’s a strong argument for expansion. If it doesn’t, we’ll have saved ourselves from a village-wide mistake. Either way, we’d have data instead of assurances from the same firm that coined “missing middle housing” and stands to benefit from its adoption.
The satire’s real target seems to be affluent neighborhoods that say they support density — until it’s proposed for them. That’s a fair thing to call out wherever it’s true. But using that argument to wave away any pilot, anywhere, isn’t a rebuttal to the idea of testing before we leap. It’s an argument for skipping the test altogether and hoping the results turn out the way Opticos predicts.
If proponents of this rezoning are as confident in the outcome as they say, a real pilot — chosen with genuine criteria, not chosen to make a rhetorical point — should be something they welcome, not something they satirize.
Nice try, JVB!
Chip Popa
Oak Park villager