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W E D N E S D A Y

August 5, 2026 Vol. 47, No. 6

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JOURNAL @oakpark

of Oak Park and River Forest

Planning for new north fire station OK’d by Oak Park board

Page 10

Stalled West Sub deal would oust Prasad, bring new owner

Village trustees recommend finding a larger site

By SYDNEY LOVAN Reporting Intern

Plans for a new Fire Station 2, or the North Station, are underway after a vote

by Oak Park’s village board at a special meeting on July 28.

The existing station, 212 Augusta, dates back to the early 1900s and once housed a horse stable at the back of the building.

The village hired Cordogan Clark, an architecture and planning firm, to conduct a space-needs analysis and conceptual planning study of the aged fire station over a year ago as part of the 2026 capital improvement budget. The study found that the current building does not provide sufficient space for the staff or equipment necessary to operate up to current professional standards.

The analysis identified three key criteria for the station which are the addition of an Advance Life Support Ambulance crew, overall safety improvements for the staff and providing enhancements to help recruit and retain new staff which is a struggle seen around Illinois.

Based on expected occupancy and best practices, they found that the building

Welch’s Proviso history resurfaces

Ramco motion accuses Prasad of bad faith; joint statement absolves him of blame for hospital debacle

By BILL DWYER Contributing Reporter

SYDNEY LOVAN

and out of especially when moving quickly.

“There used to be a stable for horses in back of the property,” said Nathan Melotte, managing director of Cordogan Clark.

“This building was designed for a 1900s fire department, so very different needs have

The lawsuit between Resilience Healthcare owner and West Sub Hospital CEO Manoj Prasad and his landlord Ramco Healthcare and owner Reddy Rathnaker Patlola may have moved closer to a settlement Friday.

The settlement was initially agreed to by Prasad and Patlola in late May. Through his multiple attorneys, Prasad has since objected to the terms of the settlement. However, if the settlement is approved by Cook County Chan-

See FIRE STATION on page 12

See WEST SUB on page 14

Managing Director of Cordogan Clark Nathan Melotte, left, and Oak Park Fire Chief JT Terry present plans for a new Fire Station 2 at a special meeting on July 28. should be about 6,500 square feet while the existing building is only about 3,500 square feet.

The current two-story building with a partial basement was originally built in 1917 when the department still used horsecarts, so the bay sizes are not adequate for modern-day fire engines to easily move in

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OPRF track needs resurfacing after JOURNAL just three years W E D N E S D A Y

of Oak Park and River Forest

General Manager Max Reinsdorf

Senior Audience Manager Stacy Coleman

Under warranty, repairs done at no cost to the high school

News Intern Sydney Lovan Viewpoints Editor Ken Trainor

By BOB SKOLNIK

Real Estate Editor Lacey Sikora

Contributing Reporter

The less than three-year-old outdoor track at Oak Park and River Forest High School is shut down for two weeks as workers from the company that installed the track resurface it and repair parts of the track that had broken off. The track was shut down on July 27 and will reopen Aug. 9. Signs on the fence around the track state the track is closed due to “track replacement and routine turf field testing” but an OPRF official said the track is just being resurfaced.

The track was opened in January 2024 and putting in the track in late fall and winter caused problems.

“It had been unseasonably warm the fall they poured the track surface, so they decided to pour in late October/November, but then a cold snap caused the track to cure to itself too fast, not to the concrete -- that’s why big chunks are breaking loose,” said Stephen Traphagen, an assistant boys cross country coach at OPRF, in a recent post to the Polite Politics Oak Park Facebook page.

Amy Guralnick, the mother of a child who attended a track camp at OPRF this summer, said that chunks of the track near the pole vault area had broken off.

A worker for Track Surfaces Company, the Elburn-based company working on the track, also told Wednesday Journal that cold weather after the track was poured caused problems.

The repair and resurfacing work is being done at no cost to OPRF because the track is still under warranty. The worker told Wednesday Journal that after the current work is completed the track should be good for at least another 10 years.

Anthony Arbogast, the assistant superintendent for business services at OPRF, said that the work being done on the track is just standard resurfacing and upkeep. Karin Sullivan, OPRF’s chief spokesperson, said the track was never unsafe and questioned whether “big chunks” of the track were breaking loose.

“It was nothing egregious,” Sullivan said.

Sullivan described the work being done on the track this summer as “nothing unusual.”

Contributing Editor Donna Greene Columnists Marc Blesoff, Nicole Chavas, Jack Crowe, Vincent Gay, Mary Kay O’Grady, John Stanger, Josh VanderBerg Shrubtown Cartoonist Marc Stopeck Editorial & Digital Design Lead Javier Govea Design and Production Associate De Sergio Villalona Designer Susan McKelvey Senior Media Strategist Lourdes Nicholls Marketing & Advertising Associate Emma Cullnan Legal Notices Mary Ellen Nelligan Circulation Manager Jill Wagner Operations Associate Susan Liss Babin BOB SKOLNIK

Social Media and Digital Coordinator Maribel Barrera Senior Advisor Dan Haley

H OW TO R E ACH US P.O. Box 6670, River Forest, IL 60305 ■ PHONE (708) 613-3300 ■ EMAIL dhaley@newswellchicago.org ■ ONLINE www.OakPark.com

CIRCULATION Jill Wagner • jill@oakpark.com • (708) 613-3340 PRINT/DIGITAL ADVERTISING Lourdes Nicholls • lourdes@oakpark.com • Ext. 3329 Emma Cullnan • emma@oakpark.com • Ext. 3304 CALENDAR EVENTS calendar@wjinc.com

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SYDNEY LOVAN SYDNEY LOVAN

People pack Oak Park’s village board meeting on July 28, with the majority of attendees speaking on proposed zoning changes.

(From left to right) Development Services Director Craig Failor, All Together principal Marisa Schulz, and Opticos principal Jennifer Settle present information on the proposed zoning changes.

Oak Park moves forward with single-family zoning discussion President Scaman says concerned community members and the board are all fighting for the same values

By SYDNEY LOVAN Reporting Intern

In a marathon of a meeting that lasted past 1 a.m. Wednesday, Oak Park’s village board unanimously referred a consultant’s proposal on zoning changes to the Plan Commission to continue the conversation over coming months.

Jennifer Settle, principal at Opticos, and Marisa Schulz, principal at the urban planning and communications collective All

Together, led a presentation at the meeting on July 28 explaining each step of the process to change the single-family zoning ordinance and what the changes could mean.

“Single-family homes in Oak Park stay, and homeowners keep the right to live in, to sell, to expand, and to rebuild their homes just as they can today,” said Shulz. “What does change is the zoning map, residential districts, and what we are recommending consolidate into neighborhood zones, allowing additional home types like two flats and

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duplexes that already exist.”

There were 28 speakers during the public comment portion of the meeting reflecting a range of opinions from tabling the conversation all together, continued calls for a referendum and full support in moving the proposed changes forward. One common theme among many speakers was questions on how the board can ensure these changes actually lead to affordable housing options and not just paving the way for more expensive developments.

“How confident are you that this will not lead to the wealthy, white, historically protected neighborhoods, becoming more expensive, more unattainable, enriching those homeowners even more while increasing population?” asked Oak Park resident Matt Millman.

Trustee Jenna Leving Jacobson shared that she has been “very critical” of the proposal despite her overall support.

“Zoning changes in and of itself do not guarantee affordability, nor maintain or retrieve some of our lost diversity, so that’s why I’ve been very loud and probably annoying about some of those things, particularly the inclusionary housing ordinance,” said Leving Jacobson.

She also said the board should take responsibility for some of the deficiencies in community outreach that may have led to confusion on what is being proposed.

Trustee James Taglia has remained an opposing voice on the board, pushing for a referendum in the previous weeks and continuing to advocate for “voters to have a voice.”

“I support referring the proposal to the plan commission because it is a necessary next step in the village’s review process,” said Taglia. “My yes vote tonight should not be interpreted as an endorsement of the proposal itself, nor does it change my belief that a decision of this magnitude deserves an advisory referendum.”

Opticos will continue with four public engagement efforts both in-person and virtually before the plan commission’s public hearing tentatively set for Sept. 17. The first outreach meeting is projected to be on Aug. 27 at 6:30 p.m. at the Community Recreation Center on Madison Street.

Opticos is also working on building online tools such as a zoning comparison map that could go live as early as next week and possibly a Frequently Asked Questions page with the questions proposed during the public comment.

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Months-long repairs on Emerson high-rise elevators cause concern Village of Oak Park says a citation was issued

By SYDNEY LOVAN Reporting Intern

One of the two passenger elevators in The Emerson Apartments in downtown Oak Park has been in and out of service for several months and has remained out of service for the past few months according to village staff. A current resident of the high rise told Wednesday Journal the second elevator has been down periodically leaving residents stuck with the stairs.

The 20-story building with 270 units, at 1135 Westgate St., officially opened in 2017.

Resident Martin Brown, who moved there in December 2025, said the one elevator has been down for at least four months. He shared he has noticed the second elevator not working for several hours on a handful of occasions in that same time frame.

Oak Park’s village code requires only one working elevator, so the building remains in compliance with the second elevator working. However, the village can issue a ticket if an elevator has not been fixed within 30 days of nonuse.

Village staff performed a site visit on July 31 to confirm the elevator remained out of service and issued a citation to property management and the elevator vendor. An adjudication hearing has been scheduled for Oct. 8, according to the village.

When both elevators are not functional, Brown has to walk up 19 flights of stairs to get to his apartment. Brown also shared witnessing an elderly couple waiting on the bottom floor as both elevators were down within the past week.

“I’m not getting what I paid for,” said Brown. “I paid for a building that had two elevators, and it’s just causing a lot of hassle and delay.”

Brown said he has been withholding 10% of his rent as he believes is his tenet tight under the village code, but the money still remains on his account as owed to the building.

The code outlines that a “tenant shall have the right to a dwelling that materially com-

plies with habitability and shall have the right to a remedy when the property is not in material compliance with habitability standards.”

One of the habitability standards is “elevators with structural integrity, in sound condition, and maintained in good repair.”

Withholding rent is listed as a tenet remedy in the code requiring the tenet to deliver a written notice to the landlord specifying the noncompliance and that payment will be withheld if the issue is not fixed within 14 days of the notice.

According to village staff, the elevator failed its inspection by Thompson Elevator on March 19 and reported that both elevators could be in need of replacement although it is not mandated. The failure was due to the emergency alarm not working on normal power and neither the alarm nor lighting working on the backup battery.

The property owner, however, is responsible for maintenance and replacements. The Emerson is owned by VA8 Emerson, LLC tied to the California-based investment firm FPA Multifamily, and the property is managed by Trinity Property Consultants.

Although Brown said he feels safe using the one elevator when it is working, he is concerned about the issue causing the delay in repair for the other.

“To have an elevator that can’t be repaired over four months, to me, is an indicator there’s something very, very seriously wrong with it,” said Brown.

In an email to Brown shared with Wednesday Journal, the Midwest Regional Director of Trinity Property Consultants Bill Van Senus, said the final repairs were to be made over the weekend of Aug. 1. He wrote on Monday that the elevator was fixed and just awaiting third-party companies Thompson Elevator and Schindler, a Switzerland-based manufacturing company, to test the car before going back in service.

As of Monday afternoon, the car was still out of service, and there has not been an update since.

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Hemingway Foundation welcomes new writer-in-residence Storytelling is what makes us human, says Amelia Estelle Dellos

By SYDNEY LOVAN Reporting Intern

Putting pen to paper is what set the new writer-in-residence at the Ernest Hemingway Foundation of Oak Park apart from other applicants, but not just for her storytelling. It was a good old-fashioned handwritten thank you card that made Amelia Estelle Dellos stand out to Executive Director Keith Strom.

The formal Writer-in-Residence program was introduced to Hemingway’s Oak Park birthplace in 2012 to further serve the organization’s mission to share Hemingway’s history and impact while also encouraging the importance of reading and writing to support current artists.

“It’s one thing to talk about an artist’s legacy, but then how does that impact people of today?” said Strom. “What we’ve been trying to do is also have a parallel mission in terms of supporting artists of today and tomorrow.”

The Writer-in-Residence is an “ambassador for the foundation” and mentor for the winner of its high school writing contest according the foundation’s website. The writer also gets to use the attic space of the birth home at 339 N. Oak Park Ave. for their work.

Dellos was named the 2026-2027 Writer-inResidence and brings a wide array of storytelling experiences to the role. She has strong ties to Oak Park having moved here right after college and immersed herself in the community. In addition to being an award-winning writer, she has written, directed and produced films that have aired on PBS and Amazon Prime. She is also the managing editor of Unwoven Literary & Arts Magazine.

“Being a writer has just exponentially made my life more interesting and rich. The people I’ve met, the experiences I’ve had, the films that I’ve made, the stories, the books that I’ve written, just doing that research, I feel like it’s added to my life in ways that I can’t even begin to quantify,” said Dellos. “I just can’t imagine not telling stories.”

She earned a Masters of Fine Arts from Columbia College Chicago in creative writ-

SYDNEY LOVAN

The new writer-in-residence for the Ernest Hemingway Foundation of Oak Park, Amelia Estelle Dellos, in front of Hemingway’s Birthplace on Aug. 3. ing and will continue working on her thesis project during her time in this position. The project is a novel exploring death and grief using her own experience in serving as her mother’s death doula in her last few days.

Dellos shared that she loves being able to compare the themes and struggles present in historical literature to what is still relevant in today’s world in ways that young people can understand and relate to.

“Storytelling is what makes us human.

It’s what gives us empathy, it’s what gives us sympathy, and it’s what makes us under-

stand other people,” she said.

She also has a background in education as a former professor of writing and rhetoric at Columbia College and Roosevelt University.

She said she loves to work with young adults and finds their curiosity inspiring. She is excited to step into her role as a mentor and get to work with the student writer.

As Writer-in-Residence, she will help in the process for the Hemingway Foundation Student Scholarship and the Allan O. Baldwin Memorial Student Scholarship which is open to juniors and seniors, respectively, in

districts 200, 201, 208, 209 and 401. One of her biggest goals is to increase the number of applicants to these scholarships specifically students outside of the Oak Park and River Forest area.

“She’s bringing a new energy, some new perspective in some ways,” said Strom.

“I’m looking for ideas so we can create some content and programming that people will find valuable, and they’ll come in and participate, and hopefully build upon us being an asset in the community.”

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Stricter regulations on intoxicating hemp products set to go into effect in November

Oak Park’s village board discusses a ban on kratom products

By SYDNEY LOVAN Reporting Intern

Federal and state laws on intoxicating hemp products are changing this November, and Oak Park’s village board updated its current ordinance to align while also bringing kratom into the conversation.

The federal FY2026 Agriculture appropriations act signed in 2025 changed the definition of hemp to consider total THC for products that use cannabinoids like Delta-8 in an effort to close the loophole the 2018 Farm Bill created. The new definition will ban any intoxicating hemp products

that have over 0.4 milligrams of total THC. The Illinois Hemp Act, or SB 3222, requires any products over that limit to be sold in state licensed cannabis stores. Both changes will go into effect on Nov. 12.

These new regulations will impact most products on the market. Wake-N-Bakery, which has a location in Oak Park on 1012 Lake St., shared “What you need to know” about these changes in March stating a 10 milligram gummy “which is standard today — would exceed the limit by 25 times,” and urged customers to stock up now.

The village board amended the ordinance restricting and taxing these products to comply with the federal and state rules effective immediately while also adding more restrictions on kratom products at its meeting on July 28. Stores selling kratom products must pay a $300 licensing fee and there will be a $1.31 tax per unit sold.

SYDNEY LOVAN

Oak Park Public Health Director Greg Olsen speaks at the village board meeting on July 28, presenting information on intoxicating hemp and kratom products.

SYDNEY LOVAN

Tobacco Zone employee Ishaak Hamdan, says hemp and kratom products are what keep ‘smoke shops’ in business.

President Vicki Scaman led the discussion at the meeting to explore banning these products entirely. Despite the market being smaller for kratom, there are concerns around the safety of these products, especially the concentrated version called 7-OH. “In the past decade, there has been a 1,200% surge in calls to the poison control center specifically for kratom products,” said Oak Park Public Health Director Greg Olsen at the village meeting. “The issue with kratom products, and initially with intoxicating hemp, is we don’t know what’s in those products. There’s been studies that show that they can contain heavy metals, pesticide residue, and a lot of times the potency that’s labeled on the bag, or the package, is not what’s actually in the product.”

For local tobacco and smoke shops like Tobacco Zone, 6638 W. Roosevelt Rd., which has been serving Oak Park for about 16 years, hemp and kratom products are a lifeline to keeping the store successful.

“That’s the source of income for smoke shops,” said Ishaak Hamdan, an employee at the store. “Cigarettes you don’t make money on, so the delta and the kratom stuff are a big reason why half the smoke shops are still open. If they took away those two things, I think most smoke shops would shut down.”

Hamdan said the store only sells kratom products they get from licensed wholesalers but agrees that clearer packaging and possible limitations on the dosages sold could be a better alternative to banning.

“They’re going to get it either way.

They’re not going to go to the dispensary because the dispensary is too high, they’re going to go to the streets. I think doing that will actually make it worse.” said Hamdan.

“Smoke shops save people from that now.”

There are currently 24 municipalities that have banned kratom products according to Olsen. The closest being Rolling Meadows with a complete retail ban, and Naperville is currently working on a ban as well.

Trustee Brian Straw shared his opinion that a ban would not be effective unless the immediate surrounding areas also joined in the effort and that education on kratom should be the first priority.

Tobacco Zone is an example of a store that is located in Oak Park, however, a smoke shop just across the street is located in Berwyn, therefore, a village ban would not apply and the products could still be easily accessed.

“By not banning it and adding the public education piece, there’s more likelihood that people come to learn and understand the issues of the variability, the issues of the dangerous effects of an overdose,” said Straw.

He said he would be in favor of a ban if the neighboring governments were on board as well. The majority of trustees agreed that more education is needed before they are ready for a full ban.

“I’ll vote for this one because it’s all I can do at this time, and support coming back with a ban,” said Scaman. “I guess I’ll be calling my colleagues.”

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Wednesday Journal, August 5, 2026

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EcoWilde blooms in the Pleasant District New floral design shop focuses on sustainability and artistic botanical gifts

By JACKIE PISANO Contributing Reporter

JACKIE PISANO

Emily Neumann, proprietor of EcoWilde on Pleasant Street

Strolling through Oak Park, it’s easy to see how the blending of nature, design, art and small businesses gives the village its distinct aesthetic.

So when Oak Park resident Emily Neumann was on the hunt for the ideal location to open a brick-and-mortar plant workshop and gift shop specializing in earth-friendly goods, planting her business’ roots in the village was the most natural choice.

Nestled in a small building in the village’s historic Pleasant District, EcoWilde, located at 1046 Pleasant St., has called Oak Park home since February, selling flowers, houseplants and one-of-a-kind botanic-

themed gifts.

From flowers grown in Oak Park and blooms sourced from independent Midwestern farms, to unique houseplants and gifts made by local artists, Neumann describes EcoWilde as the ideal sustainable alternative for shoppers looking for curated finds while bypassing the heavy ecological impact that often comes from shopping at big box stores or ordering imported plants.

“Oak Park has such a strong rewilding movement, and so many people here are genuinely passionate about plants and nature — I’m one of them,” Neumann said. “Opening this space felt like a natural way to expand that part of EcoWilde and connect with friends and neighbors who share the same

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Alongside in-store sales, EcoWilde specializes in decorating for interior spaces and weddings, and candle refilling and delivery — specifically, through a service called “recandling,” in which Neumann collects and refills candle vessels, giving their original containers a second life.

“At the heart of it all, EcoWilde is a place to connect with nature and art, and to be part of something that existed long before us and will carry on after us,” they said.

EcoWilde’s public-facing storefront is new, but Neumann’s business actually stretches back to 2018 when she first started the business out of their apartment — right down the block from where the business is today.

In between then and establishing the Oak Park storefront, Neumann also operated a production studio on Elgin Avenue in Forest Park, where they handled large event orders and delivered them directly to venues.

“This space feels like it’s come full circle — right back to where it all started, eight years later,” she said.

At EcoWilde, Neumann brings in expertise from her degrees in sustainability and performing arts and years of working in sustainable event design, setting herself apart from typical flower shops and greenhouses through her sustainabilityminded business model.

“It’s a field that’s still very new, so I’m constantly inventing new ways of doing things as I go — there’s not really a road map for this,” they said. “When I was building out the store, I wanted to carry genuinely beautiful things without contributing to the waste and landfill problem

that a lot of retail creates — and I wanted to stay conscious of my own carbon footprint.

So, I kept asking myself, ‘What would the Lorax do?’ And the answer was that the Lorax would gather things from local artists rather than mass-produce or import.”

Neumann says that since opening their doors, patrons and passersby have shown great enthusiasm and appreciation for EcoWilde.

“I’ve watched folks stop just to admire the mural or stop and say ‘hello’ to Pawlie (Neumann’s cat who roams through the store) through the window, even if they don’t come inside,” they said. “Visitors on vacation in Oak Park, or in town seeing friends and family, have made stopping by part of their trip, which has connected us with people from all over who are excited about plants and handmade crafts. And our neighbors have been thrilled too, just happy to see more life on this block and to see a space filled that had sat empty for so long.”

Whether you’re a long-time plant parent, someone looking for event design or just wandering through the neighborhood, Neumann shares that at EcoWilde, both eco-conscious shopping and neighborly camaraderie abound.

“It’s not just about the products — it’s a place to slow down and feel connected to your neighbors and to nature, right in the middle of town,” she said. “We’re proof that you can grow something good for the planet and good for the community at the same time — and we’d love for our neighbors to be part of that.”

For information about EcoWilde’s services and to inquire about design, visit ecowilde.com or call (708) 304-3675.

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Owner Emily Neumann says EcoWilde is “a place to connect with nature and art.”

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For Chris Welch, is past prologue?

Facing ethical questions, house speaker has history in Proviso

By BILL DWYER Contributing Reporter

On Nov. 12, 2001, young Hillside attorney Emanuel “Chris” Welch was sworn in as a new member of the Proviso District 209 high school board.

The week before, the D209 board had signed an agreement to purchase a 9-acre parcel of open land in Melrose Park for $2.8 million, with plans to build a magnet high school on the site.

Following the new board’s organizational meeting, Welch and another newly elected board member joined two sitting board members in voting Mike Manzo out as D209 board president and installing Teresa Kelly as president and Welch as vice president.

The new board then voted to fire D209 lawyer Stanley Kusper and replace him with attorney Burt Odelson’s firm, Odelson and Sterk.

It then voted to void the prior board’s agreement to buy the 9-acre property, a golf driving range on 5th Avenue, immediately west of the Kiddieland Amusement Park.

Melrose Park Mayor Ron Serpico, a mentor and key Welch political supporter, had adamantly opposed a school on the property.

“Whatever we have to do on the village level, we’re not going to let this happen,” Serpico said in an October 2001 news article. “We’re not going to let them rob the village of Melrose Park of a valuable piece of property.”

In a 2011 interview, Manzo, a staunch political opponent of Serpico, said that Welch opposed the magnet school in Melrose Park because Serpico didn’t want it interfering with plans for a Costco store that was eventually built nearby.

The motion to rescind the purchase agreement was voted on despite being placed on the agenda as “new business,” which Manzo angrily pointed out could not, under Illinois law, be acted upon at the same meeting at which it was introduced.

Welch brushed aside that inconvenient

fact, saying, “You cannot take away the power of the majority.”

Kiddieland would close for good on Sept. 27, 2009, and be demolished in 2010 to make way for the new Costco.

The Costco has been an unqualified success. Nearly 17 years later, the former golf driving range to the west remains a fallow field, fronted by a decaying building along 5th Avenue.

The issue of a magnet school open to district students who met high academic testing standards would roil Proviso Township politics over the next several years, with Welch in the middle of it all.

In June 2001, D209 had released poll results from McKeon & Associates showing a majority of the 600 respondents – 61% – deemed a magnet school “a necessary step” for the district, with another 28% agreeing a magnet school was “very necessary.”

Almost 9 out of 10 people thought a magnet school was necessary or very necessary, and 80% said they believed it would enrich the learning experience throughout the district.

That July Welch opined that while the magnet school concept was a good idea, building a separate school building “is not a wise decision at this time.”

“Do the majority of the voters in Proviso Township support building a magnet school?” Welch asked rhetorically in a letter to the editor. He noted that Melrose Park voters had rejected a third high school by a 2-1 margin in November 2000, and Maywood voters said the same in April 2001, by the same margin.

“We also know that only 28% of the respondents in Mike Manzo’s poll say that a magnet school is very necessary,” Welch said, conveniently ignoring the other 61% who stated they believed a magnet school was “necessary.”

Manzo said the price tag for both the land acquisition and a newly constructed school would have been “about $18 million.” He said those figures were far more certain than renovating an existing building.

“With a new building, the costs are pretty predictable. There’s few surprises,” Manzo said. “With renovation of an old building, there are all sorts of surprises.

FILE PHOTO

Illinois House Speaker Chris Welch

$18 million to $50 million Eighteen months after scuttling the purchase of the Melrose Park property, Welch, now board president, pivoted 180 degrees and led the charge for issuing $40 million in bonds to purchase and renovate a vacant medical office building in Forest Park as the new Proviso Math and Science Academy.

The D209 board passed a resolution approving a $40 million bond issue to purchase the building at Roosevelt Road and First Avenue.

Opponents mounted a referendum campaign and gathered more than 7,500 signatures to place the issue before Proviso township voters. Welch fought the referendum, arguing that it would cause a delay in the purchase of the building and effectively kill the purchase contract.

In December 2003, the D209 electoral board, chaired by Welch, threw out 3,000 of the 7,500 signatures. Some signers, Welch ruled, were not registered voters, other signatures were ruled forgeries, and several hundred were rejected due to “invalid notary signatures.”

That left bond issue opponents 2,000 signatures short of qualifying for the ballot. Welch accused the leaders of the referendum drive of sour grapes and contended Manzo and others “would like to be back in office and have their friends and cronies build this school.”

Instead, Welch and his allies purchased and renovated the former Loyola Medicine office building. Along the way there were, as Manzo had predicted, numerous additional costs, which added up to millions of additional public dollars spent.

In September 2005 the new Proviso Math and Science Academy, at least $10 million

over its initial $40 million budget, opened its doors to 126 freshman students.

Welch had also done Serpico’s bidding when, in 2004, a federal civil jury found Serpico liable for $1 million in punitive damages and the D209 board liable for $140,000 in the firing of D209 janitor Gino Trombetta. He sued after being terminated, claiming it was the result of his political opposition to Serpico.

The school district had absolutely no legal obligation to pay Serpico’s settlement, since he was neither an elected D209 official nor an employee. But Welch forced through a $1 million taxpayer-funded payment for his political patron.

‘That’s my recollection’ In August 2005, a local blogger and newspaper columnist, Carl Nyberg, posted that Welch’s brother, Billy Welch, had been arrested with a drug dealer and then was indicted.

Welch filed a lawsuit against Nyberg, alleging defamation, accusing Nyberg of “insinuation and conjecture and guilt-by association type tactics.”

A 2006 deposition documented how Chris Welch handled his brother’s criminal arraignment. Welch’s testimony raises questions, depending on how one reads the deposition, about either his legal competence or his honesty. “(Billy) Welch had never been indicted for the crime of drug dealing and had Nyberg checked the accuracy of his statements, this information would have been readily discoverable,” Welch’s lawsuit argued.

Wednesday Journal, August 5, 2026

OAKPARK.COM “… my brother is not a hoodlum; he does not hang around with drug dealers,” Welch insisted in his deposition.

But Nyberg had checked the record, which showed that Billy Welch was with a drug dealer on Sept. 3, was arrested, and was later indicted on drug charges.

On Sept. 3, agents of a joint DEA/ Chicago police task force observed an alleged cocaine dealer in the River Forest Town Center, handing a duffel full of money – as much as $140,000 – to an alleged wholesale coke supplier.

Law enforcement followed dealer and another man in a Cadillac Escalade to an apartment building on the 5500 block of W. Gladys on the West Side of Chicago and watched as the dealer took 22 pounds of cocaine from the trunk of the wholesaler’s car.

Agents stopped the dealer’s car on the 3800 block of Harrison, and when the two men were removed from the car, they discovered his passenger was Billy Welch.

The DEA affidavit stated that Billy Welch was within arm’s reach of a loaded .40 caliber handgun, two baggies containing 240 grams of crack cocaine with a street value of $29,766, and $23,500 in cash.

Chris Welch was his brother’s attorney at his Sept. 4 arraignment. The record shows Judge Kevin M. Sheehan found probable cause to detain Billy, set a $30,000 bond and continued his case to Oct. 14.

On Sept. 26, Welch and the dealer were indicted by a Cook County Grand Jury, Welch for felony possession of a controlled substance with intent to deliver.

Chris Welch recalled those events quite differently when deposed, when he could recall anything at all.

“You were Billy Welch’s attorney beginning Sept. 3, 2003, right?” Chris Welch was asked under oath. “Beginning and ending Sept. 3, 2003,” Welch answered.

“You were his attorney for one day?” he was asked.

“Yes, I stepped up, the case was dismissed Sept. 3, 2003 against Billy Welch,” Welch answered.

Welch was shown Exhibit 6 from the lawsuit and asked if it was a Grand Jury indictment of Billy Welch and the dealer, dated Sept. 26, 2003.

“Exhibit 6 says what it says,” Welch answered.

“You said that the case was dismissed on that day?” Welch was asked. “That’s my recollection,” Welch answered.

“Why is there an indictment naming Billy Welch?” he was asked.

“I don’t know,” Welch answered.

“You have no idea why there would be an indictment against him if the case was dismissed?” Welch was asked.

“I don’t know,” Welch answered.

Asked if he’d talked to anyone in the State’s Attorney’s office other than at the hearing, Welch answered, “No.” Asked if he’d ever inquired “with any government agency to determine whether or not Bill Welch had been indicted” Welch answered, “No.” Did you ask Bill Welch whether he had ever been indicted?” Welch was asked.

“Yes.” He answered.

“What did he tell you?” He was asked.

“He said no,” Welch answered.

Welch quietly dropped his lawsuit against Nyberg.

‘Without factual basis’ Sometime around 2006, a new blog called the “Proviso Insider” went online. It called itself “A beacon of light in the Proviso darkness.”

The majority of posts either lambasted Chris Welch’s critics or praised his allies. The blog posts would put a positive spin on D209 news, however negative the actual situation might be. In March 2010, Welch posted “Proviso High Schools Removed From Financial Watch List!!!”

“This feat is especially remarkable considering the financial crisis many schools are facing in the state of Illinois,” Welch stated, ignoring the fact that less than 1% of all high schools in Illinois were under state supervision.

Welch went on touting his successes and taking shots at his political enemies. On July 19, 2007 the Proviso Insider accused two lawyers who previously worked for D209 of having suborned perjury.

Melrose Park police commander Ric Cervone had been named in a federal indictment.

The Insider posted, “Sources tell the Insider that Burt Odelson and Mark Sterk …. will be indicted next by U.S. Attorney Patrick Fitzgerald. Sources tell the Insider that Mark Sterk was the attorney advising SD89 Board member Ric Cervone on how to lie to a grand jury.”

“Are Burt Odelson and Mark Sterk crooks?”

The Proviso Insider asked. “Will they be indicted next?”

On Aug. 21, 2007 Odelson and Sterk filed a libel/slander suit in Cook County Circuit Court.

The Insider hadn’t always been so hard on Odelson and Sterk. In December 2006 an Insider headline trumpeted, “D209 Lawyer Burton Odelson Respected By All.” “The Insider has learned that Proviso School District 209’s lawyer, Burton S. Odel-

son, is also the lawyer for the stars,” the website fawned. “Many think, without Odelson, Proviso would not have been able to secure and negotiate a deal for the Proviso Math and Science Academy.”

Welch denied any involvement or responsibility for the posts. That is, until a forensic examination determined the posts had been made from a computer at his law firm.

Odelson’s attorney, Michael Wall, said Welch had attempted to avoid liability for the Proviso Insider posts by alleging they were done by his law clerk Emily Robinson.

“She was told by Mr. Welch that he would take care of everything,” Wall was quoted in a March 18, 2012 news article. Robinson denied posting the defamatory comments, saying, “I didn’t do it at all.” She was not found liable for any actions.

Welch filed for summary judgment, but Judge Eileen Mary Brewer denied his motion, and ruled he had committed “defamation per se.”

Welch faced with paying a $400,000 settlement demand, did for himself what he’d done for Serpico; used his role as D209 board president to successfully pry around $50,000 from taxpayers to cover his ongoing legal bills.

But when he later attempted to have D209 foot another $40,000, as well as the $400,000 settlement, the state appointed Financial Oversight Panel blocked him, and he was forced to negotiate a new settlement using his own money.

Welch also had to admit publicly that he had lied. Or in his lawyerly wording, that he had made “statements … which were made without factual basis.”

“The Subject Statements made on the Proviso Insider … are hereby unconditionally and unequivocally retracted and the Proviso Insider regrets the publication of those statements on the blog which were made without factual basis.”

‘The Prince of Proviso’ By law, members of school boards do not have any direct authority over district employees or the daily operations of the schools outside of their authority to cast votes at board meetings.

But by August 2010, Welch saw himself, according to numerous people associated with D209 or Proviso Township politics, as a major authority figure in and of himself, to be respected and obeyed.

“He wants to be the Prince of Proviso,” one source told this reporter at the time.

Welch reportedly became angry after two sisters who worked in senior positions at Proviso West high school rebuffed his attempts to hug them at a football game. He responded with an angry text.

11

Alexis Wallace, the former principal at Proviso West before Welch had her transferred, sat down with the Forest Leaves in March 2012 to discuss her experience with Welch as D209 board president and a threatening text she’d received from him.

Wallace said she saved the text, making certain her phone was charged even after she got a new phone. The saved text confirms allegations made by Wallace’s sister, Dylester Palm, a dean at Proviso West, in her federal lawsuit against Welch for complaints similar to Wallace’s. (Palm later dropped the lawsuit, citing her inability to pay for the cost of legal representation.)

Wallace held out her old Blackberry for the reporter to photograph. The phone number on the text was the same cell number that Welch had listed on his campaign filing documents.

“I allowed them to be employed!” Welch’s text read. “And I’m the board president! Period! End of conversation. Things better change now. I won’t tolerate disresepect.”

Welch then left no doubt that he saw himself as the primary authority at D209.

“I had a direct hand in helping them b here including u. No one else,” he said. “At the minimum, I deserve respect.”

FOIA denial helps Welch avoid accountability In 2012 a FOIA was filed with the Hillside Police Department seeking any reports related to Welch’s alleged arrest in 2002 for an oft-rumored domestic battery.

That FOIA was denied by Hillside officials, who claimed that Welch, who’d been handcuffed and placed in the back seat of a squad car, had nonetheless not been placed under arrest.

A subsequent appeal was successful, and Hillside was ordered to release the documents. But the release arrived 90 minutes too late, after the primary election issue of a local newspaper had gone to print.

In that moment, Welch was working to move up oliticallys and was in a contested race for the Democratic nomination in the 7th Illinois House District. On election day Welch led Forest Park Commissioner Rory Hoskins by just 36 votes out of more than 40,000 cast in the 7th Illinois House Democratic primary. That narrow margin held.

As has happened in numerous cases related to allegations concerning questionable behavior by Welch, the story made a splash – nearly 10 years later as Welch was seeking to replace Mike Madigan as the Speaker of the House. A handful of people expressed concern and vowed to get answers and hold people accountable.

The splash was followed by silence.

12

Wednesday Journal, August 5, 2026

OAKPARK.COM

FIRE STATION Sufficient space? from page 1 evolved over the life of the building.”

There are also health concerns presented with the living space on the second floor being located above the apparatus bay with the possibility of carcinogens being transferred.

The building does not have enough room for a standard decontamination flow for firefighters returning from calls adding to health risks for the staff.

From these findings, three design options for new buildings were presented to the village board. The trustees all leaned towards the third option, a two-story building that would be located at a different site. It was agreed that a new building on the same plot of land would not be the best course of action.

“I think option three gives the most flexibility for a growing fire department, but also just giving some more flexibility when it comes to room, space concerns, and just making sure that we’re not putting ourselves in a similar situation in the near future and

CORDOGAN CLARK/VILLAGE OF OAK PARK

Option 3 preliminary design from Cordogan Clark presentation on space needs of Fire Station 2 shown at Oak Park’s village meeting on July 28. rather building something out that grows with this fire department and lasts for a longer period of time,” said Trustee Chibuike Enyia at the meeting.

The board’s recommendation of option three will now go before the board’s finance committee to review and discuss, likely at a meeting in August according to Chief Financial Officer Kevin Bueso.

The total cost estimate for option three is

$12.7 million, but there are many variables that could change once a piece of property is identified and purchased and more concrete design plans are created.

The village board voted on a long-term financial framework for structuring debt on major capital improvement projects over the next 30 years at its meeting on July 21, however, the new fire station was not accounted for in these plans. Under the cur-

rent financial projections, there is no additional debt capacity until about 2032.

Bueso outlined a few possible options to explore with this project, the main consideration being whether this project should be included in the next five years or after.

If the village wants to proceed before there is more capacity for funding, options include using untouched reserves or moving other projects currently outlined to make room.

Bueso said in terms of “best practice,” another option would be to look at ways to reduce costs and finance through surpluses.

“If we can count on surpluses year over year, we can get authorization or guidance from the board to move those funds, those surpluses, to the capital fund to fund these specific projects,” said Bueso.

Trustee James Taglia shared his opinion that the village should be looking now for a site as it’s “the most inexpensive part of what we’re looking at,” and finding available, adequate land can be difficult.

“We have to maybe look at shifting things potentially but also looking for the future and options of land don’t come along very often, so I think that we should be actively looking with our economic vitality people for property and secure that now,” said Taglia.

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Wednesday Journal, August 5, 2026

OAKPARK.COM

13

Fenwick teacher’s Poland trip guides Holocaust education ‘There isn’t any room for questioning the Holocaust … no margin for error’

By GREGG VOSS

ever devastating – was made, with names that have become infamous over time …

Treblinka, Chelmno, Auschwitz-Birkenau, Flying into Warsaw on July 5, Julie Klein Lopuchowo Forest and the former Warsaw knew her first-ever trip to Poland would be Ghetto.

It was a carefully choreographed trip, challenging emotionally.

The Fenwick social studies teacher has she said. Stanlee Stahl, the executive vice studied and taught about the Holocaust for president of the Jewish Foundation for the Righteous, gave each teacher many years, but for the first a reporter’s notebook so they time, she would see many could record what they saw, of the sites that defined the and who they met.

World War II era.

On that first day, that in“I was flying on (Poland’s) cluded three of the RighLOT Airlines, so I was flying teous, or people who had in with a lot of Polish nationsaved Jews during those als,” Klein said. “I was very years. nervous because I knew the “We were in the presence content the 10 days in front of people who saved Jews of me would be very heavy and are in their 90s, who and emotional, but I was also demonstrated the best of huvery excited. manity. It was a powerful way “I have studied this for so to start the seminar. There long and to actually be in were people who resisted these physical places with this. It was almost like being scholars and with people who in the presence of this otherare committed to Holocaust worldly greatness,” she said. education like them, I knew Make no mistake, though. it was going to be powerful.”

The places themselves and It was. Klein was one of 14 knowing what happened U.S. middle and high school JULIE KLEIN there decades ago was hard teachers from across the Fenwick social studies teacher to process. country to participate in the The most difficult day for Jewish Foundation for the Klein was the visit to ChelmRighteous 2026 European no, a small village in the midStudy Program in Poland.

They were accompanied by historian Rob- dle of lush Polish farmland. During the ert Jan van Pelt, one of the world’s leading war, people arrived at a single-track train station, were forced to undress in the baseexperts on the Holocaust.

She was there because she had earned ment of a former mansion, before being an Alfred Lerner Fellowship, nominated taken to their deaths via vans.

“You walk right next to the foundation of by the Illinois Holocaust Museum and Education Center in Skokie. In January, she the mansion and there is kind of a walking participated in the foundation’s 2026 Ad- path and you’re walking basically the same vanced Seminar on Holocaust Education, path,” she said. “I was devastated. The magnitude and barbarity … how does a society held Jan. 17-18 in Newark, N.J. But this would be different, much differ- get to this point?”

The presence of van Pelt brought much ent. She would see where history – howContributing Reporter

“I have studied this for so long and to actually be in these physical places with scholars and with people who are committed to Holocaust education like them, I knew it was going to be powerful.”

PROVIDED

From left, historian Robert Jan van Pelt, Fenwick social studies teacher Julie Klein, and Stanlee Stahl, executive vice president of the Jewish Foundation for the Righteous. scholarship and context to the situation, especially with relation to the hope and resilience of prisoners, and their individual stories. In addition, there was a guide named Pawel, Klein said, “who wanted us to know there is no single story of the Holocaust. We have to maintain the humanity of the people. Otherwise, it becomes this monolith.”

In a similar vein, van Pelt emphasized the importance of teaching this history, which Klein said can overwhelm any teacher.

“The majority of people who are tasked with teaching the Holocaust often don’t have a deep understanding of it,” she said,

“and if you’re not confident in what you’re teaching, it can be intimidating.

“What the JFR does is ensure they have the best professors and access so our knowledge is very intellectually based and evidence based. There isn’t any room for questioning the Holocaust. There is no margin for error there,” said Klein.

In other words, Klein’s goal is to make sure her Fenwick students don’t leave her classroom wondering if the Holocaust happened.

“My role is to build confidence in my students,” she said.

14

Wednesday Journal, August 5, 2026

OAKPARK.COM

WEST SUB

‘Gross mismanagement’ alleged Patlola has said millions of dollars Prasad has collected in past billing since West Sub closed in March have gone to Prasad. Asked, “Do you have any knowledge as to whether or not West Suburban Medical Center is still receiving payments for medical procedures that previously occurred,” Patlola answered, “Absolutely.

They’re receiving closer to $700,000 a week. $680 to $700,000 per week they’re receiving right now.”

Friday’s filing also disclosed yet another bank with another account controlled by Prasad, one only disclosed to Patlola during a May 11 settlement conference. At that meeting with a court appointed special master, Prasad disclosed four transfers totaling $2,190,100 between Oct. 10, 2025 and Jan. 2, 2026. The transfers were from the Westlaw, LLC bank account to a company called ME & B Consulting, LLC. Within seven days of the execution of the assets sale, Prasad’s Westlaw LLC must cause all funds held in any of its banks to be transferred back to AUM and/or the hospitals. Westlaw must then be dissolved within 60 days.

Sub-mersion from page 1

cery Court Judge Patrick Stanton later this month, it would result in Prasad’s ouster as CEO of the shuttered hospital. It would also allow him to save face in the wake of the disastrous West Sub debacle.

Prasad and Patlola said in a prepared joint statement included in the stalled settlement that they “are committed to their plan to sell Resilience Healthcare to Insight who will ensure West Suburban Medical Center and Weiss Memorial Hospital re-open to serve the communities that depend on them.”

At Friday’s hearing Stanton said he didn’t believe the settlement needed to be confidential, and Resilience did not object.

Under the settlement terms, AUM, the corporate entity through which Prasad controls Resilience, will enter into an agreement with Insight Health Systems for the sale of its interest in both West Sub and Weiss Memorial hospitals for $1.

Insight will assume “all of the rights and liabilities of AUM…” Insight Healthcare will then immediately take over management of the hospital and Prasad will step down as CEO of AUM and both West Sub and Weiss Memorial Hospital.

Prasad will continue to own AUM, but have no management rights. Insight will not be able to liquidate AUM or take it into bankruptcy.

Prasad will continue to be paid his regular salary and all insurance benefits up to the sale closing date. He also gets to keep a 2022 Range Rover Sport vehicle.

For up to six months following his resignation, Prasad “will be available on reasonable notice as a consultant for Insight,” for which he will receive a total of $100,000 in six equal installments.

Ramco attorney: Prasad acted in bad faith On July 28, Ramco attorney Scott Kaplan urged Stanton to enforce a settlement he said was agreed to in principle on May 29. After another hearing three days later Stanton told Kaplan to file his final settlement enforcement motion.

Kaplan said he wrote up a draft settlement agreement and provided a copy to Resilience on June 3. He has alleged that Ramco’s good faith efforts to finalize an agreement have “been met with delay and

SYDNEY LOVAN

Manoj Prasad, CEO of West Suburban Hospital, leaves court at the Richard J. Daley Center in Chicago after a closed-door settlement conference on July 2. bad faith efforts by the Resilience parties.”

Resilience, Kaplan alleged, “have expended considerable efforts in an attempt to walk away from key terms previously agreed to during the May 29 settlement conference…”

Kaplan noted that Prasad fired his first attorney, who was involved in the negotiations, and hired a new attorney who, he said, “has worked to undo the settlement.”

Saying “time is of the essence,” Kaplan said that if the settlement is not enforced soon, there is a legitimate threat that West Sub and Weiss would never reopen, causing “irreparable harm” to Ramco.

Kaplan asked the judge to force Prasad and Resilience to comply with the terms of the settlement, enter into a Membership Interest Agreement and corresponding Management Agreement with Insight, pay all past due utility bills and “take all necessary and reasonable steps to restore elevator service to West Suburban Medical Center” in order to allow the lifting of a no-occupancy order by the Village of Oak Park.

Kaplan said the May 29 settlement was reached in the judge’s chambers after

more than four hours. “This court personally presided over the … settlement conference and observed the parties negotiate and agree to the terms of the settlement,” he said, stressing that “particular weight is given to settlements reached in the presence of the judge.”

Kaplan included details of a Term Sheet outlining the settlement, a document he called “valid and enforceable.”

“If necessary, this court should appoint a receiver over (Resilience) to effectuate the settlement.” He named Kansas City attorney Mike Flanagan as the requested receiver. Flanagan, he said, has extensive experience serving as a receiver in the healthcare industry, and is “willing and able to act … to effectuate the settlement” and work toward allowing Insight Healthcare to manage West Sub pending the sale of assets to Insight.

Stanton gave Resilience attorney Howard Brookins and Prasad’s personal attorney Travis Richardson two weeks to work things out between them, and Ramco a week after that to go over the details of what Prasad and Resilience agreed upon.

Non-disparagement joint statement There is a non-disparagement clause in which both sides agree to not bad mouth each other. In fact, a joint statement to be released within five days of the enforcement of the agreement has a “let bygones be bygones” tone. It reads in part: “In ruling on Ramco’s … emergency motion for appointment of a receiver, Judge Stanton stated that “(a)s to the most serious charge that Dr. Prasad misappropriated money by transferring funds from Resilience to Westlaw, Ramco failed to provide credible evidence that these transfers resulted in any losses to Resilience and that “the main thrusts of the motion that Dr. Prasad had misappropriated vast sums of money was not proven.

“Stanton further stated that, as to the “implied claim that the hospitals failed due to Dr. Prasad’s performance as CEO, there is no evidence offered that Dr. Prasad caused any of these problems or that he failed or refused to address them.

However, court records show that Ramco presented no evidence of those claims at the May 8 hearing because they opted not to expend the time needed to extend discovery and then hold a required second evidentiary hearing.

The next court hearing is Aug. 25 at 9:30.

Wednesday Journal, August 5, 2026

OAKPARK.COM

15

Feds make Medicaid harder, so local nonprofits jump in More paperwork, more often will impact those at greatest risk

“You miss a piece of mail ed newsletters and direct or lose a piece of mail beoutreach to senior-centric cause you lost your housbuildings and events to help ing,” she said. “You have that population understand no way of getting access to the coming changes and to that mail. The burden and pay attention to their mail. hardship this is going to Ojeda is also a member of

By GREGG VOSS cause for people who are the Rush Oak Park CommuContributing Reporter unhoused is going to wreak nity Engagement Council, which is working with many havoc on our population beBureaucratic changes built into the Markedly more paperwork partners, including Thrive, cause of having to refile and Trump administration’s One Big Beautiful For Jennie Hull, CEO of Oak Park’s Be- that missed first or second to plan Medicaid redetermiBill Act will, starting in January, make it LYNDA SCHUELER nation events this fall. harder for people to keep their Medicaid yond Hunger, the changes are eerily simi- follow up.

“If you miss that notifica“Any resident, really, they coverage in tact. Local nonprofits work- lar to those of Supplemental Nutrition Asing with clients with mental health issues, sistance Program (SNAP) benefits through tion or an email or what have you, you’re need to check their mail regularly,” she going to lose your benefits if said. “Just make sure they have read every housing and food insecurity are busy now the U.S. Department of Agriculture. you’re not submitting your notification thoroughly and if they don’t to keep marginalized neighbors covered.

As of May 1, any ablepaperwork in a timely way.” understand, go to a place that you can get The Medicaid changes will place more Schueler said Housing help, at the township or someplace else.” onus on local residents to demonstrate bodied adult without depenForward is taking steps Schueler said Housing Forward’s case they are meeting new requirements and dents had to start logging 80 right now to help mitigate managers can help, but she also pointed to will create more paperwork to process, not hours of work per month, or that eventuality for many. the Cook County’s GetMedicaidFacts.com only for the state but organizations like they would lose their SNAP benefits. SNAP is a program “We’re preparing our case and ABEIllinois.com, the state’s website Oak Park’s Thrive Counseling Center. managers,” she said. “We where one can apply for benefits. Beyond “We’re preparing and anticipating that is designed to work are updating our own case Hunger has dedicated a page on its website what’s to come,” said Jenni Rook, Thrive’s with food pantries like Bemanagement system to be as well. president, noting that the Affordable Care yond Hunger.

Every six months, resiable to put reminders in for “Our population is experiencing housing Act (ACA), a subset of Medicaid, is going our clients so then we can insecurity and the last thing on their mind JENNIE HULL to require a six-month renewal, not annual dents on SNAP must renew their benefits by reporting anticipate when a client is is gathering paperwork and they don’t as in the past. up for renewal so we can help them get that have a mailing address,” she said.

“It’s twice as frequent as before, which their working status.

“It’s the same people getting hit again,” filed in a timely way.” unfortunately allows an opportunity for Hull said of the Medicaid greater loss of coverage,” Changes galvanizing community changes. “I think there are added Rook’s colleague, Communications crucial people who are still reelRook said that Medicaid is Thrive’s Tyler Alvarez, Thrive’s asing from SNAP. Some people Thrive’s Rook said a major issue is peo- biggest source of funding, “so there is a sistant director of referrals give up on these benefits pro- ple who don’t realize they have Medicaid. lot of risk to Thrive if people lose their and coordination. grams. I can see that locally “They have a plan that says Blue Cross healthcare.” That’s why her organization “With the changes for happening.”

Blue Shield and they don’t realize it’s a Blue is placing even greater emphasis on their 2027, there is a subset in the Alvarez said that Medic- Cross Blue Shield community plan, which population.

Medicaid population that is aid’s ACA expansion plan has is a Medicaid managed care plan,” she said.

“We’re not just going to discharge them being impacted,” Alvarez that 80-hour monthly work “There’s all this education that needs to hap- from services because they no longer have said. That’s those who berequirement, which could in- pen … what insurance (do) they have, and Medicaid,” she said. “We’re going to dracame eligible for Medicaid clude a combination of school what are they going to have to do.” matically reduce the sliding-scale fees in under the ACA, also known enrollment or volunteering.

January, the same time this rolls out, beTo that end, Thrive is distributing flyers as the “ACA expansion JENNI ROOK Someone with a chronic ill- in waiting rooms and lobbies, using social cause we want to be able to continue their plan.” ness or a mental health im- media and other communications levers to coverage.” That, she said, will likely in“For those clients there will be additional items that will be re- pairment would hypothetically be exempt let people know the reality of the situation. volve more fundraising and philanthropy.

Ojeda said the changes are in a way galRook credited Oak Park Township and its quired to provide that eligibility piece,” but must be able to prove that they qualify for an exemption, which would include a doc- communications strategy to get the word vanizing community services to help its Alvarez said. out in the community. Mary Anne Ojeda, most vulnerable.

That’s the whole point of the changes tor’s diagnosis, for example.

That means more paperwork and leg- the township’s assistant director for senior “I would say yes, we’re working really that were part of the One Big Beautiful Bill Act that became law last year, according to work, which is a major burden for those and disability services, said it is using its closely together to help educate people to website and social media accounts to that get the assistance they need,” she said. “It Lynda Schueler, CEO of Housing Forward. whose health is compromised.

Or, Schueler said, are housing insecure. end, along with e-newsletters and print- takes a village to navigate.”

“That seems to be the undergirding message from the federal government, repeal the benefits low-income people should be entitled to,” Schueler said, “then adding the extra layer of having to reapply.

“They want to kick people off by creating this additional layer of administrative burden, so there is a level of savings that comes out of this.”

16

Wednesday Journal, August 5, 2026

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Steeping into a new chapter River Forest entrepreneur behind Joy Tea transforms business from street trailer to brick-and-mortar teahouse

By JACKIE PISANO Contributing Reporter

A trailer, a dream and a passion for tea.

That’s all Max Blessen needed last summer as he rolled into Oak Park and River Forest, introducing locals to Joy Tea and promising customers the best tea they’ve ever tasted.

Rain or shine, Blessen was situated outside in his tow-hitch trailer serving up his unique spin on ancient Chinese teas.

And now, after spending a year parked across various locations, Blessen has officially opened Joy Tea’s first brick-and-mortar spot, serving up crowd-favorites from inside the new location at 7773 Lake St. in River Forest. He hopes it will eventually be one of many stores.

Situated between neighboring small businesses along a Lake Street brick building business strip, Joy Tea’s first storefront is a chic, grab-and-go beverage stop.

With natural light beaming through a large picture window, the store’s interior boasts bright digital displays, a warm wood aesthetic, and bar-style, on-tap beverage service.

From jasmine and grapefruit silk teas to green mango and aged pu’erhs with buttercream, in just over a year, Blessen turned Joy Tea from a curious mobile business into an in-demand, oft sold-out enterprise, keeping customers coming back for more of his oneof-a-kind hot and cold teas.

Joy Tea and its drinks have been in development for over a year, the result of years of both experimentation by Blessen and customer preferences.

What Blessen says sets Joy Tea apart from coffee shops selling tea and other mass-produced teas on the market is his special, seventimes scented jasmine green tea grown 1,800 meters above sea level in Fujian, China (the

JOHN STOFFER

Max Blessen birthplace of jasmine green tea over 1,000 years ago). Blessen has tasted hundreds of teas and worked with dozens of farms all over China, experimenting with time, temperature and concentrations.

“Joy is unlike any other tea product, brand or experience you have ever had,” he said “We make simple things wonderfully — there’s no flashiness to the brand or products, but there is care. I think a lot of brands spend a lot of time on presentation, and it’s beautiful and I love it, but I think the taste is really the only thing that matters. And, we want our products to be memorable for a lifetime.”

At Joy Tea, Blessen’s passion is serving delicious, health-conscious beverages while safeguarding the rich heritage of ancient Chinese tea.

“Our tea is picked, processed and packaged for us,” he said. “Compare this to almost every other tea you purchase in a cafe, store or anywhere else where tea has been packaged and stored for who knows how long. This freshness we can offer with our partnership with our farms creates a superior flavor that just can’t be matched by a tea that was picked, processed and packed six-plus months ago.”

For the River Forest native, basing Joy Tea’s first physical location in the village was something undoubtedly instinctive.

“Joy believes tea is for everyone, and people in River Forest deserve great tea, don’t they?” he said. “I grew up here but lived in Asia running our other tea company for several years prior to moving back here. When I decided to pursue this path with the store, the logical decision was to come back to my hometown.”

With a steady flow of customers — something Blessen was used in the trailer — each day in store is nonstop for him. Managing both operations and branding, he now has a

small crew of employees, with a goal of having 12 total by summer’s end.

“I’m extraordinarily grateful to all of our customers and loyal fans,” Blessen said. “The overwhelming support of the community has helped drive this to fruition more than I ever could myself.”

In addition, the opening of this first storefront signifies the step along a journey of future expansion.

“We will be the Starbucks for tea,” Blessen says. “Starbucks has about 17,000 stores in the U.S. — I think we have a long way to go. We’ll open them as fast as we can, and I’m sure our cadence will grow quicker as we get the hang of it. Right now, we are going to focus on the small walk-in store layout while we develop our drive-thru concept, which will eventually be our focus.”

Blessen’s beloved trailer — where he spent nearly 400 consecutive days in launching the business — will move to Elmhurst this fall.

There, he will introduce his teas in preparation for opening store number two in town soon after.

“We really do mean it when we tell people it will be the best tea they’ve ever had,” he said. “The communities built around Joy are so beautiful, and that is the original purpose of tea — a small, symbolic gesture and ritual to bring people closer together.

We want to focus on continuing to do that, no matter where we go.”

Blessen said this landmark of opening his first store has left him feeling very happy, fulfilled and grateful.

“I can’t imagine a better community to call home for the Joy brand,” he said. “As we grow all over the city, the state, the country and even potentially the world, River Forest will always be home. We’ll remember all the people who have become friends truthfully.”

Homes Tudor Revival near Frank Lloyd Wright Studio

NEED TO REACH US?

Wednesday Journal, August 5, 2026

email: dhaley@newswellchicago.org

17

Two Hands Interiors remakes Victorian Tudor hybrid in Oak Park

By LACEY SIKORA Contributing Reporter

Designer Rachel Alcorn knows Oak Park. Now based in Glen Ellyn, she began her career during the decade that she lived in Oak Park, and she has deep ties to the community. Through her firm, Two Hands Interiors, she has worked with many homeowners of historic homes.

Her work on an Oak Park home on Forest Avenue stands as a good representation of why clients call Two Hands Interiors: they love the charm and history of their historic homes but want to bring a sense of modern design into their spaces.

Alcorn’s clients on this project called her when they purchased their home just down the street from Frank Lloyd Wright’s Home and Studio roughly 10 years ago. At that time, the young family was looking to put their own spin on the home, which Alcorn says probably began life as a Victorian but was remodeled with

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Living Room

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Dining Room

a Tudor spin early in its lifespan.

Like a lot of her clients who have purchased a new-to-them home, Alcorn says these clients wanted to live in the home before making major changes.

“We cleaned up the Tuscan red walls and put a Band-Aid on the kitchen. Then, we did a lot of decorating for a few years before jumping into renovations,” Alcorn said.

When they jumped in, they did so feet

first. Working with Jacknow Construction, the couple embarked on a renovation to create a new kitchen, mudroom, powder room, keeping room and primary suite.

During the process, they removed the back stairs, reconfigured the kids’ bathrooms and renovated the basement too.

Alcorn noted that their earlier work decorating the home paid off. They established a design vernacular with the clients that guided the renovation, and many of

the elements they’d used to decorate the home during the first phase remained and inspired the rooms’ directions.

One overarching theme? Color.

“As a firm, we love color,” Alcorn said.

“Sometimes, what people don’t have a reference point for is that historic homes did use a lot of color. Victorian and Arts and Crafts homes used saturated color.”

See TUDOR REVIVAL on page 18

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Wednesday Journal, August 5, 2026

OAKPARK.COM

TUDOR REVIVAL

Renovation challenges from page 17 In the kitchen, the husband wanted function. He was interested in a space that would work well for the family of five. Alcorn says the wife was focused on fun and color. Alcorn knew they didn’t like how dark their old kitchen was, so she used mostly white cabinets but punched up the color with fabric in the window shades and counter stool cushions. A wall of walnutstained cabinets reads as a furniture in the room.

A key part of the space is what Alcorn calls the keeping room. Next to the kitchen, it allows family and friends to be in the heart of the home but in a more comfortable chair.

Another important piece for the family and their kids is the adjacent mudroom. Alcorn chose Schumacher’s Citrus Garden wallpaper for the room.

“It’s an historic print revitalized for modern production. We started with that and pulled the cabinet color from there.”

In the primary suite, Alcorn ran with the directive to create a bathroom that felt like a high-end hotel. The room has plenty of modern amenities like a steam shower and a separate toilet room, but the marble, subway tile and trim profiles were inspired by the era the home was built.

The entire process took roughly a year and a half to complete and wasn’t without its share of surprises. Some surprises, like a buried cistern in the yard, were confusing, and others, like a prohibition-era license plate and an old black and white photo of the home, were treasures.

Alcorn says that it’s always much harder to renovate a historic home than it is to build new. “Like any old home renovation, we pull the threads of the sweater very carefully to not unravel the rooms and items we didn’t want to touch.”

The goal was to give the family modern function in a bespoke way that also respected the home. Alcorn concludes, “It makes us happy as a firm to see these historic homes get a lot of love and carry on for the next generation.”

KRISTI HUGHES

Kitchen

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Mud Room

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Entryway

KRISTI HUGHES

Powder room

Wednesday Journal, August 5, 2026

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VIEWPOINTS

Shrubtown p. 23

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A G I N G

Retire the idea of retirement

F

or generations, we’ve organized our lives around a familiar sequence: school, work, retire. We spend our youth preparing for adulthood, devote our middle years to building careers and/or raising families, and then, if we’re fortunate, retire and hope to enjoy the time we have left.

That life script may have worked in the 20th century. It doesn’t fit the 21st.

Many of us will live 20 or 30 years longer than our grandparents. Yet while our lives have expanded, our assumptions about aging have not. We still imagine life as a three-act play, even though the final act has become an entirely new chapter.

The problem isn’t simply that we’re living longer. It’s that we’re trying to fit longer lives into an outdated framework. Again, I ask, how do we design lives worth living longer?

Instead of school-work-retire, imagine a life of learning, contributing, renewing, and beginning again — not as stages, but as ongoing practices.

In a world transformed by technology, demographic change, and new discoveries, curiosity has become one of the most valuable qualities we can cultivate. Learning keeps us intellectually alive, and it also keeps us humble, adaptable, and open to surprise. Every decade of life offers new questions worth exploring.

In our current outdated model, we equate work with a paycheck. Yes, economic stability is important. And in an updated life-design, contributions can frequently come through entrepreneurship, mentoring, caregiving, volunteering, creating, teaching, and strengthening our communities.

As our lives lengthen, our capacity to contribute doesn’t disappear — it evolves. Experience becomes an asset rather than a relic.

A recent study found that 84% of working people don’t expect to stop working at retirement age. Today, most working people believe work continues past the point that the whole system was built to end. People are working in a structure that never accounted for them to still be here.

Renewal may be the missing ingredient. For too long we’ve believed that life peaks in middle age and then it’s all downhill after that. But “conscious aging” is filled with cycles of renewal. We pause, reflect, acquire new skills, shift directions, and discover fresh purpose. A career break at 50, an encore career at 65, or a new passion at 80 are no longer exceptions. They are becoming the new normal.

This shift also invites us to rethink retirement itself. Retirement need not mean retreat. The question is no longer, “What are you retiring from?” but “What are you moving toward?”

Conscious aging asks us to see every season of life as an opportunity for growth, to embrace aging as a process of becoming more fully ourselves.

Longevity is not merely about adding years to life; it’s about adding life to our years.

We’ve already begun extending the human lifespan. The greater challenge is redesigning the human life course so those added years are filled with learning, purpose, connection, and contribution.

Maybe the first thing we should retire is the idea that retirement is the destination.

MARC BLESOFF

PROVIDED

A glimpse into the past shows that the issues haven’t changed that much.

T

The more things stay the same

his summer, I replaced some rotting wood siding on my 1910 worker’s cottage. Finding an old newspaper in the wall was a reminder of how inflation, lack of affordable housing, and race relations were issues in Chicago then as much as today.

Now the village code requires house wrap, a thin plastic weather barrier such as Tyvek, under clapboard siding. But in the old days, contractors used tar paper for wind and moisture resistance.

And sometimes, as at my house, a poor man’s sheathing was a newspaper.

That’s what I found under my rotting siding, a newspaper dated June 10, 1946. It turned out to be a time capsule of stories about life in Chicago in the immediate post-World War II period.

Most stories focused on the disruptions caused by returning soldiers after WWII ended. In the 1940s, Oak Park’s population was 66,000, higher than today’s 54,000. People had doubled up in existing housing, especially before the suburban building boom took off later in the decade.

So in 1946, the owner of my little worker’s cottage subdivided her small single-family home into a two-flat. She was Alma Banthin, a longtime employee of Frank Lloyd Wright’s family as nanny and cook.

Banthin divided the house so that a tenant could live in a one-bedroom apartment on the first floor. She moved into three small rooms on the second floor. Her unit had no bathroom or kitchen. She cooked on a hot plate and

shared the downstairs bathroom with her tenants.

She also added a screened porch off the back of the house — where I found the newspaper in the wall.

A 1946 editorial cartoon featured a worried-looking chicken sitting on a “savings nest egg” which was being shrunk by post-war inflation. An editorial titled, “Housing

by Spasm,” criticized then-Chicago Mayor Ed Kelly for suspending construction of 3,000 units of temporary housing for returning soldiers unless the federal government picked up more of the costs.

The editorial said, “Nothing can justify the spasmodic planless manner in which the city has plunged forward and reared backward” on its housing plan.

There were advertisements about real estate lots for sale in a new suburb called LaGrange Park. “Select your site now. Build your home later.”

And race relations were in the news. An article said that the first repercussions were felt from a new U.S. Supreme Court decision holding that a Virginia law requiring racially separate seating did not apply to interstate bus travel.

The plaintiff had been represented by an attorney, and later U.S. Supreme Court Justice, named Thurgood Marshall. The article described how 23 white army draftees would not ride in a Greyhound bus with black passengers who refused to give up their seats.

We may see the turmoil and issues of our day as unique. News clippings in a wall tell a different story.

JACK CROWE

V I E W P O I N T S

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Few will remember the ice

In the spirit of your “I believe that our mission is to do whatever we can to preserve the planet,” [My non-rational beliefs, Ken Trainor, Viewpoints, July 29] I submit the following: Northwest Passage: A Meltdown (Might be sung to the tune of “The Wreck of the Edmund Fitzgerald”) Sought for in vain over centuries, the Northwest Passage was a dream, but warm waters have loosened up the ice in the frozen Arctic stream.

Arctic shipping is now a possibility, going from the west or the east.

Prez and Vlad applaud the melting, and block efforts to slow down the heat.

He obstructs the use of alternative fuels, wants to stop the wind-power gains.

Is this solely to support his big oil friends or to open those cold shipping lanes?

He wants to own all of Greenland; It has shipping lanes off both shores.

Trump’s war with Iran slows shipping of oil; northern routes would enable much more.

He needs a solution for Mideast blockades, without admitting defeat.

Prez is buying icebreakers from Finland; they say he’s bought a whole fleet.

Seems the ice isn’t melting fast enough, yet smoke through our streets still churns; the war over oil goes on and on and the world continues to burn.

O the Northern Passage is no longer a dream; It might be bought for a price.

And oil would stay less expensive to those, those few who will remember the ice.

David DeMarais Oak Park

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Wednesday Journal, August 5, 2026

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A casualty of war: creative genius

were “just” (arguable at best), it is an incalcufew weeks back, I spent an enjoyable evening at the Ernest Hemingway lable loss for humanity, no matter the nationBirthplace on Oak Park Avenue listenality, no matter the ethnic or socio-economic ing to Scott Schwar talk about his new group. Genius is more widespread than we’ve book, My Journey with Hemingway, been conditioned to believe. which documents his personal and profesAnd most of those war casualties, if they sional association with Oak Park’s most had survived, would have produced offspring, famous author. Scott was a co-founder and some of whom would have had an enduring executive director of the Ernest Hemingway impact for the good of society.

Foundation of Oak Park (EHFOP) and a fine Of all the arguments against war, this tour guide to Papa’s haunts in Cuba. might be the most powerful: Armed conflicts During the Q&A following the talk, a longare, first and foremost, a waste of human time Hemingway aficionado mentioned an brilliance, short-circuiting the potential of intriguing fact: Ernie wasn’t the only futurehumankind, generation upon generation, defamous member of the youthful Red Cross priving millions, military and civilians alike, ambulance corps during World War I. Walt of the opportunity to influence our world for Disney (who grew up in Chicago) and Ray good.

Kroc (who grew up in Oak Park) also drove ambulances And not just war. If a madman hadn’t cut Abraham for the Red Cross in Europe, Lincoln’s life short, imagine how although Kroc and Disney both our reunited nation might have lied about their ages (15 and 16 changed for the better in the respectively) for the privilege. aftermath of the Civil War. If a A fascinating historical footlone wolf hadn’t assassinated note for sure, but I was floored by John F. Kennedy a century later, another consideration. Hemingour polarized country likely way nearly died during his stint would not now be in the hands when a shell exploded nearby, of a Cultural Destructive instead and I couldn’t help wondering: of a Cultural Creative. History what if all three of these major would have followed a different cultural figures had died during ERNEST HEMINGWAY RAY KROC arc, and we would certainly be that war? A very real possibility, better off. given the soaring casualty figures All the victims of gun violence of the Great War. Imagine the across America these past decades force us to gaping hole it would have left in the Ameriplay a perpetual game of “What if ?” We live can cultural landscape: No Golden Arches, in the world’s most violent culture, which no Happy Meals, no Disney animation (no gets worse with the sale of every unregulated Fantasia, no Mary Poppins), no Disneyland firearm. What if it were not so? and Disney World, no best-selling novels by Wars worldwide, and gun violence nathe iconic American literary figure of the tionwide, accompanied by the racism and 20th century. economic inequality that reduce opportunity All three of these super-influentials have and life expectancy, dilute and diminish our detractors to be sure, but like them or not, it’s cultural vitality. We delude ourselves into WALT DISNEY hard to imagine American culture without thinking we can throw away young lives them. and in general, we don’t do nearly enough to I also couldn’t help wondering how many develop youthful potential. What is the price we pay for other cultural creatives might have been among the that neglect? casualties, on both sides, who never got the chance to actualize their potential — same goes for the dead during Creative potential exists in all people, and we can’t World War II and Korea and Vietnam and the Middle afford to waste any of it. A myriad of Disneys, Krocs and East, and all the other armed conflicts of the last century Hemingways were among the many who have died in worldwide. England alone, it has been said, lost an our foolish wars and because of our criminal failure to entire generation of promising poets and scholars in the sensibly regulate firearms. trenches of WWI. It’s hard to imagine a world with no Hemingway, DisHow many creative geniuses did we lose? How many ney and Kroc. did our “enemies” lose? Plenty, no doubt, though we’ll Even harder, it seems, to imagine a world with no wars never know the full extent. Not all were identifiable as and no gun violence, a world that respects every human geniuses at the time. Think of how many were sacrificed being’s creative potential and gives everyone a chance to to questionable causes in our lifetime. Even if the causes fully develop it.

KEN

TRAINOR

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V I E W P O I N T S

Wednesday Journal, August 5, 2026

F A V O R I T E

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T H I N G S

O A K

P A R K

Sidewalk joy, pedestrian treasures

ne of my “Favorite Things” about Oak Park is discovering creative and unique places and spaces in our community.

Many readers are familiar with Little Free Libraries, weatherproof boxes on posts with books that people can donate or take.

Sidewalk Joy, meanwhile, expands from book exchanges to art, puzzles, toys, mugs, seed swaps, dog stick libraries, and other free and whimsical items. It began in Portland, Oregon and has spread across the U.S. and to other countries. According to their website, worldwidesidewalkjoy.com, the map has more than 2,100 Sidewalk Joy installations around the world.

Thanks to local resident Megan Spillman, we get to take part in and enjoy Sidewalk Joy in our own community.

Megan first discovered and was captivated by Sidewalk Joy when she visited Portland. She started Free Little Art Gallery Oak Park (1046 S. Kenilworth Ave.) in 2021.

“I loved the idea of sending a friendly signal to the com-

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munity during the pandemic,” she said.

On the same block across the street and several houses north, there is also a Sidewalk PROVIDED Joy Kenilworth Car Library. My 3-year-old grandson, Sam, and I recently checked it out.

Megan Spillman, left Sam told me he had never seen anything like Sam and Joy, right this before. He said, “I’m happy to donate my toy bulldozer to other children because I’m more interested in insects and reptiles now.” my favorites was a drawIn addition to art and toy car Sidewalk Joy, there are ing that a kid made of her parents. In Portland, I loved a also mug exchanges in both south and north Oak Park: Sidewalk Joy spot that featured buttons and small canvas mugs and trinkets at the North Oak Park Mug Exchange, paintings with affirmations next to a magnetic word 715 N. Taylor Ave. and the Oak Park Swap Spot at 714 S. display.”

Oak Park Ave. Other Sidewalk Joy installations are being For more information, readers can go to Megan Spilldeveloped. man’s Instagram page @freelittleartgalleryoakpark.

Since this series is called “Favorite Things,” I asked Joy Aaronson is an Oak Park resident who writes stories Megan about her favorite local Sidewalk Joy. She said, for Wednesday Journal/ Newswell about her favorite things “That is so hard to narrow down. I love that the artwork in the village. in the gallery is contributed by people of all ages. One of

JOY AARONSON One View

Reading the zoning report

he Oak Park Village Board advanced the Opticos Design zoning report on July 28, by authorizing staff to refer the missingmiddle housing recommendations to the Plan Commission. The action moves the initiative forward to public hearings without enacting final code changes yet.

Opticos’ design can be found at EngageOakPark.com/Shape. As an approximately 80-year resident of Oak Park and a 53-year owner of what used to be a single-family home, I have read the entire report. It has a lot of technical jargon as would be expected from a report recommending a step-by-step change to Oak Park’s complex housing zoning.

I now live in a single-unit dwelling unit close to Beye School on a block consisting of other single-unit dwelling units and two-unit dwellings. Our block would be re-zoned Residential N-2. That means that any “complying lot” in our area could now have a 4-unit dwelling built on it that was 3 stories tall, not to exceed 35 feet. However, the “Notes for Table 4-1” state: “In the N-2 and N-3 Districts, zoning lots that are at least 50 feet wide and 125 feet deep may contain up to six dwelling units, provided the development complies with all applicable bulk, setback, design, and site development standards,” which the Opticos report has considerably shortened and narrowed.

My lot is 50 by 171 feet. My dwelling was built before 1890 and is a very well maintained Victorian dwelling unit. In the past, the village would have encouraged a buyer of my dwelling to maintain and even possibly improve my dwelling through renovations.

However, the village board unanimously voted to send

the zoning report to the Plan Commission, thus supporting the idea that whoever buys my dwelling, or any of the surrounding dwellings with the same lot size, should build one or more six-flats on our block.

Along with these six-flats would come up to 12 cars for the residents of the six-flats, which would have to be parked on the street. The Opticos report has not ignored this fact and states: “Overnight permit parking is available in designated multifamily areas and other limited locations. The Strategic Vision for Housing previously identified the overnight parking regulations as an issue warranting review.”

So it appears the Village Board is basically planning to eliminate overnight parking wherever a developer decides to build a four- or six-unit dwelling in what used to be single-family zoned housing.

The Opticos report goes on to state: “Historic districts cover a significant portion of Oak Park, including several larger lots that may be able to accommodate additional housing, as well as properties with more modest or newer homes that may not be central to the village’s preservation goals.”

What does this mean? How about putting a nice 8-unit dwelling on the south end of the Cheney Mansion, and replace all those useless flowers with affordable housing?

The above statement also recommends slicing up all the historic district properties and building 4-, 6-, and 8-unit dwellings between each of those historic buildings.

And our village president and all our trustees say none of these changes will affect the basic character of what makes Oak Park such a wonderful place to live.

Alan Krause is an Oak Park resident.

ALAN KRAUSE One View

Déjà vu … all over again

Reading all the letters/comments pertaining to MadisonAshland Development is almost word-for-word what we heard at the Lake/Lathrop hearings. We attended and participated with neighbors at three public meetings, responded to letters and other discussions.

What we are seeing here is a repeat of strong opposition to this kind of development. If we could roll back to that time when the neighbors were voicing reasons why Lake & Lathrop was an unsound project and the developer was certainly shady and did not represent as responsible partners, we would hear the same words from our neighbors now.

If we could replay the words spoken and defensive responses by Village President Adduci and others at that time, it would sound almost like the same responses we are hearing today.

Back in May 2024, a developer did approach the village with a very preliminary proposal to build 15 to 18 detached prairiestyle homes as a senior community on the village-owned Madison and Ashland site – but apparently was not the favored developer of this board. This proposal also seemed to be architecturally suitable to our picturesque village.

The village leadership is not showing any leadership as they listen with token interest and do not respond to the calls for not going along with their chosen developer, as they did with Lake & Lathrop … and we all know how that worked out.

And we are still looking across the street at that failed development!

Bill & Lynne Higgins River Forest

V I E W P O I N T S S H R U B T O W N

Wednesday Journal, August 5, 2026

by Marc Stopeck

W E D N E S D A Y

JOURNAL of Oak Park and River Forest

Viewpoints Guidelines

A long way toward building trust

Newton’s Third Law of Physics states that every force is met with an equal and opposite force. Adopting a significant zoning change is a major change for any community to absorb. All significant change generates some resistance.

The Oak Park Village Board can reduce that resistance by slowing the process down and giving the public confidence that its input will genuinely be considered.

Experts in public-sector change management emphasize that building public trust is essential to successful change.

That trust is built as much through the process as through the policy itself. [1] Two trustees, seeing a moral imperative for immediate action, urged that this proposal be adopted by the end of the year. While that moral imperative may motivate people who agree, it will cause people who do not see themselves as racist to become defensive and less receptive to the proposal.

Heavy moral persuasion makes it harder to have an honest discussion about tradeoffs and concerns — or to take seriously the consultant’s other recommendations, such as rolling it out as a pilot.

With an aggressive timeline, people will perceive that the Plan Commission process is a mere formality rather than a meaningful opportunity for input into how this policy is

shaped.

The board could tone down resistance and gain support by acknowledging residents’ concerns, recognizing that every policy involves tradeoffs, and allowing public input to meaningfully shape the proposal. Demonstrating the humility to acknowledge that reasonable people can view this issue differently would go a long way toward building public trust.

Since 2022, when the zoning code was amended to allow ADUs, only 12 have been built. The consultant’s report, the stakeholder input and the public feedback have consistently said this will not create affordable housing. New construction is expensive. Change will not happen overnight.

I urge the board to use every effort to build public confidence so that whatever policy is adopted rests on a stronger foundation of public trust.

[1] Outcomes, Process, and Trust of Civil Servants, Gregg G. Van Ryzin, Rutgers School of Public Affairs and Administration. Journal of Public Administration Research and Theory, Volume 21, Issue 4, October 201, https://doi.org/10.1093/jopart/muq092

Simone Boutet

Municipal law attorney Former village trustee

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Wednesday Journal, August 5, 2026

V I E W P O I N T S

Tardy was punctual on future leaders

I want to congratulate Karen Tardy on her retirement as program coordinator for the OPRF Community Foundation’s Future Philanthropists Program (FPP). Karen joined FPP as a mentor in the program’s second year and took over as program coordinator in 2013. She has managed FPP’s growth from 16 high school juniors and seniors annually to 70 in 2025, as well as coordination with mentors, parents and grantee organizations.

Her dedication to FPP and passion for its mission will be dearly missed.

This program, which I created with my wife, Cheryl, would not have happened without Karen and the kind of effort she puts into the nuances and details. Working with teenagers is not everybody’s cup of tea, particularly as a mentor trying to influence their future behavior. We relied on Karen and our mentors to show that passion every day — and that has proven to be the case over and over again. Alumni from 15 years ago still keep in touch with her.

“Karen Tardy is the glue that binds the teens, mentors and the Future Philanthro-

pists Program together,” says FPP mentor Wendy Will. “Her leadership is on display whether it’s planning and implementing the teaching modules, organizing the volunteer opportunities, collecting the grant requests and so many other details that keep us all together. Her positivity and encouragement work to bring confidence to the teens as they grow as leaders.”

“It’s been said that it’s not what we have in life, but who we have in our life that matters most — and Karen Tardy is one of those people,” says Jane Erickson, an FPP mentor.

“I have known her for over 20 years and we have worked together in FPP and other organizations. She is that person you can always count on and she sees what needs to be done even before you realize it.”

Thank you, Karen, for teaching the art, science and business of philanthropy to the next generation of community leaders.

Rick King

Future Philanthropists Program Oak Park

What responsible zoning requires Oak Park is considering a major zoning change that would allow duplexes, triplexes, and fourplexes in areas currently zoned for single-family homes — a decision that could permanently reshape residential neighborhoods deserves careful review, transparency, and meaningful public participation.

The village has described this proposal as an effort to expand housing options through “missing middle housing.” Expanding housing choices may be a worthwhile goal, but residents deserve to understand what outcomes this proposal is expected to achieve.

Is the goal increased housing supply, affordability, housing choice, or all of the above?

How will success be measured?

Oak Park has demonstrated a commitment to affordable housing through its Housing Trust Fund, which has supported projects such as the Keystone Apartments, the Clinton Avenue conversion, rehabilitation and preservation efforts, and emergency rental assistance. Those efforts deserve recognition.

The question is how this zoning proposal fits into that broader housing strategy.

Smaller developments such as duplexes, triplexes, and fourplexes would not be required to include affordable housing units.

If affordability is a goal, residents deserve to understand what evidence shows these changes will achieve that outcome.

The village has commissioned a feasibility study, which is an important step.

However, the proposed zoning amendments have already moved forward to the Plan Commission, while the study is not expected until the end of August. With a public forum scheduled for Aug. 27 and a Plan Commission vote expected on Sept. 17, will residents and commissioners have enough time to review and understand the findings?

A feasibility study should help guide decisions. Residents deserve the opportunity to consider that information before recommendations are made.

The study should also address the practical impacts of increased density, including parking, infrastructure, traffic, and municipal services. These are not arguments against housing or change; they are the questions responsible planning requires us to answer.

Taking additional time to fully evaluate the proposal is not a barrier to progress — it is part of responsible planning.

Audrey Strode Oak Park

OAKPARK.COM | RIVERFOREST.COM

Does public input actually matter?

The recent Development Review Board’s recommendation to approve the Madison & Ashland development raises a question that extends beyond one building. It raises questions about the integrity of River Forest’s planning process.

Just months ago, residents spent countless hours participating in the village’s discussion of proposed zoning changes that would have allowed larger, denser development. Those proposals were rejected, based on concerns about neighborhood compatibility and overdevelopment.

Now the village is considering approving a 5-story, 72-unit building through variances that exceed the very standards that were recently affirmed.

If the village can grant variances for what it declined to adopt through its zoning code, residents are left wondering what purpose the zoning debate served.

Why ask the community to spend months shaping development policy if those standards can simply be set aside, project by project?

Equally concerning is what this process says about public engagement. Meaningful public participation is not measured by the number of meetings held or comments

collected. It is measured by transparency.

Residents deserve to know what the village heard, how public input influenced the recommendation, and why certain concerns were accepted while others were rejected.

Listening alone is not enough. Good governance requires demonstrating how that listening informed the final decision.

I understand that not every resident will agree on this project, nor should every public comment determine the outcome.

But every resident who participates in good faith deserves confidence that the process was more than an exercise in checking procedural boxes.

Development and neighborhood preservation are not competing values. River Forest can welcome investment while also honoring the planning process, respecting its own zoning decisions, and demonstrating that public participation genuinely matters.

If we lose confidence in those principles, we lose more than a debate over one development — we lose trust in how our village makes decisions.

Angie Grover

River Forest

Not responsible stewardship

I am an Oak Park retiree living in a 40-unit condo building near the main library. Recently I engaged a local, family-owned, Oak Park-based business to do a one-day job: moving my electric panel from inside a closet to an adjacent wall 2-3 feet away. This project is being required of all residents not currently code-compliant, meaning that these panels can no longer be located inside closets.

The highly recommended vendor I chose and am happy with, who has done work in our building and many others in the Oak Park area, estimated the cost of a permit at $175 to $200, based on similar previous work and information on the village’s website.

However, I was informed on the day before the work was done, the actual cost will be $425. I also learned that VOP has for the last several years been outsourcing permitting to a third party called SafeBuilt.

That seems way out of line: $425

for reviewing and approving a simple permit application. Forest Park charges considerably less, and as recently as last year, Oak Park was charging under $200. I would sure like to know who is pocketing that extra cash, and how on earth the village trustees justified the use of a third-party company to do the review instead of the Oak Park Building Department.

My taxes and those of all Oak Park residents pay the salaries of VOP employees, right? And now we have to cough up almost twice as much, with a hefty chunk going outside Oak Park.

Why? It’s a reasonable question that no one at VOP seems to have a reasonable answer for. So, like with many other projects and expenditures around town, our village government is proving not to be responsible stewards of our resources.

They need to do much better.

Ellen Edwards Oak Park

V I E W P O I N T S

OAKPARK.COM | RIVERFOREST.COM

Raise, don’t raze, our history

The issue at hand is whether Oak Park should eliminate single-family zoning.

Having lived and worked in this community my whole life, I see nothing wrong in keeping it as a single-family zoning. Oak Park has always been in the forefront of diversity. Bobbi Raymond did an excellent job in ensuring that. Did you know that Oak Park had an African American church before the turn of the century? Have any of the board members been to our History Museum to learn of Oak Park’s past?

Having been a past commissioner of the Landmarks Commission, I have always had an appreciation of single-family dwellings. The whole nature of Oak Park is its architecture. Did you know there was a surge in population in Oak Park, after the Chicago Fire?

Oak Park was incorporated in 1902. I was on the committee to celebrate that

milestone, along with Elsie Jacobsen, in 1977. My business took me to rehabbing and preserving historic structures in the village for many years.

What would happen if we were to do away with single-family zoning? Certainly it would have a much different atmosphere than what we are experiencing today. This is not a racial issue although I do believe that future developers would like to use this tactic so as to have people shy away from this issue and thus further their development plans.

Oak Park is a community of old and new ways and should be celebrated as such. But to raze its history is not the answer. The future of Oak Park should be celebrated with its past, which includes its singlefamily zoning.

Bob Proko

Oak Park

Wednesday Journal, August 5, 2026

Public trust is at stake here

Last week, the Oak Park Village Board had a choice: let residents vote directly on one of the biggest zoning changes Oak Park has considered in decades. Instead, by a vote of 5-1, that choice was taken away.

More than 20 residents spoke at the meeting. The overwhelming majority asked for one thing — a referendum. Not a veto, not a blockage, just a chance to be heard on the record, on a ballot this November. The board said No. I understand the arguments: that zoning is legally the board’s responsibility, that a yes-or-no question can’t capture something this nuanced, that we elected representatives to make hard calls so we don’t have to.

Those arguments aren’t unreasonable. But they miss something important — no one on this board ran on a platform of eliminating single-family zoning village-wide.

This isn’t a small thing to skip. It’s about

Dealing with problem properties

Wednesday Journal’s story on Heritage House [News, July 29] illustrates why Oak Park needs to improve how it deals with problem properties.

The process is too slow. Per the article: “It has been plagued for years by issues like filthy floors, rats and bedbugs, inadequate garbage dumpsters and … outsiders entering the building unfettered.”

The process is too timid. “Oak Park began issuing citations this spring instead of the usual warnings.” One or two warnings should suffice before citations are issued.

The penalties are too minor. “Pacific Management was assessed a $50 fine … for each citation.” The fines totaled $500, a drop in the bucket compared to the money saved by failing to keep the property clean,

safe, and vermin-free over the years.

We have experienced similar commercial and residential property issues in the North Avenue District. For example, the long-vacant IHOP at North and Elmwood has been an eyesore and a health/safety hazard for years. When asked about this property last summer, a village employee said: “We’re working with the owner.”

Really? After years of neglect? There are several other North Avenue examples.

Nothing is a greater impediment to revitalization efforts than problem properties like this one.

An inadequate approach to problem properties has been an Oak Park issue for a long time, long predating Kevin Jackson’s tenure as village manager, due to some

density, parking, traffic, and the character of the blocks we’ve built our lives on. Thousands of families in this village bought their homes understanding they were single-family zoned.

That understanding has value — financial, yes, but also the simpler value of knowing what your neighborhood is and will be.

To be fair, affordability is real. Oak Park is losing people who can’t afford to live here, and that needs to be addressed. I don’t think anyone disagrees with that goal. But a good goal doesn’t excuse skipping the people who will live with the outcome.

So the ask is simple: slow down. There’s no urgency to implement this immediately.

Let residents have their say in the upcoming zoning meetings, and let the board get the details right.

Public trust is what’s at stake here.

Chip Popa

Marion Street resident

Modernize outdated parking laws

combination of municipal code insufficiencies and the village’s generally laissez-faire culture toward the owners of these properties. I would like to see the village take direct action on serious problems, bill the owners, and file liens against the properties. HUD hired a temp agency to clean Heritage House. The village should take a page from its book. Had it done so, the serious fire at 1239 N. Taylor in February could have been prevented.

It’s my understanding that village staff is studying how its approach to problem properties can be improved, including by direct action. It’s about time. I hope the study process can be expedited.

What is happening with the absurd parking rules in Oak Park? I cannot park my car in my driveway without some neighbor calling me in for “blocking” the sidewalk. Many homes in Oak Park have short driveways and garages which do not fit modern-day vehicles. So now I must pay parking tickets because I have neighbors targeting me. We must have a vote to modernize outdated parking laws in this village. Enough is enough.

Oak Park

Oak Park

Judith Alexander

Matt Avery

Send letters

We are better than this

Last week I attended my first ever village board meeting to express my support for rezoning to legalize homes. The public comment period included remarks from two renters, both of whom favor legalizing rental units, and over 20 homeowners who were split. Around midnight, trustees were finally allowed to speak. As soon as Trustee [Cory] Wesley began explaining the racist history of exclusionary single-family zon-

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ing, he was shouted down by an angry old white male homeowner who already had his turn at the podium.

The derisive energy flowing off many of the anti-zoning-change (and overwhelmingly white) homeowners was something I never expected to see in my beloved Oak Park. Also, bizarre claims from many older residents that multi-unit housing will overwhelm the schools and other

infrastructure, when anyone reading this paper knows District 97 and District 200 are losing students and laying off teachers, were depressingly detached from objective reality.

Fellow Oak Parkers, we are better than this!

We can let a Black trustee talk about racism. We can also read enough to acknowledge basic facts.

Noel Stringham Oak Park

Ken Trainor, Wednesday Journal ktrainor@newswellchicago.org Fax: 708-524-0047 Please include name, address and daytime phone number for verification.

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Wednesday Journal, August 5, 2026

V I E W P O I N T S

Blissfully ignorant

Second 2026 tax appeal period opens

Our village board members were elected to represent us, the citizens, in the running of our village. When they assert that referendums, whether for leaf bagging or overhauling zoning, will not be put on the ballot, they seem to forget that this is a cooperative venture. We are all in this together.

But Jim Taglia was the only trustee in favor of the referendum.

I can think of only one reason to refuse a referendum: our board does not want to know how many Oak Parkers are in favor of demolishing our zoning ordinances.

In blissful ignorance, they will march ahead.

Oak Park residents concerned about the assessed values of their properties may appeal them with the Cook County Board of Review between Aug. 3 and Sept. 1. Residents should know that the Oak Park Township Assessor’s Office is available to assist those who wish to file appeals.

Just call 708-383-8005 to set up an appointment.

In May of this year, the Cook County Assessor’s Office sent reassessment notices to all Oak Park property owners. These notices proposed new assessed values for each property that would impact the taxes paid by local residents from 2027 through 2029. Taxpayers unhappy with the proposed values had a right to appeal them to the county assessor’s office, and appeal results were released in mid-July.

Shelly Uslenghi Oak Park

Yet we shall survive in the memories of our friends as long as the remembrance will serve any good purpose; and then our work and thought and influence will mingle with the great ocean of human achievement, and the sum total of that will be something more, something different, from what it would have been without us.

Ron Moline Oak Park

I attended the marathon village board meeting on July 28 to learn more about the proposed elimination of single-family zones in Oak Park. My thanks go out to trustees and staff who stayed late to hear all public comments. Many questions were asked by citizens, and we got a few answers. Here is a list I compiled: Q: Will all lots zoned today for single-family homes change to multi-unit zones? Is the change village-wide?

A: Yes and yes.

Q: Can any single-family home be torn down for a multi-unit building?

Taxpayers dissatisfied with the results from their appeals, as well as taxpayers who did not file an appeal with the Cook County Assessor, now have the right to appeal to the Cook County Board of Review. There are some differences in the way the two county agencies review tax appeals, such that one agency sometimes denies an appeal while the other grants it. Thus, if you thought you had a good case but lost your first appeal, don’t give up!

My office has many experienced staffers who can help local residents quickly and easily file appeals with the Board of Review. Call before the Sept. 1 deadline and we will work together to get your appeal filed.

Ali ElSaffar

Township Assessor

Be one of the 5 in a kid’s life

Yet we shall survive …

I very much appreciated your last column on your beliefs [My nonrational beliefs, Ken Trainor, Viewpoints, July 29]. You are a Universalist in your soul, in my opinion.

Your words are so close to those I want to share with you, that I suspect you may have read them at some time or another. They were given by Augusta Chapin, Unity Temple’s first — and up until a week ago, only — woman minister, delivered sometime during her ministry (1885-1891), the occasion lost to history: The greatest names will perish from human history, the finest monuments crumble into dust, and the time will come when our places know us no more.

OAKPARK.COM | RIVERFOREST.COM

I have worked as the Learning Edge Tutoring Marketing coordinator for just over two years. You may be thinking, “She’s paid to promote them.” It’s true! But I wouldn’t do this work if I wasn’t a super-fan. In fact, initially I didn’t know if I had the bandwidth to do the work, but I attended a single tutoring night and I was hooked.

I wish you could feel, as I did, the energy as dozens of students eagerly greet their mentor-tutors and get right down to work – and after a long day at school, no less!

At one session, I watched a student come through the doors, squeal, run toward her mentor-tutor, and throw her arms around her.

Learning Edge is a nonprofit, community-based organization that provides Chicago-area students free one-to-one tutoring and academic enrichment, enhanced by caring, mentoring relationships. Many of our students join tutoring when they’re young so they have an additional adult to keep tabs on them, to notice when they are struggling in certain areas. Like medical preventive care, proactively creating this culture of accountability and structure makes for stronger students.

More questions than answers

A: Yes. Current single-family zones will be consolidated into three zones, with 3- or 5-story multi-unit buildings allowed depending on the zone.

Q: Has there been any analysis conducted to evaluate potential population increase and resulting impact on shared resources (e.g. parks, CRC, library, fire/police schools) or infrastructure (e.g. trash, utilities, roads, sewers)?

A: No Q: Will property values decrease for adjacent single-family homes when a large multi-flat is built next door, or will developer

Here are some things our mentor-tutors have said about this work: Barb says, “It’s so much fun to see the lightbulb go on.” Lloyd says his student brings out the best in him. Karen says, “The human connections go such a long way; I love the combination of ages – it works beautifully!”

As we approach a new school year, we are seeking additional adults to do this meaningful volunteer work.

Our mentor-tutors do not need experience; we provide training and materials. While we do have educators in our ranks, we also have mentors who work in retail, textiles, medicine, IT, banking, etc. We also have high school students!

If you give it a try, we think you might just stick around. Our average tutor is with us for four years.

There’s a theory that five caring adults in the life of a child can make the difference between surviving and thriving. Are you willing to help kids in our community thrive? learningedgetutoring.org/volunteer

demand raise values?

A: TBD Q: Will you change setback and height rules to accommodate larger edifices?

A: Standard setbacks apply, but allowed height is increased.

Q: Will parking rules change?

A: Yes, the overnight parking ban will be eliminated.

Q: Will property taxes be impacted?

A: TBD Q. Can coach houses be built?

A: TBD Q: How does the village ensure new multi-

Nancy Schroeder Oak Park

units constructed will actually be affordable and not high-end?

A: TBD Q: Does the proposal include support for current Oak Park residents struggling with housing affordability?

A: No There are more questions than answers. I advocate slowing the process down to better inform, discuss, and refine the proposal to ensure it delivers desired results without unintended consequences.

Grant Johnsey Oak Park

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OAKPARK.COM | RIVERFOREST.COM

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Common sense and the common good

o me, it seems the most common sense of conclusions: if you keep dumping any single thing into a confined space, eventually you’ll create a problem. Water is necessary for the human body. But drinking water to excess produces “water intoxication,” which causes drowsiness, muscle weakness, and in extreme cases, death.

Oxygen is necessary for us to breathe.

But an overly-oxygenated environment is highly flammable, resulting in danger to anyone who is present. And so it seems fairly self-evident that emitting too much carbon dioxide into the atmosphere would eventually create a problem. Scientists understood that excess carbon dioxide in a confined space would produce warming by the mid-1800s, and they made quantitative predictions about climate change before the turn of the 20th century. Fossil fuel companies studied climate change and predicted its current effects 50 years ago.

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Wednesday Journal, August 5, 2026

This is not new science. It is not an outlandish idea. But in the face of punishing heat waves, torrential storms, and destructive wildfires, it is still contested. By some, its veracity is contested. By others, its degree. By still others, its remedy.

A famous quotation whose authorship is disputed tells us, “It is difficult to get a person to understand something when their salary depends upon them not understanding it.” This is most especially true for fossil fuel corporations, their executives, their boards, and their shareholders.

For the rest of us, we can alter this quotation slightly: “It is difficult to get a person to understand something when their worldview depends upon them not understanding it.” And it is that intersection of pecuniary interest for corporations and preservative interest for everyone else that creates our current stasis. Everyone

fears change. Wealthy elites fear losing power. We fear losing everything. Or if we can’t conceive of that, we fear losing comfort. And those in fear react in a few common ways: They fight. They flee.

They freeze. Our communal survival depends on us finding another way.

If we process our fears healthily, we can react differently. We can use less but feel more. We can connect with one another rather than collecting more possessions.

We can forgo accumulation and value relaxation. Rather than believing the corporatist lie that we are all alone and falling behind, we can create the truth that we are all together in having what we need.

But this cannot just be a shift in mindset; it also must be a shift in power. This new way of thinking must allow us to come together in rejecting wealthy elites’

JIM SCHWARTZ One View

control of our economy, government, and society. We must take back our common power to eliminate their undue influence, eliminate their ability to buy elections, tax back their money into our shared coffers, and use our common wealth for the common good.

As we do this, addressing the excessive emission of carbon dioxide and other substances becomes a matter of exercising that common power. When corporations no longer control either the power or the narrative, we can regulate pollution.

We can ensure quality education for our youth. We can ensure that all people have adequate food, shelter, and health care.

Common-sense conclusions. Commonsense actions.

Jim Schwartz is an Oak Park resident, an educator, and a blogger at Entwining. org.

Seeing the same facts

s I have listened to Oak Park’s debate over single-family zoning, I have become convinced that we are arguing about much more than zoning. We are often looking at many of the same facts, yet reaching very different conclusions. Facts alone do not tell us what they mean. We filter them through our own experiences, histories, values, and beliefs, connecting them into stories that help us make sense of the world. Those stories shape how we understand our community and what we believe should happen next.

Every resident who speaks at a village board meeting or writes a letter to this newspaper brings a perspective shaped by experience. For some, the defining experience is exclusion — the memory and reality of families denied housing opportunities because of race, discrimination, income, or unequal opportunity.

When Trustee Cory Wesley says that in some neighborhoods he does not see many

people who look like him, he is expressing a lived experience that deserves to be heard and taken seriously.

For others, the defining experience is different. It is the story of saving for years to buy a home, raising a family, investing in a neighborhood, and building stability. When these residents ask how zoning changes may affect neighborhood character, housing values, infrastructure, schools, taxes, or parking, they are expressing concerns rooted in their own experiences. Those questions should not automatically be interpreted as opposition to inclusion or denial of Oak Park’s history.

The challenge is that people often attach very different meanings to the same facts and symbols. One person sees justice; another sees uncertainty. One sees opportunity; another sees disruption. That helps explain why this debate has become

so emotionally charged.

Recognizing different perspectives does not mean all policy conclusions are equally persuasive. Our experiences deserve respect, but public policy must ultimately rest on evidence. We should be able to acknowledge Oak Park’s history of exclusion while also asking practical questions about whether a proposed policy will meaningfully increase affordability, who is likely to benefit, how many homes may actually be built, and what unintended consequences might result.

The responsibility of democratic government is not to choose one narrative over another. It is to listen respectfully to every perspective and then make decisions grounded in evidence, law, and the public interest. Listening does not guarantee agreement, but it should leave residents confident that their voices were genuinely heard.

BOB MILSTEIN One View

Visit us online at www.OakPark.com

One way to strengthen that confidence would be an advisory referendum. Such a vote would not transfer the board’s legal responsibility to govern, nor would it dictate the outcome. Trustees would still have the responsibility to exercise independent judgment. But on an issue involving history, identity, neighborhood character, and the future of Oak Park, an advisory referendum would allow every resident to be heard while providing the board with valuable information before making its final decision.

Oak Park’s diversity includes more than race, income, and housing. It also includes diversity of experience and perspective.

If we can respect those differences while remaining committed to evidence-based decision-making, we will not only make better policy — we will strengthen the trust that allows a community to move forward together.

Bob Milstein is an Oak Park resident and a former village trustee.

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Wednesday Journal, August 5, 2026

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OAKPARK.COM | RIVERFOREST.COM

O B I T U A R I E S

More outreach

I am bothered that some people have equated opposition to eliminating single-family housing to racism. If I were to use a single word to describe this complex issue it would not be race. It would be density.

If you don’t believe that, think back to the vivid opposition to the high-rise buildings that were built in Downtown Oak Park a few years ago. No one thought it would bring in low income minorities. That wasn’t the issue. They were objecting to the greater density.

I view increased density as a negative, with its impact on traffic, schools, etc. One speaker at the board meeting said that if people want an area with single-family homes, there are plenty of suburbs with them. I have no desire to move. I did not want to move to a suburb that only has single-family houses.

Nor did I want to move someplace that only had multiple units. One of the reasons we chose Oak Park was that we wanted to live in, and raise our child in, a community with a mixture of housing types and a diversity of residents.

Also, who says that only whites want to live in single-family homes? There are entire suburbs, such as Bellwood or Country Club Hills, that are predominantly black families living in single-family homes.

Our block is diverse. So how is wanting a singlefamily home a race issue?

Another issue is the historic districts in Oak Park.

So many people have worked so hard over the years to protect them and our historic architecture that is world-famous. Could they be torn down to make way for multi-unit buildings? If the answer is no, then those of us in bungalows are being discriminated against.

The village really should do a mailing to every home in Oak Park explaining the issues and notifying people about opportunities for discussion. I have not seen anything directly from the village. I sometimes hear about the meetings and comments after they have happened. I know there are more meetings planned. I’ve seen a list from a neighbor but hope there will be something directly from the village.

Affordability is certainly an issue, but it is not an issue exclusive to single-family homes. Look at the price of condos. Some of them cost more than my house. Rentals rates are hardly cheap either, so building more buildings might not help. It is an issue all over, not just here. The village has built some affordable buildings. How has that gone?

There was a much greater outreach for community involvement for a less consequential plan several years ago to redo Downtown Oak Park. In the almost 44 years that I have lived in Oak Park this is the most consequential issue ever, and the village really needs to reach out directly to all its residents.

Joyce Porter Oak Park.

John Muhlenberg, 94

Engineer who loved sailing and music John Albert Muhlenberg, 94, of LaGrange Park, formerly of Oak Park, died peacefully on Aug. 1, 2026 at Lightways Hospice in Joliet. He had lived with Parkinson’s for many years.

Nonetheless his sudden decline shocked everyone. His wife of nearly 30 years, Elisabeth Muhlenberg, was by his side throughout and particularly during his hospice stay. Lightways was instrumental in making John’s last days comfortable and peaceful.

Born in Reading, Pennsylvania, he attended Wyomissing High school and served in the U.S. Army after the Korean War (19531955), spending much of those two years in Fort Hood, Texas.

He deeply disliked the army, but made lifelong friends and achieved a kind of fame in the Signal Corps by slyly resisting authority enough to avoid getting promoted, but not too much to get court-martialed. His independence and rebellion against authority affected his entire life, including his educational career. He switched universities repeatedly, eventually receiving a bachelor’s degree in Psychology from the University of Illinois Chicago (UIC).

With the support of his first wife, Alba Muhlenberg, John finally found his niche at the Illinois Institute of Technology (IIT). He graduated as a mechanical engineer in the 1970s and accepted a job at the Assocation of American Railroads (AAR), testing railroad equipment. He loved his job and retired in 1995 when the AAR moved operations to Colorado.

He loved the outdoors, and relaxed, particularly after Alba’s death, by walking 5 miles after work. The greatest damage Parkinson’s inflicted on him was losing his ability to walk. He canoed wildwater races competitively with his cousin Ferd Thun, and spent years instructing sailing for Sail Chicago, passing the tough test to become a US Sailing Association instructor.

With Parkinson’s, he discovered the wonderful Judd Goldman Adaptive Sailing program.

Throughout his adult life he subscribed to the Chicago Symphony and the Lyric Opera of Chicago. For their first date he took his future wife Elisabeth to a performance of the Chicago Symphony. John and Alba did not have children. She died in 1989 of a chronic lung disease. John adored his two step-children Stephanie (Mathew) Hein and Martin (Terese) Broerman.

He took special pleasure in all five grandchildren, Tim, Annelise and Erik Hein and Charlotte and Fritz Broerman.

John was the fourth child of the late Charles Muhlenberg and Wilhelmina Thun Muhlenberg. His siblings, Nick, Mimi, Philip and Jerry all predeceased him. He was especially close to his sister’s family, her three children, the late Christopher Cherney, Mary Cherney and Kaethe Cherney and the children, Tim Cherney and Charlotte Grillot.

John chose to donate his body to science through the Anatomical Gift Association. A memorial service is planned for a later date at Plymouth Place.

In lieu of flowers, gifts can be made to the Judd Goldman

Adaptive Sailing Foundation https://juddgoldmansailing.org/ donate/ or Lightways Hospice https://lightways.org/make-adonation.

Arrangements were handled by Inclusive Funeral Care, www.

InclusiveFuneralCare.com.

Patrick Newton, 67 Family historian

Patrick Kevin Newton, 67, died of natural causes after a brief illness in San Diego on July 8, 2026. Born on Jan. 31, 1959, in Evanston, the ninth child and youngest son of the late Walter and Mary Eileen Newton, the family moved to Oak Park when he was just 7 months old.

He graduated from St. Edmund School, Oak Park and River Forest High School, and earned his degree from the University of Portland in Oregon in 1981. Following graduation, he worked as records manager in various law firms in Portland, San Diego, and Los Angeles before eventually making San Diego his home.

An avid walker and jogger who loved staying active, his true passion was swimming. Beyond his active lifestyle, he possessed a remarkable mind and a lifelong obsession with dates.

He served as the family’s unofficial historian, recalling names, family events, milestones, and shared memories with an unmatched, keen sense of detail and humor.

His profound fondness for his nieces, nephews, and great-nieces and -nephews was touching; he took immense joy in watching them grow and celebrating their lives. He also formed deep, enduring friendships over the years.

Patrick is survived by his loving siblings: Diane (Richard) Van Grunsven, Don, Rev. Steve CSC, Mary Pat (Ron) Hestbeck, Jerry, Mike, Sheila Slifka, and Maureen (Dave) Winfrey. His nieces and nephews, Gregory (Christianne) Van Grunsven, Michelle (Kyle Marcus) Van Grunsven, Cheryl (Thomas Fondano) Van Grunsven, Erin (Jeff) Mielke, Laura (Jordan) Nelson, Kelly (Michael) Terranova, Terry (fiancée Alexis) Newton Jr., Kristin (Julio) Ruiz, Kyle (Stephannie) Slifka, Shannon Slifka, Megan (Kyle) Michelsen, Brandon (Tori) Slifka, Kayla Winfrey, and Mara Winfrey. He is also survived by several grand-nieces and grand-nephews, all of whom will deeply miss his love, laughter, and remarkable memory.

Patrick was preceded in death by his parents, Walter and Mary Eileen Newton, his brothers Terry and Tim, and his brother-in-law Steve Slifka.

Visitation will be held on Friday, Sept. 18 from 10 to 11 a.m. at St. Edmund Catholic Church, 188 S. Oak Park Ave, in Oak Park.

The funeral Mass will be celebrated at 11.

Memorial donations may be made to Erna’s Roadside Farmstand, established to assist with the ongoing expenses related to Patrick’s niece, Erin, as she battles her six-year fight against lung cancer.

Details for contributing are available on: Erna’s Roadside Venmo or Erna’s Roadside Facebook.

Wednesday Journal, August 5, 2026

29

SPORTS River Forest 11U wins state championship Delayed steal of home, key late-game K propel locals to Little League title

By GREGG VOSS Contributing Reporter

Baseball is beautiful, simply due to perfect execution of plays like a delayed steal of home. Picture it: Runners on first and third bases with one out in the bottom of the first inning of a scoreless game. Push a run across, and you’ve suddenly got all the momentum in a Little League state championship game.

That was the position the River Forest 11U baseball team found itself July 29 at Hinsdale – a team the locals lost to in the 2025 10U title game.

With Nate Kardosh on first and Dawson Przyborowski at third, at bat was Jack Hanley, and all three knew what to do.

Kardosh broke for second in an attempt to get into a rundown, thus allowing Przyborowski to score. Hypothetically, anyway.

The Hinsdale catcher threw the ball across the field to his shortstop and Kardosh froze within feet of second base. Simultaneously, Przyborowski broke for the plate. Hanley’s role was simply to get out of the way.

It worked. Przyborowski beat the throw and Kardosh was safe at second.

“Once I saw the catcher was throwing it down to second base, I knew I had to start running because the shortstop had a good arm,” said Przyborowski, son of coach Josh Przyborowski. “It was exciting. I knew it was going to help us settle in with the lead and it would calm down our pitcher so he wouldn’t have to be perfect.”

The pitcher was Hanley, who was nothing short of stellar in his team’s 3-2 state championship win over Hinsdale. Despite the fact that Hinsdale was hosting the finals, No. 2-seeded River Forest was designated the “home” team and Hanley threw a complete game, giving up just those two runs.

He also got out of a major jam in top of the sixth inning to seal the victory with a ton of help from his catcher – Przyborowski.

With two outs and the bases loaded, there is no margin for error, and Hanley knew it.

“I was thinking that I couldn’t leave the ball over the middle,” he said. “I would have to pick corners and Dawson definitely helped me.”

At the moment of truth, neither player flinched. Hanley painted the corner, nestled the ball neatly in Przyborowski’s mitt and Hinsdale’s best hitter was called out on strikes.

Bring on the pandemonium.

“At the time, I was thinking we’ve been waiting for this for a year,” said shortstop Michael Berger, son of pitching coach Ian Berger. “Last year we got second and it was great

SUBMITTED BY TIM MADDEN

River Forest 11U State Champions Team to beat them back.”

And how. River Forest went 22-2 this season, including winning their last 19 in a row – eight in the state tournament. But July 29 was the big day, as the locals drubbed Moline 12-0 in the semifinals at 5:30 p.m. before beating Hinsdale at 7:30 p.m.

“We made the state tournament last year and felt like we were underdogs,” Josh Przyborowski said. “We left last year believing we belonged there and came into this tournament with much more confidence.”

This is about the age that travel ball begins to beckon, and Przyborowski said his group is different because they’ve been friends for essentially their whole lives and want to play together. They’ll do that next year in 12U, which is when the opportunity to advance to the Little League World

Series comes about.

But let’s not get ahead of ourselves. Przyborowski said there are several things he and his coaches emphasize to their young charges.

“We remind them that baseball is a tough game and it’s a game where you have to learn to deal with adversity,” he said. “Nobody should feel like they are out there by themselves. They should rely on the strength of their teammates.”

But these guys aren’t alone and they won’t be as middle school bleeds into high school baseball. You’ll be reading their names in Wednesday Journal a few years from now.

“I think it’s everyone in the neighborhood and the talent and the coaches,” Berger said. “We work so well together and we’re best friends.”

30

S P O R T S

Wednesday Journal, August 5, 2026

OAKPARK.COM | RIVERFOREST.COM

Far-out 4-peat for Elmhurst/River Forest 14U Central Region champs head to 4th consecutive Junior World Series

By MELVIN TATE Contributing Reporter

Back in the ’90s, Michael Jordan and Scottie Pippen led the Bulls to six NBA titles in eight years. Last decade, Jonathan Toews and Patrick Kane were the linchpins in the Blackhawks’ run of three Stanley Cups in six seasons.

The Elmhurst/River Forest 14U baseball team has now joined those local sports dynasties following a 10-0 run-rule rout of Whitefish Bay, Wisconsin in the Junior League Central Region finals, Aug. 2, in Midland, Michigan. The victory punches the team’s ticket to the World Series for the fourth consecutive year.

“I’ve known about this team for a long time and wanted to play,” said River Forest resident and incoming Fenwick freshman Will Bartolucci. “Winning the regional means a lot and it feels very good.”

“It’s good to see all the hard work has paid off,” said River Forest resident Jimmy Madden. “It’s a good opportunity to play some really good competition.”

Elm-RF, which had squeaked out a 4-2 victory over Whitefish Bay in its tournament opener on July 30, took care of business early in Sunday’s rematch, scoring four runs in the bottom of the first inning. Madden and fellow River Forest resident Danny Goggin each had run-scoring singles in the frame.

“When the top of our lineup starts well, it gets the morale of the team really high,” Goggin said. “Scoring those early runs gave us the momentum.”

Then Elm-RF sealed things with six runs in the fourth. Bartolucci had a runscoring double during the rally; he was 2-for-2 at the plate for the day along with Goggin. He had missed the state tournament the previous week due to a thumb injury and was glad to make a major contribution in the regional.

“I wasn’t 100 percent sure if I was going to play,” he said. “Playing baseball again felt awesome; it’s my favorite thing to do.”

“They saved their best two pitchers for (Sunday), but our guys are hitting the ball so well, we were ready,” said Elm-RF head coach Rob Fleming. “We came out strong, got on the board early, and never looked back.”

In Elm-RF’s 11-0 semifinal victory over Negaunee, Michigan, Aug. 1, Bartolucci

SUBMITTED BY TIM MADDEN

River Forest 11U State Champions Team and Madden each delivered RBI singles.

The team had advanced to the semifinals with a 7-6 victory over Bullock Creek, Michigan.

The four River Forest players on the team, Bartolucci, Jon Ellis, Goggin, and Madden, have meshed well with the Elmhurst players. Goggin feels the quicklydeveloped chemistry between the two leagues has led to this year’s success.

“Through state it was a little iffy,” he said, “but once we got to regionals, we stayed overnight (together). We ate dinner together and got to know each other. We brought a game of bags along and started to bond; now it feels like we’re a family.”

“When we played (Elmhurst) in 12U, I

couldn’t have imagined being friends with them,” Bartolucci added. “Being in the same hotel brought us closer together and it’s been really great.”

To a man, the players know about the high expectations of the 14U team and were eager to make their mark.

“I remember watching them last year on TV and thought it was so cool. I really wanted to get (to the World Series),” Madden said. “I realized it comes with a lot of hard work and dedication. I’m very proud of everybody.”

Ellis has missed the state and regional tournaments with a hamstring injury, but he’s scheduled to return for the World Series. And he’s eager to help out his team-

mates.

“It’s been kind of hard sitting on the bench,” Ellis said. “I like supporting everyone, but I’m really excited to return and help out the team as much as I can.”

“Super-excited because Jon’s one of our best players and pitchers,” Bartolucci said.

Elm-RF faces Murfreesboro, Tennessee in the opening round of the Junior League World Series, Aug. 9, in Taylor, Michigan.

Fleming is optimistic about his team making a strong run.

“The hitting and fielding are at top level and the pitching’s been amazing,” he said.

“These guys want to win, they’re hot. They deserve our best effort that puts them in the best position to be successful.”

31 Wednesday Journal, August 5, 2026 HOURS: 9:00 A.M.– 5:00 P.M. MON–FRI • Deadline: Monday at 5 p.m.

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PUBLIC NOTICES

LEGAL NOTICE NOTICE OF PUBLIC INFORMATION MEETING Notice is hereby given that the Village of Oak Park will hold Public Information Meeting #2 for the Bridging the Ike project in an open house format welcoming all community members to learn about the study and participate in the planning process.

The project is examining opportunities for expanded bridge decking over I-290, which could accommodate new development, public plazas, and park spaces over the expressway.

Date: Thursday August 20, 2026; Time: 5:30-7:30 p.m.; Location: Veterans Room at the Oak Park Public Library, 834 Lake St, Oak Park. This meeting is ADA accessible For more information about the public information meeting and ways residents can share their priorities for future bridge crossing improvements, visit https://engageoakpark.com/ike Published in Wednesday Journal August 5, 2026

PUBLIC NOTICES

PUBLIC NOTICES

NOTICE OF PUBLIC HEARING You are hereby notified that a Public Hearing has been called by the Housing Authority of the Village of Oak Park, Oak Park, Illinois to be held at the Village Hall of Oak Park at 123 Madison Street, (Lombard and Madison), Oak Park, Illinois in Village Hall Council Chambers at 10:00 A.M. on Wednesday, August 19, 2026, for the purpose of considering the following item of business: To hear comments from the Public on the Public Housing Agency Plan.

The draft of the OPHA Annual Plan for 2027 along with the public’s comments will be considered by the Authority before adoption of the Annual Plan to be submitted

by Wednesday, October 15, 2026, to the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development.

The draft plan is available for inspection at the following locations during normal hours of operation, Monday through Friday, 8:30 A.M. to 5:00 P.M.: Oak Park Housing Authority, 21 South Boulevard Oak Park, IL 60302 Mills Park Tower, 1025 Pleasant Place Oak Park, IL 60302 Written comments will also be accepted prior to the hearing for inclusion in the public record.

Address all comments or inquiries to: Oak Park Housing Authority Executive Director Re: PHA Annual Plan 2026 21 South Boulevard, Oak Park, IL 60302

REQUEST FOR PROPOSALS Notice is hereby given by the President and Board of Trustees of the Village of River Forest, Cook County, Illinois, that sealed Proposals will be accepted for:

Published in Wednesday Journal August 5, 2026 LEGAL NOTICE The Village of Oak Park—Office of the Village Engineer, 201 South Boulevard, Oak Park, IL 60302—will receive PDF proposals via email, at aspentzouris@ oak-park.us until 4:00 P.M. on Tuesday, August 18, 2026, for the following: Professional Engineering Services for Construction Engineering (Phase III) for the Ridgeland Avenue Improvement Projects. The Village is in need of phase III engineering services for two separate construction projects on Ridgeland Avenue in Oak Park, IL, planned for 2027 construction. One project (Project A) is the locally funded Ridgeland Avenue Sewer Replacement Project, and the other project (Project B) is the federally funded Ridgeland Avenue Improvements Project (Section 24-00268-00-RS) The Request for Qualifications may be obtained from the Village’s website at https://www.oak-park.us/BuildingBusiness/Request-for-Proposals starting on Thursday, July 30, 2026.

For questions, please email Abby Spentzouris, at aspentzouris@oakpark.us.

THE VILLAGE OF OAK PARK Bill McKenna Village Engineer Published in Wednesday Journal August 5, 2026

EQUAL HOUSING OPPORTUNITY

All real estate advertising in this newspaper is subject to the Fair Housing Act, which makes it illegal to advertise any preference, limitation or discrimination based on age, race, color, religion, sex, handicap, familial status or national origin, or intention to make any such preferences, limitations or discrimination.

The Illinois Human Rights Act prohibits discrimination in the sale, rental or advertising of real estate based on factors in addition to those protected under federal law.

This newspaper will not knowingly accept any advertising for real estate which is in violation of the law.

All persons are hereby informed that all dwellings advertised are available on an equal opportunity basis.

Restrictions or prohibitions of pets do not apply to service animals.

To complain of discrimination, call HUD toll free at: 1-800-669-9777.

2026 Washington Blvd. Phase II Design Engineering Services The Village of River Forest is requesting proposals for professional engineering consultant services, for completion of Design Engineering for the development of construction plans and specifications of Streetscape improvements, traffic calming installations, bicycle and pedestrian improvements, and roadway resurfacing along Washington Boulevard from Thatcher Avenue to Lathrop Avenue. Respondents must be able to demonstrate expertise with all aspects of roadway related engineering tasks and bicycle and pedestrian improvements, as well as familiarity with Invest in Cook grant funding along with ITEP grant funding requirements and their often required design, billing, and permitting procedures in consideration to similar projects.

Submittals should include the firm’s qualifications, project team, resumes, project approach, and recently completed related engineering work (high value will be placed on experience assisting municipalities with Phase II design engineering for improvements similar in scope) The RFP is available for download starting Monday, August 3, 2026, at: www.vrf.us/bids Proposals must be submitted by Tuesday, August 25, 2026, at 10:00 a.m. to: Village of River Forest Attention: Jack Bielak P.E., CFM Director of Public Works & Engineering 400 Park Avenue River Forest, IL 60305 Proposals will be considered based on the criteria set forth in the RFP. No Proposal shall be withdrawn after the opening of the Proposals without the consent of the President and Board of Trustees of the Village of River Forest for a period of thirty (30) days after the scheduled deadline.

The Village of River Forest reserves the right in receiving these Proposals to waive technicalities and reject any or all Proposals.

Published in Wednesday Journal August 5, 2025

PUBLIC NOTICES PUBLIC NOTICE Notice is hereby given, pursuant to “An Act in relation to the use of an Assumed Business Name in the conduct or transaction of Business in the State,” as amended, that a certification was registered by the undersigned with the County Clerk of Cook County. Registration Number: M26001868 on July 23, 2026 Under the Assumed Business Name of MARGOO & CO. with the business located at: 9035 27TH ST., BROOKFIELD, IL 60513. The true and real full name(s) and residence address of the owner(s)/ partner(s) is: BRIDGET MASSENGILL 9035 27TH ST BROOKFIELD, IL 60513, USA. Published in RB Landmark July 29, August 5, 12, 2026

PUBLIC NOTICE Notice is hereby given, pursuant to “An Act in relation to the use of an Assumed Business Name in the conduct or transaction of Business in the State,” as amended, that a certification was registered by the undersigned with the County Clerk of Cook County. Registration Number: M26001868 on July 23, 2026 Under the Assumed Business Name of MARGOO & CO. with the business located at: 9035 27TH ST., BROOKFIELD, IL 60513. The true and real full name(s) and residence address of the owner(s)/ partner(s) is: BRIDGET MASSENGILL 9035 27TH ST BROOKFIELD, IL 60513, USA. Published in RB Landmark July 29, August 5, 12, 2026

LEGAL NOTICE NOTICE OF PUBLIC HEARING Notice is hereby given by the Board of Education of Riverside Brookfield High School District 208, Cook County, Illinois, that a tentative budget for said school district for the fiscal year beginning July 1, 2026, will be on file and conveniently available at the school district’s administrative offices at Riverside Brookfield High School District 208, 160 Ridgewood Road, Riverside, Illinois, from and after 8:00 a.m. on July 1, 2026.

Notice is hereby given that a public hearing on said tentative budget will be held at 7:00 p.m. on September 8, 2026, at Riverside Brookfield High School District 208, 160 Ridgewood Road, Riverside, Illinois.

Published in RB Landmark August 5, 2026

REAL ESTATE FOR SALE

REAL ESTATE FOR SALE

IN THE CIRCUIT COURT OF COOK COUNTY, ILLINOIS COUNTY DEPARTMENT - CHANCERY DIVISION Select Portfolio Servicing, Inc Plaintiff, -v.Derrick T. Broadway; Lesli Broadway; Defendants.

2025CH08611 1028 MAPLETON AVENUE, OAK PARK, IL 60302 NOTICE OF SALE PUBLIC NOTICE IS HEREBY GIVEN that pursuant to a Judgment of Foreclosure and Sale entered in the above cause on 5/18/2026, an agent of Auction. com, LLC will conduct the Online Only auction at www.auction.com, with the bidding window opening on 8/24/2026 at 10:00 AM CDT and closing on August 26, 2026 at 10:00 AM subject to extension, and will sell at public sale to the highest bidder, as set forth below, the following described real estate.

Commonly known as 1028 MAPLETON AVENUE, OAK PARK, IL 60302 Property Index No. 16-05-116009-0000 The real estate is improved with a Residential Property. The judgment amount was $124,548.83 Sale Terms: Full Sale Terms are available on the property page at www.auction.com by entering 1028 MAPLETON AVENUE into the search bar. If sold to anyone other than the Plaintiff, the winning bidder must pay the full bid amount within twenty-four (24) hours of the auction’s end. All payments must be certified funds.

No third-party checks will be accepted. All bidders will need to register at www.auction.com prior to placing a bid. The subject property is subject to general real estate taxes, special assessments, or special taxes levied against said real estate and is offered for sale without any representation as to quality or quantity of title and without recourse to plaintiff and in “AS IS” condition. The sale is further subject to confirmation by the court. Upon payment in full of the amount bid, the purchaser will receive a certificate of sale that will entitle the purchaser to a deed to the real estate after confirmation of the sale. The property will NOT be open for inspection and plaintiff makes no representation as to the condition of the property, prospective bidders are admonished to check the court file to verify all information. If this property is a condominium unit, the purchaser of the unit at the foreclosure sale, other than a mortgagee, shall pay the assessments and the legal fees required by the Condominium property Act, 765 ILCS 605/9 (g)(l) and (g)(4). If this property is a condominium unit which is part of a common interest community, the purchaser of the unit at the foreclosure sale other than a mortgagee shall pay the assessments required by the Condominium Property Act, 765 ILCS 605/18.5(g1). IF YOU ARE THE MORTGAGOR (HOMEOWNER), YOU HAVE THE RIGHT TO REMAIN IN POSSESSION FOR 30 DAYS AFTER ENTRY OF AN ORDER OF POSSESSION, IN ACCORDANCE WITH SECTION 15-1701 (C) OF THE ILLINOIS MORTGAGE FORECLOSURE LAW. For information, contact Plaintiffs attorney: CODILIS & ASSOCIATES PC (630) 794-5300 please refer to file number 14-25-05043. Auction.com, LLC 100 N LaSalle St., Suite 1400, Chicago, IL 60602 872-225-4985 You can also visit www.auction.com. Attorney File No. 14-25-05043 Case Number:

2025CH08611 NOTE: PURSUANT TO THE FAIR DEBT COLLECTION PRACTICES ACT, YOU ARE ADVISED THAT PLAINTIFF’S ATTORNEY IS DEEMED TO BE A DEBT COLLECTOR ATTEMPTING TO COLLECT A DEBT AND ANY INFORMATION OBTAINED WILL BE USED FOR THAT PURPOSE. I3291045

REAL ESTATE FOR SALE

32 Wednesday Journal, August 5, 2026

Events

Submit events and see full calendar at oakpark.com/events

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