New President Explains Canceled Walmart Work Group Meeting

During the opening moments of the Village Board meeting Tuesday, newly elected President Bob Bradley explained why he canceled a meeting of the C1/C2 land use work group.

The C1/C2 Workgroup, as it's commonly known, refers to the group of people—residents, business representatives and past and present public officials and Plan Commission members—addressing Walmart's request for land to be rezoned and for the big box retailer's applications for an amendment to the land use plan.

Walmart wants to build a 182,000 square foot supercenter at the southeast corner of 4 Mile and Green Bay roads. They are asking the village to address differences between what is designated in the land use designates and the zoning that exists on the parcel.

Reading from a prepared statement, Bradley outlined three primary issues he wants addressed before any decisions are made about continuing the group:

• Why the plans don't match as described in state statutes;
• The manner with which the group was assembled may not have taken into account the need to mail materials and possibly have to forward them;
• Whether or not the scope of the group's focus is adequate looking into the future.

"The Planning Commission chose to go down the path to amend the LUP with the participation of the C1/C2 neighbor group which is fine," he said. "However, I disagree with the lack of effort in providing consistent representation of those on the work group."

Bradley also took village staff to task, telling them that trustees rely on their recommendations and expertise so information has to not just be current, it has to be consistently correct. He pointed out that both plans were adopted on the recommendation of staff, and said he wants to be sure that going forward, having the best materials will be key in correcting the perception that the village doesn't operate with transparency.

"There is very little confidence in our ability to represent our citizens in an open and honest way. That perception has to change," he said. "It gains no credability with anyone when we have to back track to fix things already adopted. We need to get it right the first time."

The topic of the work group will be addressed at the April 24 Planning Commission meeting, Bradley concluded.

As of Wednesday, the agenda for the Plan Commission had not been updated to include the discussion about the C1/C2 work group.