After more than a year of planning, research and study, Glencoe officials are expressing optimism an updated comprehensive plan for the village will be in place within the next few months.
For over a year, the Glencoe Plan Commission has been working to fully update the village’s comprehensive plan, an action that has not occurred since 1996.
“The village and the world have changed in the last 27 years and our plan needs to keep pace with those changes,” Village Trustee Dudley Onderdonk said at a Feb. 29 forum at Writers Theatre.
Under the heading of a process labeled All In Glencoe, the plan’s objective is to provide direction for future decision making.
“It is a long term look at the community. It is general, but the idea there is to be approximately right rather than absolutely wrong,” Onderdonk said. “If you know where you are going, you can align your resources to meet those objectives.”
Currently, there are five main ideas integrated into the draft. Those themes include building on the village’s current character, integrate sustainability, maintain economic resilience, care and support for the community and delivering excellence in planning management and governance, according to Glencoe’s Development Services Manager Taylor Baxter.
The updated comprehensive plan will serve as a backdrop for planning as village officials are soon to face major decisions on several topics including the potential relocation of its public works building that is now adjacent to Village Hall downtown.
Other issues on the horizon include the possible expansion of multifamily housing opportunities and future of the village’s nearly 100-year-old water plant.
While the entire village’s comprehensive plan was last updated nearly three decades ago, there was an examination of Glencoe’s downtown adopted by the Village Board in December 2016. This new plan will not replace that project, but it does include a fresh look at the downtown planning process and what lies ahead for the central business district.
“There is a constant balance of preserving the character of the community, encouraging retail and lively shops on the ground floor,” Plan Commission Chairman Bruce Huvard said.
Village Trustee Gail Lissner noted there are currently 48 separate action items in the draft acknowledging not every idea in the plan is likely to be accomplished.
“You can’t do everything,” Lissner said. “It is an aspirational plan and you need to focus on different things at different times. It is hard to have progress on every aspect of it.”
Right now the plan is in draft form and the village is seeking additional public comment both at its website or at plan commission meetings. The plan commission is working toward a public meeting ahead of the draft being submitted to the village board for adoption, Baxter said.
“We want to make informed, reasoned impartial decisions,” Onderdonk said. “Glencoe is a community of choice and we need to work to keep it that way.”
Daniel I. Dorfman is a freelance reporter with Pioneer Press.
