Expansions in the millions of dollars for high schools and a middle school, the approval of plans to develop hundreds of apartments, plans for a $100 million redevelopment of Westfield Old Orchard and shifts in the police departments (including one that barks!) made the news in Skokie in 2024.
Hers’s a recap of what happened in 2024:
1. Expansions in local schools
In early January, the Board of Education for Niles Township High School District 219 approved $41.6 million design plans to create a 41,000-square-foot student services building at Niles West High School.
The board approved the building addition because of safety concerns raised by a district audit conducted before the COVID-19 pandemic. The proposed building will be attached to the existing high school but only accessible from the third floor, which will be used as a student lounge.
The school’s attendance office, dean’s office, main office and security office will be located on the first two floors of the building addition.
Niles North High School also opened a similar building addition in 2023, which cost the district $24.5 million. When asked why the Niles West addition is estimated to cost $17 million more, the district’s Director of Communications, Takumi Iseda, cited inflation.
Renderings of the proposed building were released in October.
The board of education also approved a standalone $28.2 million building for Niles Central High School in January. The school houses the district’s special education program, typically has between 28 and 40 students a year, and currently shares its space with the district’s administrative offices.
The building is proposed to be two stories tall, and house a therapeutic school with a neighborhood model, according to the building’s architect.
The standalone building will be a substantial upgrade for Niles Central students. Central’s space is 12,600 square feet currently with seven classrooms, two fitness rooms and a gym. The proposed building will be around 41,000 square feet, with eight classrooms and dedicated experiential labs that can also be used by all the students in the district.
Renderings for both proposed buildings were released in October.
District 219 won’t be the only district to have building expansions. In November, the Skokie Plan Commission approved Skokie School District 68’s plans to create a $13.3. million building addition at Old Orchard Junior High School.
The building addition will be used to house the district’s pre-kindergarten program, according to District 68 Superintendent Scott Grens. He said enrollment in pre-K has skyrocketed over the years, with 50 students being enrolled in the 2023-2024 school year, and 103 students enrolled in the 2024-2025 school year.
The district won’t need to go out to bond to fund the building, Grens said, and is using capital improvements funds for the project.
2. Main Street revitalization
A series of popular block parties along Main Street near Crawford Avenue garnered enough attention to get the village involved in creating a draft for future development to bring in additional commerce, housing and gathering space in the area.
The block party’s key organizer, Lissa Levy, said she was inspired to create the block parties known, as Meetup on Main, by Main Street’s history as a local hub of commerce patronized by previous generations of Skokieans. The history was a stark contrast with the current condition, she said, because of the row of vacant buildings.
The first series of block parties took place in the summer of 2023, and by August 2023 the village hired a consultant to assist in creating a draft plan to re-envision the area, with feedback from local residents.
In December, the village released the draft plan, with renderings of a block-by-block breakdown of what they envision as the Main Street corridor between Crawford Avenue and Tripp Avenue. The village’s Director of Economic Development Johanna Nyden said the plans are largely aspirational, and could take as long as 20 years, because most of the property in the area is privately owned.
Additional development in the area includes the permanent brick and mortar location of Soul Good Coffee and an expansion of Zelda’s Catering. Both businesses were recipients of the village’s Storefront Enhancement Program.
3. Westfield Old Orchard redevelopment
The Skokie Village Board gave the owner of the Westfield Old Orchard Shopping Center final approval for its $100 million redevelopment plans on Dec. 2.
The redevelopment will take place in two phases. The first phase will create 425 apartments across two mixed-use buildings, one five stories tall and one seven stories tall. The first phase will be near the vacant Bloomingdale’s store and have over 16,000 square feet of retail and restaurant space.
The second phase of construction will include a seven-story mixed-used building with 200 apartments and an eight-story mixed-use building that could house either a 200-room hotel or another apartment building with 125 units.
Per the village’s Communications and Community Engagement Director Patrick Deignan, Old Orchard’s redevelopment will be only mall in the Chicago area to have affordable housing units.
Affordable housing advocates, however, wanted more housing units than the developers were willing to offer. The village board approved the development to include 3.5% of the total units to be rented at affordable rates, and many advocates asked for the development to raise that to between 10% and 15%.
Westfield’s redevelopment application was submitted to the village before the Village Board approved and adopted an affordable housing ordinance that would have doubled the number of affordable housing units. Trustee James Johnson, one of the board’s most persistent affordable housing advocates, accused the Village Board of intentionally dragging its feet in passing an affordable housing ordinance in order for the mall to not need to increase the allotment of affordable housing.
The village board had passed an affordable housing ordinance on its fourth try in May, after debating it for 18 months.
“I do not think it is at all fair to say the Skokie Village Board dragged its feet for a year purposefully because we had Westfield in mind,” Mayor George Van Dusen said. “That is just a simply incredibly unfair, very unfair, allegation to make,” he said.
Trustee Edie Sue Sutker said, “I find it insulting that you’re saying we dragged our feet. We could not agree (on an ordinance). Some of us voted the same way each time it came up for affordable housing, but we could not agree and we ended up compromising and that’s what delayed it. Not because of Westfield.”
The following stores/restaurants have also opened at Old Orchard in 2024: Zara, Rivian, Tempur-Pedic, Läderach, Arc’teryx. Pottery Barn, Arhaus, Cafe Castemila, Little Words Project, Tortazo, Intimissimi, Cupitol and Urban Outfitters.
4. Reporting for duty
The Skokie Police Department saw multiple promotions, including a new police chief and deputies in 2024. One of the more talked-about jobs, however, was the department’s new comfort dog: Meri, a 60 pound, two-year-old American Stafford Bull Terrier.
Meri, short for America, was adopted by the department a day after the Fourth of July in 2022, according to her handler. Her primary goal is to help comfort people, whether that be victims that need a little extra reassurance, or police officers and dispatchers handling stressful calls.
“She’s very mild-mannered. She doesn’t wander; she’s not the curious type of dog,” her handler said. Meri earned the nickname of “Land Hippo” at her training facility, she said.
Communicating with victims can be made easier with Meri, the handler said. Meri is also trained to participate in co-responder team calls, a practice the police department uses when it pairs up an officer with a mental health specialist to respond to a call where an individual is having a mental health crisis.
The department also saw a change at the top. Skokie Police Chief Jesse Barnes was sworn in the second day of the year. His top priorities in the department, he said, include increasing recruitment and strengthening communication between the department and the community.
John Oakley, who has been on the force for 14 years, was also promoted in January, to deputy chief of operations, the position Barnes held before being promoted.
Denise Franklin, the department’s first Black and female deputy chief, had been promoted to the deputy chief of administration in November 2023.
5. More apartments
In addition to the 625 to 750 apartments approved by the Village Board for the Old Orchard development, the board also approved a 245 apartment development along Old Orchard Road and a 68-townhome development on Main Street at the current location of Arie Crown Hebrew Day School.
The development along Old Orchard Road will convert two seven-story office buildings near the Edens Expressway exit, at 5202 and 5250 Old Orchard Road. The development will offer a mix of one-bedroom, two-bedroom and three bedroom apartments.
The village board’s approval process was not straightforward. The board initially rejected the developer’s plan, with two trustees not participating in the vote and two trustees voting against it because of its lack of affordable housing units. The developer shifted plans to include 5% of the developments units to be made affordable to households that earn up to 120% of the Chicago-Naperville-Joliet area’s median income.
That would equal $94,200 for one person and $107,640 for two people, according to the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development.
The 68-townhome development also met some resistance before getting approval from the board in February. The lawyer representing the development said the developer initially envisioned a five-story apartment building facing Main Street and townhomes facing the alley. Community groups raised concerns that the density could increase traffic and other issues, and the developer dropped the number of housing units to the approved 68.
The developer paid a $450,000 fee in lieu of providing affordable housing units.
6. Changes in elections
For the first time in 40 years, Skokie Mayor George Van Dusen will not run for re-election.
Van Dusen joined the village board as a trustee in 1984. After serving on it for 15 years, Van Dusen was appointed as mayor in 1999 when his predecessor retired.
In his 25 years as mayor, Skokie’s park district and police department achieved accredition, a CTA Yellow Line “L” train station was added on Oakton Street, redevelopment plans were approved for Westfield Old Orchard Shopping Center and the Illinois Science + Technology Park was created, among other things.
Third from right is Skokie Mayor George George Van Dusen. Images from the Skokie Festival of Cultures on May 21, 2022 in Skokie at Oakton Park (4701 Oakton St.).
The absence of Van Dusen’s name from the ballot in 2025 won’t be the only electoral change. In July, the Village Board approved adding term limits for the positions of mayor, village trustees and village clerk on the Nov. 5, 2024 ballot, which voters approved overwhelmingly.
Term limits will only apply to municipal elections, and the limit is three four-year terms. The limit will not apply to the two-year terms for district trustees on the 2025 ballot, in accordance with the village’s new application of staggered terms.
The board rejected the idea of implementing ranked-choice voting, with some trustees voicing that other municipalities in Cook County have not been able to implement it.
Trustee James Johnson told Pioneer Press that his petition for ranked choice voting to be on the April 2025 ballot has enough signatures, and that he planned to file them at the end of December.
7. Body found in wooded area of Evanston identified as that of missing Skokie woman
After Tsering “Dolma” Wangyal, 82, of Skokie, went missing on July 15 in Evanston, according to Skokie Police, the Tibetan Alliance of Chicago confirmed that a body found in a wooded area of Evanston is that of Wangyal.
Eight weeks after Wangyal was last seen at the Levy Senior Center, Wangyal’s family and the Tibetan Alliance of Chicago held a prayer vigil in honor of the missing elder. The vigil was held at the time to refuel efforts to continue the search, which was led by the Skokie Police Department.
A citizen walking in the area of 2330 Oakton Street, Evanston, found a body in a wooded area, and contacted Evanston police on Nov. 30.
In an email to Pioneer Press, Tseten Dorjee, the president of the Tibetan Alliance of Chicago, said, “We are heartbroken by the news, but we take comfort in knowing that Dolma was surrounded by love from the community she cherished.”
