A long-running lawsuit filed against the Winnetka Park District by residents upset about the potential transfer of beachfront land to private individuals or entities was settled on Jan. 16, 2025, when the park district board voted unanimously to approve a settlement agreement that calls for the entire Centennial Park beach to remain the property of the district.
In October 2022, Winnetka resident Robert Schriesheim filed a lawsuit against the district, contending that the state’s park district code barred the district from entering into a land swap with billionaire Justin Ishbia that would have given Ishbia some vacant district land in exchange for an equally sized property — with a house on it — that Ishbia had bought that sits between Centennial Park and Elder Lane Park.
District officials hailed the land swap at the time, since they had long wanted to link the two smaller parks into one long beach and park. The agreement also would have given Ishbia a contiguous parcel of land for a beach he would have privately owned.
Schriesheim’s initial lawsuit arguments against the land swap ran aground with a Cook County judge in 2023; he pivoted and updated his claim in Cook County Chancery Court, asserting that any land swap would violate the public trust.
Since that time, Ishbia has bought other land to the south and begun work on a 68,344-square-foot mansion on three acres just south of Centennial Park, and district officials largely have abandoned the pursuit of the land swap, at least for now.
Under the terms of the settlement agreement, each side would pay for the respective legal fees, and the district agrees not to transfer title to beach property at Centennial Beach to any non-governmental entity. In particular, the district promised not to transfer any property east, or lakeward, of the steel sheet piling at the toe of the bluff, to any non-government entity.
In exchange, Schriesheim agreed to dismiss his lawsuit, although the settlement agreement allows him to make future legal claims, should the land swap with Ishbia be resurrected involving any non-beachfront property at Centennial Park.
According to the settlement agreement, the district first approached Schriesheim about settling the suit.
“This settlement represents an important milestone in moving forward for the benefit of our entire community,” Park Board President Christina Codo said in a statement. “It reflects the park district’s dedication to safeguarding public resources while fostering collaboration and goodwill. We are optimistic about the future and look forward to continuing our work on behalf of the residents of the district.”
In a statement, Schriesheim, who is the former chief financial officer of Sears Holdings Corp., said “our goal is to protect the public beach along the shore of Lake Michigan. The agreement with the Winnetka Park District is a clear victory upholding the Public Trust Doctrine and ensures that public access to the beach cannot be denied and the beach cannot be given to a private party. It also preserves our ability to challenge future decisions that threaten to privatize precious natural resources, including our public parks and shoreline, that belong to the people.”
It’s not clear whether a judge would bar the land swap if it were resurrected and followed the state’s park district code. Cook County Circuit Judge Eve Reilly in 2023 disputed Schriesheim’s contention that the park district has no authority to dispose of public trust land, and she concluded that the district had acted in accordance with the state’s park district code because the value of the land that Ishbia would have given up was greater than the value of the land that he would have gained.
Goldsborough is a freelance reporter.
