Joint Special Meeting of the Committee of the Whole & the Historic Preservation Commission  03/09/26
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wTn7z3K1f4k
Automatic captions; not audio-verified.

[6:07] to call to order this joint meeting of the City Council of Highland Park, Illinois, Committee of the Whole and the

[6:15] City of Highland Park Historic Preservation Commission. Uh we'll start with roll call, then some comments by me, and then we will get into our

[6:24] scheduled business. And I just want to thank everybody for all the work that's gone into preparing for this meeting.

[6:29] Uh, but we'll start with roll call first for the city council and then for the historic preservation commission once their chair calls their meeting to order.

[6:36] Council member center.

[6:37] Council member Breman here. Council member Ross here. Council member Tapia preser. Council member Bloomberg here.

[6:45] Mayor here. Uh, thank you. And I need to confirm that that is Council Member

[6:52] Bloomberg. I don't have a good question for you tonight, Council Member Bloomberg. So prove to us that you are you.

[7:00] Uh who is bees? There's my question. Who is bees?

[7:08] Excellent. All right. Are we okay with council member Bloomberg joining us? Yes, we are. Okay. Thank you.

[7:17] And now we'll pass it to Chair Weer to call your commission to order and to have roll call.

[7:26] Call to order the Historic Preservation Commission and uh may we have a roll call? Of course.

[7:33] Commissioner Cad present.

[7:35] Commissioner Harer here.

[7:36] Commissioner here.

[7:38] Commissioner here.

[7:40] Commissioner Hines Vice Chair Weer here.

[7:49] Thank you so much. So we have a quorum of each of our groups. Tonight's joint meeting with the Historic Preservation Commission marks the next step to

[7:57] forward in our journey to create a permanent place of remembrance in Hila Park.

[8:03] Before we begin our conversation, I'd like to invite everybody to join us in a moment of silence in honor of Katie Goldstein, Arena McCarthy, Kevin Michael

[8:12] McCarthy, Steven Strauss, Jackie Loi Sunheim, Nicholas Toedo, and Eduardo Yugaldo.

[8:32] Thank you. May their memories be for a blessing and may the comfort and care for their loved ones continue to be front of mind for each of us this

[8:41] evening. It's not hyperbole to say that this is one of the most significant projects that our community uh has

[8:48] pursued. So often when we think of capital projects that build or transform or restore buildings or spaces in our

[8:56] community, we're laser focused on the future. We consider how well that project will serve the community for decades from today. And while knowing

[9:05] that this outcome will last for decades into the future as part of the core value of this team that's been planning for a permanent place of remembrance for

[9:14] the past nearly 3 years, the care and concern for the victim's families, people who were injured, uh people who

[9:22] were directly impacted on that day is paramount. So, in undertaking this project, we're challenged to create something that will be enduring, but

[9:29] will be a meaningful place for solace and remembrance for people who continue to grieve today. We're also challenged

[9:37] to create spaces for remembrance that will balance different needs that will honor the places in the heart of our downtown where so many lives were

[9:45] forever changed while considering the resiliency journey of the broader community including the residents and business owners who call the nearby

[9:54] spaces home. This is difficult work not just because of the scope of the project and all that it must take into

[10:02] consideration but also because we each and every one of us share a deep love for this community. Thus we are also

[10:10] challenged to be vulnerable and sharing our own experiences and emotions and at the same time we're challenged to

[10:17] consider with empathy and compassion those whose experiences might be different from our own. Um, as we embark

[10:25] on tonight's discussion, I ask that we all take care to be candid because honesty and transparency are foundational values of effective

[10:33] government, and to be compassionate in our cander, because leadership without empathy does a great disservice to the most vulnerable among us, those who

[10:42] continue to be the most directly impacted by that day almost four years ago. Uh, those are my comments just to

[10:50] set the stage this evening. And again, I thank each and every one of you for your time and for the thoughtfulness that you'll be bringing to this conversation.

[10:59] Um, and with that, I think we just move to scheduled business. And who's going to start with manager and presentation?

[11:10] Welcome, Commissioner Pines. Thank you for joining us. Hi.

[11:26] Good evening.

[11:28] Just wanted to start with a brief history of the property projects that we'll be discussing tonight. Just take you through some of the background.

[11:39] In 1938, the property park was at the park district. It was commonly referred to as the rose garden today. Actually is

[11:47] a portion of the property. The entire property is park that has been part of

[11:54] the state since 1930. In May 1942, Governor, which is the park portion,

[12:01] which was was commissioned by design and presented to the city in 1942.

[12:12] In 1992, Gardener's Memorial was designated a local landmark that was designed by

[12:19] Marshall Johnson. Marshall Johnson was the president of the men's garden club and a landscape architect in in Jen

[12:26] Stensson's practice and the son-in-law Jen Stenson.

[12:30] This pro this project was designed with several goals and originally was designed to commemorate three different

[12:38] residents of Highland Park. William Eaggan commonly known as the first Rosarian of Highland Park. Jesse Low

[12:45] Smith who's a naturalist and Jensen Jensen landscape architect.

[12:49] Each section of the property, as we'll discuss in a little bit, was designed to commemorate a different portion of the work of the man it is that they are memorializing.

[12:59] And then in November of 2022, the city identified the space commonly referred to as the rose garden as the

[13:07] temporary memorial space, the space best suited to be the temporary memorial. And at that point in time, the city took over the maintenance of the property

[13:15] from the park district. Prior to that point, it had been maintained as it was owned and maintained by the park district. And then finally, in May of

[13:23] 2025, as a part of a land swap involving more properties, ownership was transferred from the park district to

[13:31] the city. So the city is the current owner of Laurel Park and the Rose Garden.

[13:38] As far as the landmark status of the property goes, in 1992, the Rose Guard the Gardener's Memorial

[13:45] was determined to be a landmark meeting several criteria set out in city code for a landmark designation. And while I

[13:54] won't read each of these points, these were the of the different factors that are considered for historic preservation. As you well know, these

[14:01] are the criteria that were determined to be met by the historic preservation commission and ultimately the city council in 1992.

[14:11] A little bit about the original vision for the project. This is the original 1942 design for the property. As you can

[14:18] see, it encompasses many different areas and we'll discuss three main sections of the park, but this was the full vision for the property.

[14:29] We do have a brief update from 1986.

[14:32] There isn't a complete history of the record as far as what has happened to the property from 1942 to current day.

[14:38] But in 1986, there was a survey. We'll discuss a little bit about it. There we'll go through each piece of the

[14:46] property, but there were two pools originally in the design that were filled in prior to the landmark designation in 1992.

[14:56] There was a portion that contained a council ring that was a portion of the um the Jesse Lil Smith wildfire guard

[15:05] and then there were stone pavers that were never fully implemented.

[15:12] This is the existing condition. There are again three main sections. The rose garden which was designed to honor the first Rosarian.

[15:21] There is the wildflower garden which is in the northeast portion of the park that you can kind of see up there that

[15:28] was designed to honor Jesse Lo Smith that contains the current Sundial retaining wall. And then in the south

[15:36] what in the southeast corner is what's called Players Hill which designed was designed to honor Jen's Jensen that um

[15:43] in its current state does not have um any remaining integrity of design. So, a little bit about again these three

[15:51] different areas that rose the rose garden in its current state right here.

[15:59] Many of those roses have been replaced over the years. They were placed with hardier varieties. They have been reduced. They was never built to its

[16:07] full fruition as far as roses were concerned because that just what was originally designed never came to development.

[16:15] In that northeast corner corner in the wildflower garden, there was a sundial bench which replaced

[16:23] was built instead of the council ring that was added some point between 1942 and 1992

[16:30] actually 1988 that built that bench was built and that retaining wall was a part of the original pool that was filled in.

[16:38] That's what remains of the retaining wall.

[16:43] So a little bit about give you a little bit of vision of that particular piece.

[16:46] There is an additional sculpture placed in that area called Forest King which was placed in 1959 that is unrelated to

[16:54] the original Marshall Johnson plan of the landmark status. So you can see what remains of that retaining wall for the

[17:02] pool as well as the sculpture as it exists today.

[17:10] This is a picture of the sundial bench which was built in there as part of that retaining wall as well. So again this is

[17:17] exists in the wildflower garden con portion of the plan.

[17:24] So again some implementation notes as we go over this. It was never fully built to plan based on the 88 landscape survey

[17:31] and the 80 and I'm sorry and the 86 survey as well.

[17:36] We don't believe the ever the vision of the entire plan was ever built based on the historical record available to us.

[17:43] That rose garden, those rose plantings were reduced due to maintenance, replaced with hardier roses better suited to the climate as well as additional plantings were placed there.

[17:52] That original pool was filled in at some point between 1942 and 1986 and the a rain garden was placed in

[17:59] front of the rose garden. So these were these are changes from the 1942 plan.

[18:05] These conditions were as they were we believed to the best of our knowledge at this point when the property was landmarked in 1992.

[18:15] As far as the wildfire garden portion of the property, the council ring was never fully implemented and that sundial bench

[18:22] was installed in its place. The original pool, while we believe it was built, was filled in between 1942 and 86, but that

[18:30] original retaining wall remains. And the sculpture Forest King was installed in 1959 as I showed you in the in the pictures earlier.

[18:39] And again, that is unrelated to the Marshall plan and the original design.

[18:43] And then the player house, while it does have a marker, a stone marker for that, it was not um built to design and

[18:50] there's little integrity of design remaining in the current section of the plan or of that area. And just an additional note, in the center of what

[18:59] is now the Rose Garden, a sculpture called Analopee was installed in 2015, completely unrelated to the Marshall

[19:07] Johnson plan, which was removed um as a once the temporary memorial was put into place in 2022.

[19:17] So again, a summary of that current status. Those are the original three main elements of the plan. The rose garden, the wildflower garden and and

[19:26] Players Hill. The rose garden remains in a slightly altered form. The wildflower garden again though the

[19:34] section is there, very little of it remains. There is the stone sundial bench which was a in place at the time of the landmark designation and the

[19:42] stone retaining wall was in place as well though it was not built to plan.

[19:46] and Players Hill was not built to design and so that was not that is no longer a part of the current design and current landscape.

[19:57] So again, as we move forward with this play place of remembrance project, we just would like to consider how the historic element restrictions could impact the place of remembrance design.

[20:08] They will certainly be a factor in in addressing them and honoring them as the process goes forward. But they do have the potential for limit the ability of

[20:16] place of remembrance to achieve the stated objectives. And those are the three state of objectives of the place of remembrance that were established at the beginning of the process. To create

[20:25] an accessible public place for reflection, remembrance, and solace to pay tribute to the memories of those killed. And to honor the community's

[20:34] resiliency, especially those who are injured.

[20:38] So, as we move forward with this process today, we're seeking your feedback on the local landmark designation and how those historic elements will inform the

[20:46] design process and the primary focus and how to incorporate that into the primary focus of creating a shared space for the needs

[20:56] of of victims and the broader public and the community.

[21:01] that I'll turn it over been where we are with SWA. Sure. Why this question aside from the obvious?

[21:11] Yeah.

[21:12] What we're trying to achieve with this conversation, I think that would be helpful.

[21:15] Yeah, absolutely. As the working group began their process um the in 2023 as they move forward the first started

[21:24] with a process to determine the location for the place of remembrance which involves substantial community feedback

[21:30] a community survey and an addition a great deal of engagement with the community to determine where the community would like the memorial to be

[21:39] placed the place of remembrance to be placed. The outcome of that engagement process was a recommendation that there

[21:46] be a primary place of remembrance at the Rose Garden and a subtle secondary marker at Port Clinton Plaza. Those

[21:54] recommendations were supported by the working group and presented to city council who supported those recommendations, those location recommendations.

[22:03] Following the location determination, we move forward with a design engagement process. The working group move forward

[22:11] with the design engagement process and issued a request for qualifications for firms to design the place of remembrance seeking someone who is experienced in

[22:18] the process of designing memorial spaces as well as extensive community engagement in that process so we could

[22:26] ensure we're capturing all voices in that process.

[22:29] After interviews with the firms as well as review of the proposals and public feedback, feedback from victims,

[22:38] families of the next of kin as well as anyone in the working group and the general public. A recommendation was

[22:45] made to move forward with SWA. We engaged in a negotiation with SWA and that contract was entered into in December of 2025.

[22:56] That project was then I'm sorry, January of 2026. That project was then kicked off and we've begun the design engagement process for the community. As

[23:04] we went through this process, we did determine um that the Rose Garden and actually in Laurel Park was a landmarked

[23:12] property and we needed to discuss how to best handle those concerns and honor the historic elements as while moving

[23:20] forward with the project that is critical to the community.

[23:26] Great. Thank you so much. Um, so we just wanted to be sure that the HPC had that context. if you haven't been following

[23:33] along step by step. Um, and I think as Emily presented, close to 900 people provided feedback and the primary

[23:41] question was where should the place of remembrance be located and the landing place was a primary place of remembrance which is the focal point for solace and

[23:50] respit and remembrance being in the Rose Garden and then a subtle secondary remembrance at Port Clinton Square. Um,

[24:00] so obviously we want to have the opportunity to talk with all of you about the historic designation, the

[24:07] local landmark designation, what was intended, what never was built, what sort of was

[24:15] built, what maybe shouldn't have been built there based on the climate and the deer, and just to get a general sort of dialogue going in terms of moving

[24:24] forward. Um but we know that from the past three years uh this has served as an important place in our community and

[24:33] as my council colleagues I know will share with you as well going forward needs to be a remembrance and also a testament to the resiliency of the

[24:41] community. Um so mayor may just one additional sure um point um so in uh reviewing proposals

[24:50] for the consultants um we did review you know references their background experience expertise and they provided

[24:58] some general concepts for what could take place at both locations and so those are public records we've had some

[25:06] questions about those but um so we selected uh SWA and altogether as our consultant At this time, we do not have

[25:14] any schematic designs. I know some people have asked us like what is it going to look like? So, we don't know.

[25:18] So, that's where we're at really at this point. We presented at the last committee, the whole to get policy feedback from the mayor and city council

[25:27] and then our next step is to go to the historic preservation commission um to everything that assistant manager Todd

[25:34] indicated getting your feedback as part of that process. Your feedback then will be given to the consultants as they undertake the listening sessions with

[25:43] the public and victims and next of kin and then eventually we'll have schematic designs that will come back then to um

[25:51] to both groups and I'll just share that all together um serves as trauma informed specialists.

[25:58] This is the same group with SWA who did the Sandy Hook memorial um and several others. So they are cognizant of this

[26:06] isn't just a place, this is a remembrance. So I hope that is helpful context for the conversation.

[26:18] With that, Chair Weider, I turn to you and say, how would you like to proceed?

[26:23] Well, thank you. Um, I I'm I'm grateful to be here.

[26:33] Some of you know that I was one of the wounded. So, I come to this particular gathering with with additional um just

[26:43] additional insight, I guess. Um, I I I I believe that the enthusiasm showed in

[26:51] 1992 for the landmarking of this this property and this this uh landscape

[27:01] was not um was not also supported by the devotion of resources.

[27:08] Right. And I'm hoping that with an overlay of of an additional meaning on this landscape, there will be resources

[27:16] and it will become more meaningful. I think it's the situating of it is is is appropriate. I um I know that the

[27:24] temporary memorial has been a source of of some solace for me and my my late husband. And uh and I remember fondly

[27:34] the story time from the library back on the on the um up in the Highland part.

[27:40] Uh lots of lots of lots of happy times there as well as uh you know significant next to the library next to Cabin. I

[27:49] think it's a I think it's a terrific site. We need to just balance and my advice my design advice is keep it simple.

[27:58] So, it's interesting because we had that conversation with SWA and now they'll be coming out to the public, but just to have the council have the opportunity

[28:06] and there was a lot of discussion about natural materials and keeping things simple and having it be the place for the person and not the place that the

[28:14] person came to so to speak. So, appreciate your insights.

[28:17] I'd like to open open up comments to my fellow commissioners who have had some time to consider this.

[28:26] I'd just like to ask, has any direction been given on the amount of space or where things are being located? Because

[28:34] from the report here, it's pretty darn clear that there's one section, the rose garden that was developed according to plan. There was another section where

[28:43] there was something done, but it may not still be there. It may not have been done right. Who knows? And the third portion looks like it was never done.

[28:53] And having visited it, it's not in the best of shape anywhere, especially this time of year, we might add. But, uh,

[29:01] even the rose garden, I've been there in the summertime. It's beautiful in a way, but it's not exactly, uh, in the best of

[29:08] shape. So the resources might be there for restoring some of these things that were intended to be there all along and

[29:16] developed and and as part of the overall site to include uh the the memorial. I

[29:24] don't know how much space you're thinking where it's going to be located.

[29:28] Has some of that been discussed? And if so, and that's one of the questions that's being raised is do you maintain the rose

[29:35] garden and then build back to the ravine? Do you move the rose garden and build the entire site? Do you say it's

[29:43] been a pleasure to the rose garden that you know for the rose gardeners in this town who know the deer are happy to have expensive snacks and very few rose garden varieties make it for very long.

[29:55] Um those are part those are some of the questions and frankly we're looking to you for sort of your input about this

[30:03] local landmark designation is this and and I understand and recognize with resources you could build it to its

[30:10] original plan. I brought this along uh these are plans from my backyard done by Marshall Johnson and uh they picked this one by the way.

[30:20] I don't know how much of it looks like what it was, but the climate does change and the deer are more prevalent and so

[30:27] things have gotten moved around. Um, I think it's a matter of and and I'll let my council colleague Andre Tapia share

[30:35] his point of view which I thought was an apt point of view about this place and being tied to plans of the past versus

[30:45] what we need to do for the future. If you want to share your comments, do you remember what I'm referencing? by the meaning of historic. Well, historic and relevant. Yeah.

[30:54] Yeah. I you know, you know, we face a a collective dilemma just because of the

[31:00] the u the policy and what does it mean to protect something that is already landmarked and yet, you know, whatever

[31:07] gets built is going to affect this. And um and so since this didn't rise up to the fullness of its vision and since

[31:16] your mandate is to make sure that we're preserving the history of what has happened in this city and is architecture and its feeling, right? Uh

[31:26] just for discussion purposes, I wonder if we could think about history in a in a kind of present and future kind of way

[31:32] too because what happened on that 4th of July is part of our history. So it it I'm suggesting that maybe we broaden the

[31:40] definition of historic and and it's not just a preservation of the past but it's a membrance of those who have been with us and history does serve as a

[31:49] celebration and a remembrance of the past and present and then this this place members is about a strengthened

[31:58] future despite the tragedy without ever forgetting it. So I would just suggest more from a semantic perspective that maybe we don't get too trapped on what

[32:06] historic means isn't really backward looking and preserving the past but how remembering the past can help us in the present and future.

[32:14] Mayor if I could add just one other thing just in response to the question.

[32:18] Um so since the shooting we've been guided by the department of justice office of

[32:24] victims of crime. Um so they provide support and assistance communities that have gone through um mass shootings, mass tragedies. And so one important

[32:33] element that they have shared with us is that when you establish a place of remembrance is that you establish a location where people can opt into. So

[32:43] not to have it as a focal point that if someone doesn't want that visible reminder, it's not by their place of

[32:50] employment, it's not on their way to school, anything of that nature. So, in looking at the sites, um, you know, some

[32:57] people have asked, well, why don't you do it at the far west end of the property off closest to St. John's off

[33:04] the curb line? And so, just keep that in mind as we get your feedback is one recommendation is not to have it where

[33:12] it's visible from public right away. So that's why closer further back east would be preferred, but certainly that's what we want to get your feedback as it

[33:20] pertains to the landmark elements of that site. May I also add and just did want to note that that was

[33:27] one of the elements SWA had noted is that they want to approach the project holistically as far as location of the

[33:35] place of remembrance is they want to ensure that there's a continuity of experience for individuals so that it is

[33:43] not a a section of perhaps walking through one section to get to another and they're distinct. that whatever is

[33:50] built in whatever form is approached as a holistic experience for individuals so that it it

[33:57] isn't necessarily jarring to be working from one one section to the other.

[34:05] Yeah. Um, I guess from a preservation perspective, I don't think anybody should be tasked

[34:12] with rebuilding what is either no longer there or uh, yeah, I guess rebuilding what is no

[34:20] longer there. I think what is still there needs to be protected. And I think from the original plan, there's a lot of

[34:27] like trees that definitely existed when this was originally placed and like certain design, but it's let go so far

[34:35] that it's sort of difficult to see without even some like precursor maintenance where anything should go. A

[34:42] lot of the things this seems needs to be stripped back to what we know was about the original design left to see, okay, this was this was what was there

[34:50] originally. This is this tree was planted here purposely or this tree was here originally and designed around and

[34:57] all the other garbage or things that have kind of come into it needs a 1959 sculpture that was just correct. And do like my one of my other

[35:06] questions was do we even know who these artists are? Like we have the names of the sculptures but do we know? We do.

[35:11] Yeah. And they're members of the like they're they're they were members of the community or they're important artists that were commissioned by the city and who owns the art.

[35:20] We know all that stuff. Yeah, we do have to right now, but yes, we Okay. Yeah. I mean, I think that should

[35:28] be moved and put somewhere else in the city because the envelope doesn't need to return. Yeah. Correct. Okay.

[35:33] Yeah. I mean, I I I I question whether we even have the ability to maintain a rose garden. And

[35:43] but I also I think that question is important because do is what is built as the does

[35:50] it incorporate some sort of protection for the rose garden so it can exist and like so deer can't just like you know

[35:58] get into the rose garden eat everything so it can be maintained because I do think it's important that that rose garden exists and can be maintained by

[36:05] the city because that's what was that's what was landmarked. Um, it seems like I mean it seems like it's there and you can see it, it's there. Um, and that

[36:14] sundial bench is great and I think can be incorporated incorporated as well into the design, but I think whatever whatever stonework

[36:23] I also I as Erica knows, I have a I have also a problem with like I know you like natural materials and all these things, but like you know building something

[36:32] that new that matches all of this old stuff I don't know is the correct way to handle it either. I think this this new

[36:39] thing that is built maybe should be distinctly new and should not necessarily blend or interfere with the original design although the original

[36:47] design should be there and maintained and allowed to be maintained.

[36:52] So we'll circle back to you for design ideas when we are reaching out to the public. So appreciate your comments though tremendously. I can see council

[37:00] member center I think you want to say something.

[37:02] Yeah sure. Thanks mayor. I think uh first of all the work that you guys do is so critically important and right

[37:10] that's why we're here today is to sort of figure out how we can ensure we're making a collective citywide decision

[37:18] considering all of the stakeholders and considerations that exist. I'd like to zoom out a little bit because we kind of

[37:25] dove right into like what how do we do this? How do we do that?

[37:30] I think at least for me, I'd love to understand what makes this site significant

[37:37] for the landmark and is there an opportunity to say, "Ooh, it hasn't been built to the way that we expected it to be built.

[37:48] Why don't we identify a different area to to pay homage to those that we were trying to pay homage to and use this

[37:57] site for such a for what we're talking about today, the place of remembrance, which has been, you know, um really well

[38:05] vetted and and thought through and um you know,

[38:12] with significant input from the community and with with third party assistance, you know, can can we take a look at what that might look

[38:21] like. Um I think again for me it would probably for the council in general it would be helpful to understand sort of what about this site is significant

[38:30] relative to the historical significance of what why it was designated in the first place. I think if we go back to the the slide that showed the I don't

[38:40] know when it got the land the reasons for the landmark. It seemed like it was more not so much the space but it like it was the architects.

[38:50] Um number two uh identified a person or person who significant contribute to the development of community county. I think

[38:57] that had to do with the land um the landscape architect. And then same thing if you go down to number three.

[39:04] Uh it's the same thing overall in the number of design. And so it's kind of it seems more it's maybe it's not so much the spa like the actual location. It's

[39:13] more of the person what they did at the location. And so I was kind of looking at it as more of you know if you think

[39:22] of history going you know going back to that way there are many many elements out there in the world that that's not

[39:29] the original design notam is a very good one many years to redo it and they spent a lot of money to get it done but I

[39:38] guarantee if you go into it you probably would never know the difference of before it happened and you know it probably burned many many years for

[39:48] how can we do the same thing where we take the sund dial figure out a way where it kind of blends in with

[39:55] everything but still there is a sund dial someplace. Can we use the same materials and you know somehow figure a

[40:03] different way? Um or even taking like the rose garden. how do we make that and kind of doing those things and can it

[40:10] turn into other things where now there's a a rose garden club. So now the these

[40:18] are people that are helping out kind of maintaining those things. So we're you know so there's ways that you might be able to still use what's there take the

[40:26] new design and whatever design gets created use those techniques. So whoever the and I apologize I can't remember the name off the top of my head but the main

[40:35] landscape architect what was that person known for Johnson.

[40:42] So you know being able to use those designs taking that retaining wall what can we do you know how can they take that same retaining wall and turn it

[40:51] into something that blends everything together. So, you were not really changing the overall I don't want to say look and feel because there's definitely going to be a

[40:59] change in look and feel, but we're not changing the design elements. We're just kind of updating it so it maybe it looks like a Jensen kind of related thing, but

[41:08] knowing that he didn't specifically do it, but it's that same design. So, how can we blend multiple elements that

[41:15] cover all the different facets that we're trying to cover in the space and still be able to make it so everyone

[41:22] feels comfortable. It does what it needs to do. And I think that's where we kind of have to figure out because it seems like for me the landmark status is more

[41:30] on the person than it is more of the the place. So, are you interested in seeing an overlay of a new design of this place

[41:38] of remembrance, but maintaining the historic elements that still exist?

[41:42] Mean specifically, that's I think I just want to make sure I'm hearing what you're saying.

[41:46] Yeah. Specifically, I think that would be a good way where, you know, you don't get into the situations of well, they

[41:54] change the whole look and not the whole look and feel. Everything's not the same. So, then why do we have landmark statuses? if there's a way that you

[42:02] could still blend it because it I mean you never know when something happens and you have to rebuild it. How do you keep on doing those things? So I think

[42:09] if there's a way that we could do that or figure out a way to do that it could potentially cover everything where we don't have to change the historic

[42:17] landmark but still be able to stick with 92 or the what they did in 92. Do you want to keep the status, keep the

[42:24] elements, overlay whatever improvements we have come up for this place of remembrance into those elements?

[42:32] In in my opinion, yeah, because I think it's challenging. Someone in 1992 came up with this plan and says there's a

[42:40] reason why and going in and changing it completely.

[42:46] Does it open up precedence for so many other different things? And that's the challenge. I don't specifically know, but based on the short term that I've

[42:55] been on this committee, I feel like it could. So, if we could figure out a way where we could keep the landmark status

[43:01] and still be able to do what needs to be done. Mhm.

[43:06] Um, and it seems like there's a lot of stuff that needs to be done. How can we do all those different things, keep everything going, and if there's a way

[43:14] that we can blend different elements, and elements can mean all kinds of things. the historic piece of it, the

[43:21] the materials that are used and kind of go from there. So, that would be my two cents.

[43:27] Thank you, Council Member Ross.

[43:30] Thank you, Mayor. Um, I uh first of all, you want to thank you as as well for, you know, being here tonight and for your partnership uh in this process.

[43:43] uh as uh my colleague uh council member center said that you you are very

[43:48] valuable to the city. Um, and I I I uh

[43:54] you know I I agree um uh with you uh uh Commissioner

[44:02] Commissioner Hartinger um that there you know

[44:09] I guess a a question I have just to start off is do do we have um representation from SWA in in the room

[44:18] today? We don't know because we're just looking for their feedback.

[44:24] I just thought it would be, you know, interesting to have them here here. Um the uh you know, the I I think first of

[44:34] all, having walked late today again, you know, there there's a good amount of

[44:40] room there. Um it's it's not a, you know, hugely confined site. there is room and we there there were reasons you

[44:50] know to uh to honor you know the three individuals that are that are honored.

[44:58] Um I think that um I you know it's a little concerning to think that you know

[45:05] 20 30 years from now you know if we if we decide not that anyone in this room is is saying this that you know that

[45:13] that it's not worth you know restoring then you know could uh decades from now

[45:19] you know future councils and uh commissions say that the you know this

[45:26] memorial isn't is is important. Um these are I think that that we don't we want it to remain important for for decades

[45:35] to come for for you know for the life of Highland Park. Uh and so I I I agree

[45:42] that I think that there it you know it just takes some real creativity but

[45:48] that's what we hired SWA for um to uh you know how how can we accommodate both

[45:56] because I I do think it is it is possible that there are possibly lots of different solutions for this um to to

[46:05] overlay it. And I I think that um I'm personally just one council member here

[46:12] less inclined to just move pieces of the memorial away. I think I mean it the the

[46:19] site plan the uh painted I don't know if it's a watercolor um you know it's just the original we've got a better version of it online that you see on the screen

[46:28] um is really lovely uh beautifully rendered and uh I think it's it's worth

[46:34] um it's worth saving in a way that and and that there's enough room to creatively come up with something that

[46:43] that can also be a memorial That's my feeling that we haven't seen the solutions yet. We haven't seen proposals

[46:51] for Well, I think one of the questions was do we keep the the Rose Garden structure in place because that is significant and

[47:00] I think that frankly is the most existent at this point given that everything else is not much that was in

[47:07] the original plan. And so to the city manager's earlier point and to um assistant city manager Tob's point, do

[47:16] you have basically a rose garden and you walk through and there's a memorial or a place of remembrance? Is the entire

[47:24] thing incorporated together? How do you make it so that people know why they're there and aren't stumbling upon

[47:31] something so important? and and there are lots of different ways to do that, you know, through uh you know, different

[47:40] design elements, lighting paths, um you know, and and I know I there at least

[47:48] a number of victims, you know, families that don't want to see um people walking on, you know, paths that represent uh

[47:56] victims. But but still there are other there are there there lots of different design elements that could could be used. Um and as far as maintaining you

[48:05] know or if if we were to actually fulfill the original intent of the design um the uh tanic gardens obviously

[48:13] has uh extensive rose gardens. Um they've uh you know we're not the tenant gardens and they have a fence around the entire place.

[48:21] Yeah. Uh, in any event, I I think I'm less concerned with the particular breed

[48:28] of flower. Uh, maybe there's a heartier rose. Uh, but I I just think double knockouts.

[48:35] Just think that that, you know, creativity. Um, that that there are many.

[48:42] You would like to keep the rose garden elements in place. I'd like to see what's possible. Okay. That's what I'd like to see. You're not wed to anything. I'm not wed.

[48:49] I just like to see what the possibilities are. I think there there a lot of potential mayor they I mean SWA and their team

[48:56] will provide us schematic elements. The purpose of this is really just to get the historic preservation commission's feedback so we can give direction to the consultant before they start designing.

[49:06] I don't want to make it seem like they need ideas on how to design this. We really just what they need direction on is

[49:13] the landmark elements. How critical are they? What are they? What should they preserve? What they should work around?

[49:20] So, Commissioner Erlick and then Commissioner Gona. Thanks.

[49:23] I think no one said here I've heard nothing from anyone that we're not going to preserve the landmark status of this

[49:30] piece of property. So, you know, it's I think that needs to be clarified and I think we're all up for agreement that it

[49:37] it's going to be maintained. Uh the question is what do we do with the property? And I think uh Commissioner

[49:44] Tapia said something that's very interesting in that historic can be historic going back in time or historic now. But one thing that seemingly can't

[49:54] be too terribly historic is when nothing was done but only planned on portions of the area. And we have extensive area

[50:02] there where we could put something up still that may have been planned in a smaller way, but we have extensive area

[50:09] there where nothing was done. And if something was done, we don't even know what was done and we're not going to rebuild that because we don't know what

[50:18] was done as you've already said happily on point that we shouldn't be restoring necessarily what we can't restore and

[50:26] what may never have been done. So I think we've got plenty of varian on that uh Commissioner Tabia where you said

[50:34] it's you know historic is a thing going forward and back and we now have something where we could put something

[50:41] very historic in an area that and and still commemorate the three individuals that deserve commemoration and have an

[50:50] area for reflection. And it might be off to one side. I I don't know because that's for design people to tell us what

[50:58] they think in light of what they've done with other situations and they're the skilled people and then at that point we

[51:05] could consider whether we think some modifications should be made but I think now is our chance to make this really historic the entire piece of property.

[51:17] Thank you. I just want to make sure somebody answers John's question directly and because you were definitely insinuating like not not in a negative

[51:25] way just do we even have to consider any of this stuff. Could it just be could we build the rose garden somewhere else?

[51:30] And I think my answer is no. I don't think we can do that. But what I also don't think is that the rose garden can't also

[51:37] be part of the place of remembrance as a whole. The entire lot has been designated as the place of remembrance.

[51:44] That doesn't mean the place of remembrance starts at St. John. even though the focus might be all the way in the back right corner that that entire

[51:53] thing is the place of remembrance that also has a rose garden in the middle that was designated as historic in 1992.

[51:59] I I think that is to to me that's the general idea and we have no idea what any of the plans are. The design is this subject to a certificate of

[52:08] appropriateness all things aside like this is our question.

[52:11] Okay. So like I and I and there's definitely a lot I mean I think so too.

[52:18] Yeah. Okay. So, but so I should designate right like I just think like okay so let's let's see the design let's put it

[52:28] through a guideline of certificate of appropriateness and I think it needs to go through that process but I also don't think that that is so like there must be

[52:37] a rose garden in its original form right here that's not necessarily what a certificate appropriatiseness is either

[52:44] um so I think there's definitely ways to preserve the idea that was the rose garden in the middle that isn't

[52:52] necessarily paving it in the exact same material it was originally paved and planting the original species of rose that it was. I

[52:59] I think there's like you know maybe going too far is not preserving the original shape it was designed in. But I don't think the original shape it was

[53:06] designed in from that aerial would really affect that's not how you experience a space anyway. That doesn't affect necessarily the whole layout or how anybody would experience that space.

[53:14] I don't walk in and be like, why is there this funny pathway that kind of feels like a road? Like, nobody's going to say that if it's done correctly.

[53:23] Thank you, Commissioner.

[53:25] Thank you. Um, first of all, I'm encouraged by the fact that we're doing this collaboratively and collectively with the city council, not just this

[53:33] city council, but previous iterations of city council. So, thank you for that. Um I I am well first of all as far as the

[53:42] landmark criteria to council member center's question if I'm not mistaken in order to get landmark status there are

[53:49] actually nine criteria and all you need is I believe two so these were five criteria that were established back in '92 that it the

[53:58] commit commission members felt that it met these five criteria but we only needed you only needed two to get a

[54:06] landmark status. So I think that bar was pretty easily met in this particular case um based upon who was being you know remembered or the original purpose.

[54:19] Um so I'm going to make a couple comments about my hopes as to you know where we go with this particular

[54:26] project. First of all, the thing that really struck me about the original

[54:33] designated property is that it's referred to as the

[54:40] gardener's memorial, which I think is a very clear

[54:47] message. Okay? I mean, I think of memorials and I think of cemeteries. I hate to be, you know, go there, but I

[54:55] think we all know how people just get outraged, if you will, if there is an attempt to try to move cemetery plots.

[55:05] Okay. So, so the original purpose was to um create a memorial for those three

[55:13] individuals. Now I know that you can take property and you can still you know for

[55:22] instance I I know that in your February committee of the whole you talked about the property just to the east of the

[55:29] library. So there is property you could in theory move or create a new gardener's memorial

[55:38] um on that property, but I think it disrespects and maybe that's maybe not the right word and I don't mean to

[55:45] criticize that suggestion because I think any suggestion you know which is out of the box is good. Okay, because you know you have to you can't you can't

[55:54] get to the point of saying I don't like that suggestion if the suggestion is never made. So, it's not that I don't like this suggestion. It's just that I

[56:02] prefer to maintain the fact that this particular land was a memorial to those

[56:09] three individuals. And I and I I think that's that has to be respected. Now,

[56:15] when it comes to the design, I I really appreciate the comments from

[56:22] city manager about the victims because I truly do believe that when you

[56:31] walk from the sidewalk on St. John and you start to come into this property,

[56:38] I really agree. you don't want to make the memorial, if you will, right there.

[56:44] And in my mind, walking into the rose garden or what they call the rose garden is a perfect entry into the memorial for

[56:54] the victims. And I and I have to tell you, I especially love that property back there, uh, Players Hill and

[57:02] whatever else they called on the left side or on the north side. But I love that property. First of all, I love it

[57:09] because it's open space, but I I just have a thing for rev for ravines and they've got they've got the slope down

[57:16] there and there was water running through that that this past week when I went over there and I thought this is a

[57:23] great place for so I my hope and I'm just going to end by saying my hope is that we meld the history of the past

[57:32] with what we're trying to do as far as the current history and create a a you

[57:41] know a project that will last you know for the foreseeable future. And one last

[57:49] comment that I'm going to make about I think one of the reasons why Gardener's Memorial maybe gets a bad rep. It's not

[57:57] so much a bad rep, but nobody knows about it. And why is that? We don't have a plaque. There's no plaque there. I know that you've got a plaque on the

[58:05] ground where it says something about Jen's Jensen and whatever. And I thought about this when I was there last week

[58:12] and of course I saw a stoopy cabin and I said to myself, "Oh, there's a plaque over there. I think I'll go over there and I'll read the plaque." And I'm

[58:21] thinking to myself, you know, if I when I moved into Highland Park 40 years ago, if I had taken my kids over to the cabin

[58:30] and if my five-year-old and my two-year-old said to me at the time, "What is this?" I would have said, "Oh,

[58:37] I don't know. It's just some old cabin that might have been somewhere." And they decided it would be kind of cute to have it next to city hall. And yet I

[58:47] didn't have to do that because the cap the plaque says it all. So whatever is done for this particular project, please

[58:55] let's create a plaque to explain to the public not just what happened July 4th,

[59:03] but somewhere on this property to explain what um you know, Gardener's Memorial was all about. Those are my comments.

[59:12] It'll be in English and in Spanish. There are a couple people ahead of you.

[59:15] Thank you. Uh, Council Member Little, thank you. So, um, first of all, I I can't tell you how it warms my heart to

[59:23] hear, um, from the preservation commission. we all have our respect and we deal all the time, but um to get to hear where you're coming from on this

[59:31] because um you know, we all know how serious this is for our community. But um and and how important it's been and

[59:40] that's why we've gotten so many responses from people as to where and how and and that's why we're also spending a lot of money and time to do

[59:49] the focus group so people really can be invested in it. Um but having said that

[59:56] um what you do in many ways and I do agree council meapia that history can be

[1:00:03] looked at backward present and future but it is a very slippery slope when we start to erase history

[1:00:11] and um I don't care if something wasn't properly finished. I don't care if something wasn't properly maintained. I

[1:00:20] don't even care if it wasn't properly built.

[1:00:23] In many ways, I look at this and what I'm hearing from some of you is we're almost being given a second chance to

[1:00:31] improve upon the original landmark designation and then to take it a step further, which is why I see this melding

[1:00:41] the two to represent another significant historical um event that unfortunately we all live

[1:00:49] through, some of us even more closely than others.

[1:00:52] Um, but it it scares me tremendously and frankly the um whole thing about

[1:01:00] cemeteries and I don't mean to be morg but you know people really get angry remembrance memorial how do you want to

[1:01:07] even call this but anybody who's done any history after World War II into this

[1:01:14] destruction of cemeteries in vibrant communities and the amount of money that many people have spent in the last two

[1:01:23] decades rebuilding those cemeteries so that the people who lived prior to World

[1:01:29] War II, their memory comes back when you purchase a new stone for them. Um, it it

[1:01:38] takes away the destruction, the madness, and it brings back the remembrance of that time, too. So, I think we've been

[1:01:46] given a wonderful opportunity. I I hate to show how ignorant I am. I did not know until very recently that this had been landmarked.

[1:01:54] I did not know um and in part I felt that because the city hadn't owned it, it was the park district's property. And

[1:02:03] so I'm not going to even get into the question of the maintenance of it or even the initial building of it. And there's no point because we're going to

[1:02:11] move forward. But if we're looking to have the funds to do this right now, I think we're being given a wonderful

[1:02:19] opportunity to take all of Highland Park's history, including the remembrance of these three very gifted

[1:02:27] gentlemen, and then include a remembrance of another horrific attack, but somehow bring to it um you know, the

[1:02:36] peace that we hope to find there in some way and water and flowers and all the things that we're going to speak to

[1:02:44] about the particulars will be there. But I'm very troubled about the idea of moving either one of these out of that.

[1:02:53] And I'm also troubled and to your point, Commissioner Hinger, about some of the points that, you know, were made before

[1:03:01] in terms of the old landmark where and bringing those back. Um I I think we're given a great opportunity here.

[1:03:08] Thank you. Uh, Council Member Bloomberg, didn't know if you had anything you wanted to add.

[1:03:13] Uh, yes, just u very briefly and and thank you for all of the comments that have preceded me. Um, I find myself uh

[1:03:23] very very interested and moved by everything that's been said. And what I'm particularly encouraged by

[1:03:30] is the um willingness of the Historic Preservation Commission to become involved in this

[1:03:39] um to understand some of the limitations on the existing uh historical

[1:03:46] items that that are currently at the site. I think uh obviously there needs

[1:03:53] to be a certificate of appropriateness procedure. I think um Commissioner Daka

[1:04:00] hit it on the nose when he said that that doesn't have to be a rigid procedure that necessarily

[1:04:07] uh results in a full uh specific outcome of identical materials and a

[1:04:14] reconstruction of the existing or intended items.

[1:04:19] there's an opportunity to incorporate the principal intentions of the rose garden into the place of remembrance.

[1:04:28] And um I I I won't get into the design issues that I'd like to see or don't want to see. Um I think mayor you hit it

[1:04:36] correctly on the head when uh you observe that the uh group that we hired is perfectly capable of doing that and

[1:04:44] the direction is that they should do that. they are going to have to recognize uh some of the elements that are on the site and incorporate that.

[1:04:53] And I think that has the potential to be a very exciting outcome that accomplishes what we want to accomplish

[1:05:00] with a a place of remembrance and still preserving our recognition of past acknowledgements and the people that were intend to be recalled at this site.

[1:05:12] Um, lastly, to the extent that some elements of the site don't exist, may never have existed, I think it would be

[1:05:21] appropriate to find some way to remember those specific individuals and their contribution to the community, that may

[1:05:29] not that part may not be in the site and although it is a memorial and I understand that it isn't actually a

[1:05:36] cemetery and so the issues are somewhat different in terms uh placing some of

[1:05:42] the elements in another location in order to accommodate the very important opportunity for this place of remembrance.

[1:05:52] So bottom line is I'm very enthusiastic about everything I've heard tonight. Um I I think it's been a great discussion

[1:06:00] and I I support all the elements of people's concerns and observations.

[1:06:06] Thanks, Council Member Bloomberg. Uh Commissioner Pines.

[1:06:09] Yes. Um, I think that we're very fortunate, very, very fortunate in that we've got this piece of property sitting

[1:06:18] directly north of City Hall, sitting directly south of the Stoopy Cabin, sitting directly south of the library,

[1:06:26] sitting directly south of the ravine. I just think that that is a something that we should all for a moment uh really

[1:06:34] feel good about. I mean, we've got a great piece of property there that I think fits the bill to a tea.

[1:06:40] Absolutely. To a tea. And I also think that there's an opportunity here for um

[1:06:48] with good design basically taking everything that we've been talking about and and uh and melding it in to a plan

[1:06:58] that does everything we're talking about uh in terms of respecting the past from years ago, the past from three or four

[1:07:06] years ago, and going into the future right now. This is history right now. right now as we're living right now.

[1:07:12] This is history. Somebody will look back on this and say, "Boy, they made some good decisions about that and and we will make some good decisions about

[1:07:20] this." And I think there's reason to be optimistic about it. Then I think that um I think that the designers can handle

[1:07:30] this in a way with sensitivity to all the points that we've been talking about tonight and do it with a great deal of

[1:07:38] uh competence and uh I think they can I they they must come up with something that we will love.

[1:07:48] They will. I will.

[1:07:49] Council member Buffman, thank you. Uh, so just want to say thank you and this has been a incredible conversation between the two two groups.

[1:07:58] Um, and to the point that was just made, um, I I can't wait to see what SWA comes back with to um, both groups so we could

[1:08:07] kind of look at everything from there and decide what works and what doesn't.

[1:08:11] Um, I I agree. I think this is an incredible opportunity to be able to work together on this um, and honor the place of remembrance as well as the

[1:08:20] historical landmarks. Um, so thank you again and I I look forward to see what S SWA comes back with on this.

[1:08:27] Just as a small point, I think if there's some way also to pay some respect to the first responders in some

[1:08:34] tangible fashion that would be I mean that would be essentially making this into a home run.

[1:08:41] We already have that element and we appreciate. Thank you chair Weer.

[1:08:47] In in architecture we refer to this as both and we can get a both and solution here. Um, as a technical matter,

[1:08:56] I I was looking into lands, historical landscapes and the in the, you know, how how historical landscapes are identified and they are in in historic preservation.

[1:09:07] um lang all the language always includes landscape as absolutely as legitimate as architecture and it's a little I think I

[1:09:17] think it it it benefits this sort of program in that architecture and in that the landscape is more some somehow more

[1:09:26] evocative and I think a a a better place it lends itself to contemplation better than than necessar than a building might

[1:09:33] necessarily. So I I I do believe that landscape architecture is is will serve serve a positive purpose

[1:09:41] here. Um from but as a technical matter what we you know we looked at in 1992 it five

[1:09:50] criteria we we never get five criteria for a landmark. This this was obviously very well regarded but what we have here

[1:09:58] is it's the integrity prong. we don't have the the integrity has not been maintained

[1:10:06] and and that that is the sort of technical that's that's technically where

[1:10:12] this landmark is is can be called into question and I think bolstered supported

[1:10:19] and added to by this additional uh this additional uh I'm going to say program is that's that's a terrible word for it

[1:10:27] but but this additional meaning imposed upon on it and um yeah so the other the

[1:10:34] so I want to I want to make sure that we have good accessibility absolutely um I want to try to to make

[1:10:42] sure we have some yearround interest which I think has been very successfully done by the landscape architects Omen von Sweden there at Evening Island and I

[1:10:50] want to say that it needs to be a message and if it means words on a plaque there needs 20 years people wandering on need to know and I I think

[1:10:59] words on a plaque is the the most direct way to do that.

[1:11:03] What is our message? And that's, you know, I leave that for others to hammer with all of that. Hammer out.

[1:11:10] Thank you. Thank you. Um, Council Member Ross.

[1:11:13] Thank you, Mayor. Uh, and I just um want to say how much uh again I appreciate uh

[1:11:22] well everybody's comments but uh you you the commissioners have put it in such a

[1:11:30] lovely way uh about architecture and landscape architecture. Um, and I I

[1:11:37] think a a first reaction, you know, to hearing about the historic landmarking was that it presented challenges. Um,

[1:11:45] but there was, you know, a lovely plan that Jen's Jensen son-in-law designed and the rose garden as an entrance is is

[1:11:54] an opportunity and and I'm going to say again, I I truly believe it's a matter of sheer creativity and there's so much, like I said, so much opportunity and and

[1:12:03] I and and I think that challenges, you know, that whatever your existing

[1:12:10] conditions are and meeting them create creatively is where designs really shine and the most brilliant ideas come from.

[1:12:19] Uh and and so I I think we should be encouraged um and excited. Uh, and I I

[1:12:27] guess I would also uh ask that um if I may that that I hope that um because S

[1:12:35] Swa came to us with some boards of you know landscape colors and lighting and whatnot kind of like mood boards

[1:12:43] mood mood boards and I and I hope that that they shift you know as quickly as possible to actually what what's the

[1:12:50] concept um and um but this is such an important meeting before that I think. Yeah.

[1:12:57] And I think it's important to remember that we placed the temporary place of remembrance at the rose garden for a

[1:13:04] reason. It wasn't like, oh, now the rose garden for the permanent place. We've already established that as a place of respit and solace. So, I'm so encouraged

[1:13:13] by the conversation that we're having this evening. Thank you. Uh, Council Member Tapia.

[1:13:18] Yeah. ju to put out there just to think also about how to preserve the spirit of the original plan since there's not that

[1:13:25] many artifacts or pieces left and and it feels like an appropriate thing to preserve those, salvage them, elevate

[1:13:33] them, whatever. But since so much is missing or wasn't built, you know, since this what was one of the main reasons

[1:13:40] was to honor these architects and some of these architects were, you know, landscapers, you know, landscape

[1:13:47] architects. point chair reader. So I wonder if we could just ask the the landscapers for us to channel the spirit

[1:13:55] of those architects and the landscaping which is in the plan but also we can think have them think beyond just the plan because we're honoring their work.

[1:14:05] Now they had an idea about how to look make it look in this uh garden but I think they can think beyond that you know as honoring the these three

[1:14:13] architects that have these roots with Highland Park you know their spirit their legacy their aesthetic informed you know the other meeting the

[1:14:22] other needs that this place has and that's a nice way to you know respect the the historical legacy without being

[1:14:30] too literal about the what had been there and the map right and I'll just share share with you. When we had our mood board conversation with SWA, we referenced Jen

[1:14:40] Jensen and the materials and his meadow and the use of circles and all of that.

[1:14:46] Um, in that conversation as we just gave our input and also referenced the use of native plantings. So, I think we were

[1:14:54] doing it without even intentionally doing it. When we had that conversation, we were informed by this very cool picture. Um,

[1:15:02] Commissioner Ganka, I I just want to say I was really gonna go there, so I don't want this to seem like I'm picking any, but I don't think it's necessarily the goal to like

[1:15:11] channel all of these things that have already happened. I think that the fact is that this place is a landmark that has existing cons conditions as Yumi

[1:15:19] said, but the entire thing is the place of remembrance. the entire plot is. And I think the

[1:15:27] the challenge should be to actually I don't want to say compete with because I that's not what it should do, but I

[1:15:34] think the level Jen's Jensen is an incredible landscape architect.

[1:15:40] The the level of design that needs to be put into this needs to match the quality that was there. And that doesn't

[1:15:48] necessarily mean like materials or like it needs to match.

[1:15:54] I I think it needs to match intellectually and design-wise to all of this. I think that that is the point.

[1:16:01] That is what is the important things that are historic about our our city in architecture are world class.

[1:16:12] I I don't know anything about S SWA so I'm not going to speak anything but they need to bring their game on this thing.

[1:16:18] This needs to be worldclass stuff. That is what is progressive about Highland Park. That is our history is to invest

[1:16:25] into design. That is what the original citizens of this town did. They invested into design. When they built their houses, when they built their buildings

[1:16:33] in this community, they invested into design. That is what we need to do. We need to invest in design.

[1:16:38] And I assure you that's why we chose them. Thank you, Council Member Center.

[1:16:41] Yeah, thanks. Um, Commissioner Gono, thanks for addressing my question earlier uh directly and and Commissioner Portman. I appreciate sort of

[1:16:50] the the level of care and explaining and context that you provided and and you know the overall sort of commitment

[1:16:58] to to collaboration. I hear totally your perspective and everybody in front of me and frankly probably the majority of the

[1:17:04] people beside me. Um and and chair Weer, you know, the both and concept. I think that that applies to a lot of things in life.

[1:17:14] Um so I I like that a lot. I I actually don't think it applies here. Um we

[1:17:22] experienced the biggest tragedy our community ever has and hopefully one that all of us who were there never has to experience anything like that again.

[1:17:31] and and I from my perspective it deserves its own place. Um,

[1:17:38] and I believe I'm taking a big picture approach to this and thinking about the fact that we're 1 2 3 six people and you guys are

[1:17:48] six people and yes, there were six or 12 people before us who made this decision, but we also surveyed 900 people and and

[1:17:54] and hired trauma-informed experts to determine the best place for this remembrance and that's where it was

[1:18:01] decided. And I'm just having a hard time myself ignoring the big picture facts and what

[1:18:09] we all experienced despite everything that you guys just said. And so it's it's it maybe it's a

[1:18:16] bold from my perspective or you know um so I I you know if this is what we're going to do I I'll disagree and commit you know

[1:18:25] I'm totally I'm there that's totally fine. I just want my sort of feelings and and my sort of perspective on where I'm coming from. It's it's not personal.

[1:18:32] It's sort of just kind of reading the tea leaves on everybody in the community and and trying to to to be respectful to how

[1:18:40] horrific this was and the attention that it deserves.

[1:18:43] Just real quickly, like I think uh I don't want to say trust the process, but I I I think all of us here know that

[1:18:51] what happened is outweighs any architecture designer. So

[1:18:58] I I think it's like just Erica pulled up what S swa's work is and it's world class. So, and it's chosen

[1:19:06] for a reason. So, let's just trust them to do something that even they're going to do a great job. And uh Absolutely.

[1:19:16] And I think I think it's not like the importance of Jen Jensen does not o outweigh or any of these three people

[1:19:24] that are part of this original memorial do not outweigh what happened four years ago or uh sorry. Yeah. Yeah.

[1:19:31] Um it's not even close. So So I think to to summarize sort of where we've all landed, um keep the local

[1:19:38] landmark designation, incorporate historic features as feasible, see where the public input leads, and prioritize

[1:19:46] that this is the permanent place of remembrance of a historic event that happened unfortunately in our community.

[1:19:53] Um what do you need from the rest? Are we good to move on from this topic? Sure.

[1:20:01] Sorry to bring that up. I don't want to open a can of worms, but partially out of respect to council member um center

[1:20:08] and everyone here, I don't like to put it as this is more important or that isn't.

[1:20:13] No, they're both significant in totally different ways.

[1:20:16] And I'm I'm not going to I I'm not even saying that this is even a possibility anymore. But in many ways, the reason I

[1:20:24] was so troubled to learn that this was landmarked was because I did feel that each deserved its own place in its own

[1:20:33] special way. And while we did survey the community, one of the reasons we do have, and I don't like to call it the

[1:20:40] secondary landmark, but the reason we do have something else in Port Clinton is because frankly a lot of people, and

[1:20:49] if you look at the numbers of people who voted where should this be, the vast number of victims and family members

[1:20:59] wanted it at Port Clinton. Now, the overall numbers came out at the garden,

[1:21:06] but in many ways, um I think one of the reasons we came up with the secondary place was so that there would be another

[1:21:15] spot that was just for remembrance of the victims of the 4th of July. And I

[1:21:23] also trust these architects to do or the designers to do a world-class job to meld both. But in many ways, I I do

[1:21:32] understand not only where you're coming from, but I agree with you. And in some ways, that was why I was not in favor of it being a throw garden. But I do trust

[1:21:41] the process. And I think that that's where we are. And I encourage people to go to John's Johnson Park and drive down

[1:21:49] Eganale and recognize that these guys are not just in the Rose Garden. Jesse Lo Smith's house is still available um

[1:21:56] and can be viewed from the outside. But thank you Commissioner partner, can you I believe Jesse was a guy

[1:22:06] because he was involved in you think. Are you sure?

[1:22:11] Well, we could do some research, but that we'll figure it out. Okay. Thank you everybody for on this. We do have one other item to hear from the historic

[1:22:20] preservation commission about which I think is super important as well. Um and that is historic preservation incentives. We had a conversation Gita

[1:22:29] and I with the HPC several months ago and Joel I think we're having people speak from over there.

[1:22:37] Thank you. Just looking.

[1:22:44] Um okay. So this presentation is about historic uh preservation incentives.

[1:22:52] Um and the purpose of this part of the meeting is to really just to encourage a discussion about the portfolio incentives that were discussed with the

[1:23:00] historic preservation commission. Um as as directed by u city council. Um as you may recall back in the fall and

[1:23:08] September in the summer beginning and into the fall we um we got direction from council to work with the HBC to

[1:23:17] develop ideas to encourage historic preservation. Um we met with the uh commission on several occasions. Staff

[1:23:24] presented some ideas and the commission responded and provided feedback. Um and

[1:23:32] we came to the conclusion uh in December uh with the commission uh adopting a resolution making a recommendation that

[1:23:40] is found in staff's report. Essentially that's the recommendation. The staff's report includes that. Now you know all

[1:23:48] of these uh ideas are not fully fleshed out. It's the idea was to see what might

[1:23:54] be ideas for encouraging preservation and then to see council's direct further direction as to which to pursue.

[1:24:03] Um, so the commission recommended a layered portfolio of incentives as well as select disincentives to recognize the

[1:24:12] public good of private preservation, increase voluntary landmark designations, prevent loss of historic resources due to demolition and fun preservation initiatives.

[1:24:24] Okay, so there's we refer to them as tools. Okay. So there's encouraging preservation through financial tools,

[1:24:32] regulatory tools, and through penalty tools. So we'll go through each of these categories of tools uh in tonight's

[1:24:39] presentation. So the first of which is uh financial tools. And um there the pres uh the preservation commission said

[1:24:48] let's look at property tax abatements, city portion only of the property tax uh rehabilitation grants and permit fee waiverss.

[1:24:58] Um, in terms of regulatory tools, they've said, "Hey, let's look at or eliminate the number of properties needed to constitute a district." Right

[1:25:06] now, that's 10, and we'll talk about that in a minute. Um, and we also looked at in terms of regulatory schools, uh,

[1:25:15] zoning relief. Um, and that that would allow greater things like greater floor area ratio and reduce setbacks.

[1:25:24] Um in terms of discouraging loss through uh penalty tools uh discussion was focused on ideas around longer

[1:25:32] demolition delays. Right now uh the maximum delay is 365 days. Um there was

[1:25:39] also discussion about uh historic resource demolition um and meaning demolition tax associated

[1:25:47] with resource demolition um and prohibiting variances with loss of historic resources. So for properties

[1:25:54] that were demolished that were of significance, they wouldn't be able to get zoning variances. So those were the ideas in terms of discouraging laws through penalty tools.

[1:26:06] Okay. So just for an overarching scope and framework, um we're not going to get into the weeds on each of these, but just to provide a general sense, um the

[1:26:16] idea behind this is focused on limiting the incentives to those designated regulated structures. There are

[1:26:24] currently 133 in the city. And those structures found to meet sufficient criteria during a demolition review

[1:26:32] consideration. As you well know, we don't necessarily have all of our historically significant properties

[1:26:40] locally landmarked or within a local historic district, right? So, as time goes on, the number of uh local

[1:26:47] landmarks has gone up as well as uh and and as well as when demolition delay reviews are uh conducted. Uh properties

[1:26:56] are delayed due to their historic status. Um and so that's something that would be a trigger in terms of potential

[1:27:03] eligibility and we'll talk about that um in a minute. So eligibility for the financial incentives um just general overarching high level.

[1:27:14] This isn't all the details of a programmatic effort but it provides just a taste of what we're referring to must

[1:27:21] either be a regulated structure or would become a regulated structure meaning it voluntarily landmark prior to receiving any incentive. Okay. So encouraging

[1:27:30] local voluntary landmarks or having to do with an already landmark property or

[1:27:37] regulated structure if you will constitute a renovation rehabilitation of salient architectural features or

[1:27:44] elements of the historic resources really important and a certificate of appropriateness would

[1:27:51] be required. So these things together would provide at a very high level the entry into this. There'll be more

[1:27:58] details of programmatic development uh and requirements and exceptions but before getting into that level of work

[1:28:05] we wanted to understand what council's uh thoughts were on this on these matters. Um so okay so with that in mind

[1:28:14] that overarching kind of framework so looking at the preservation tools um and encouraging through financial tools

[1:28:22] property tax abatements city portion only must be a regulated structure rehabilitation grants eligible exterior

[1:28:30] improvements only regulated structures with certificate of appropriateness for work permit fee waiverss eligible exterior projects regulated structure

[1:28:38] with certificate of appropriateness for the work, which incentives should formally be explored um and should

[1:28:45] regulated structures be eligible for a property tax abatement without renovation or rehabilitation project in

[1:28:51] mind. So in terms of looking about whenever looking at creating a new program, understanding the scope of that

[1:28:59] program is really important. So there are various decision points that will change the scope of the program. So one of them is that last one that I just

[1:29:08] mentioned. And so you have 133 uh regulated structures right now in the community. Okay. And so we have like

[1:29:15] 10,000 14,000 properties actually including commercial. And so you know it's a small but very important portion of our community. So when you're looking

[1:29:23] programmatically at the scope of the program, um this question becomes salient. So would, for instance, a

[1:29:31] property tax abatement apply to all 133 homes just because they're already landowned or would we say that same

[1:29:40] abatement would be only if there was an investment, meaning a rehabilitation or a restoration of historically significant

[1:29:50] features. And that's a very important part. It's not just for anything else in your home and things like that. It would be for the things that matter, the

[1:29:57] things that matter in terms of historic preservation. Okay? So, we go back to why this was landmarked, what were those

[1:30:04] features, are there features that were missed that are nonetheless important?

[1:30:07] And is this project about those features? So, that's that's how we would keep that scope into the appropriate

[1:30:15] area, if you will. Um, and so that's the financial tools aspect of

[1:30:23] things. So we'd have potential for tax abatements if that's entertained rehabilitation grants and permit fee

[1:30:30] waivers. Permit fee waivers is probably the easiest one of these. It's associated provided that is eligible exterior work receives a certificate of

[1:30:39] appropriateness. It's a regulated structure that would be then um eligible and would apply. Um, permit fee waivers

[1:30:47] are revenue foregone as opposed to cost uh money being given to a a potential applicant in the form of a grant.

[1:30:59] Can we defer to um in terms of preservation or regulatory tools? So um one aspect of

[1:31:08] what we had talked about with the commission was you know the creation of uh local historic districts. Okay we

[1:31:16] have three currently. Um there is a code requirement that makes it be that you need to have 10 properties to be

[1:31:24] considered district and you know the commission really was looking at that as you know why 10 why why not make it far

[1:31:32] less maybe three or two. Right now, what we have is local landmarks, only one building, only one property. That's

[1:31:40] fine. And then we have 10 for a district. So, there's no magic in the number 10 that we've been able to

[1:31:48] discern. Um, and we didn't boil the ocean to try to find out why 10 actually happened. So, I just want to say that.

[1:31:55] Um but having said that this would allow by lowering this number maybe even eliminating or saying two because

[1:32:03] landmark is one right so okay two or three um you know would allow for these

[1:32:11] more theme-based um districts that are non-ontiguous and we talked about that previously last year on in the amendment

[1:32:19] but um these non-ontiguous districts nonetheless can have significance and tie together really important

[1:32:26] architecture and other history and and might be worthy of considering even if it wasn't 10 uh properties. So that was

[1:32:35] one idea um in terms of regulatory tools and that's fairly easy one and would allow for um the creation of more uh

[1:32:43] local non-historic uh non-ontiguous districts in terms of zoning relief.

[1:32:48] allowing greater floor area ratio and reduce setback requirements could help uh historic properties. Um these these

[1:32:57] properties uh although they have very important elements that are tied to their landmark status and regul

[1:33:04] regulatory regulated qualities rather um there's a need to avoid functional obsolescence that might benefit from

[1:33:12] well done additions or add different additional changes to properties that would enable them to be um more modern

[1:33:21] if you will in terms of some of those features. um allowing reduced setbacks based on past regulation um to apply to

[1:33:30] these these structures, the regulated structures. Um our zoning code over the years has changed. And so when you look

[1:33:37] back at when these homes were built, um what were the setback regulations then?

[1:33:43] And so why not have them apply still to those regulated structures as opposed to the current code which may be and is you

[1:33:52] know appropriate for the community in general but is it appropriate for the historic preservation goals we have for these uh regulated structures these important historical resources.

[1:34:04] Okay. So discouraging loss through penalties. Um instituting longer delays demolition.

[1:34:13] Um right now the code uh allows a maximum delay of 365 days with a finding

[1:34:19] of four criteria. Okay. Um so extending that would further discourage demolition

[1:34:27] of historic resources making it a longer delay period. um establishing a historic

[1:34:34] resource demolition tax. Okay, so the code currently requires a $15,000 demolition tax and allocates the money

[1:34:41] for affordable housing. Council's well aware of that. It's been around for quite a while. Works well. Um so this

[1:34:49] idea would be to introduce an additional form of demolition tax not instead of but in addition to that that is triggered by a finding that the structure meets um sufficient criteria.

[1:35:01] And so through a de demolition delay process or demolition delay consideration process if sufficient

[1:35:08] criteria are met and let's say the 365 day and let's say it's four um when that

[1:35:15] home if it does get demolished then that tax would apply this demolition of historic resource tax on

[1:35:23] top of the demolition tax for affordable housing. So looking at that tax, you know, the dollar amount, you know, would

[1:35:30] be additive. And so that's an important part of of of an inducement not to knock

[1:35:36] down the house. Um, prohibit variances with loss of historic resources. What

[1:35:43] this means is, look, folks are looking for places in Highland Park to develop new homes. Okay? Land is at a premium as

[1:35:51] we all know. You don't have a lot of land sitting around. It's vacant in Highland Park. And if there is vacant land, it usually has some other issues.

[1:35:59] Um, but folks are looking at when they're going to purchase a piece of property just to demolish it, they're really looking at it as just land. Okay?

[1:36:09] And so, um, what this would do is say, look, if we're going to lose something this important to the community, um, we

[1:36:18] don't necessarily want to have a bunch of other zoning variances associated with it. It is a form of discouragement.

[1:36:24] It's a regulatory discouragement so that somebody couldn't come in and then say, "Well, now I need a setback variance and a this variance and a height so that I

[1:36:32] could have a much bigger home there that kind of doesn't fit on that lot based on our current zoning and we lost the historic resource." So the nexus being

[1:36:42] loss of resource shouldn't have the benefit of additional revenue. That's that's the nexus there.

[1:36:49] Okay. So that's the end of my presentation. um and encourage discussion of this portfolio of incentives and um feedback from the council.

[1:36:59] Thanks, Director Fontaine, and thank you to Zuben and to Maddie and to the HPC for all the work that you've put into

[1:37:06] providing this opportunity. Um we're fortunate to live in a community that has a lot of amazing historic buildings

[1:37:13] and homes. Um sadly, we've lost several and more recently seem to be accelerating. uh and we know that there

[1:37:21] are plenty that are also still vulnerable that need to be protected.

[1:37:25] This is a great opportunity for several reasons. One, to educate this community.

[1:37:29] People need to know what we have, the treasures that are here, but also the risks that are being posed against them.

[1:37:36] Um I tend to lean towards generosity when we're talking about preservation because once it's gone, it's gone. And

[1:37:44] um we want to encourage people to stay here, but we also want to encourage people to protect the elements that make this such a special town. Um so I know

[1:37:52] you had something you wanted to ask and I said please wait until he's done. So go ahead.

[1:37:56] Well, I just have a quick question and it does it just goes to my reasoning for some of the other ones. When you talk about a waiver of permit fees, what kind of money are you talking about?

[1:38:06] It it it depends on the project. So um the base fee that we have is a 1% of

[1:38:14] construction cost. So and then there are additional incremental fees depending on what else is happening

[1:38:22] in the project. So electrical plumbing and other I just didn't know if this was like your $75 fee and I was going to say okay that's

[1:38:30] trivial. We don't need to bother with this. But if you're talking about 1% of construction costs you're talking about significant money and and there's a range in there. So, you're telling me

[1:38:39] that's even more if someone's doing a half million dollar renovation. We're getting into some significant money here

[1:38:45] because the $15,000 demolition we have as a council heard complaint many time and had people come to us and say, you

[1:38:54] know, that's just on top of everything else I'm doing. I have to pay this too.

[1:38:57] But, you know, that's when you're beginning to hit a point where people care about the money. So, $75 fee wasn't going to cut it for me, right?

[1:39:06] But thank you. Thank you. If you don't mind, can I call on the council because you guys have had like a lot of time to digest this and I think they're kind of if that's okay with you guys.

[1:39:15] Do you want to do now? Uh, no. Okay. Council member Buckman.

[1:39:21] Um, so I I think all these um consider policy. I'm in favor. I had I had a

[1:39:27] question though about the um the pro the um

[1:39:40] the program the um you there was a comment about the 10 um

[1:39:47] the historic district but they're not contiguous.

[1:39:50] Yeah. Why? Um, you want to change that, I guess, or I said I back history on that. I'm just curious.

[1:39:58] So, um, essentially I we don't know exactly why the magic number 10 was picked. Okay.

[1:40:04] So, I'll concede that point. But um in terms of historic preservation we look at we the commission and and staff

[1:40:12] thought that you know a it should be less to allow for more non-ontiguous

[1:40:20] local historic districts or theme-based districts to be as opposed to geographic districts be created. So there might be

[1:40:28] um an architect or specific style or design that we're trying to capture and those can be then nominated and considered and and enacted.

[1:40:37] Okay. Helpful through the mayor. Through the mayor. Right. Thank you.

[1:40:42] Um I just wanted you to elaborate on like the reason is it's no longer

[1:40:48] it's all voluntary now at this point as well. There's no involuntary. So if two people want to come together and say

[1:40:56] arch rooms are important together, why would we not let them have this like ceremony of landmarking their houses together? And I think that was the whole

[1:41:04] idea is like as long as it's all voluntary at this point, why are we why are we discouraging an element of community that could be brought into preservation?

[1:41:12] Thank you.

[1:41:14] Yeah, I like the holistic nature of the incentives and disincentives. So I think it's very well thought out and the

[1:41:20] purpose for it is, you know, I'm part you want to Yeah. Thank you.

[1:41:28] Thank you. So I I love the tax abatement. I would do anything to incentivize property owners to do this.

[1:41:34] I think the F is a big deal.

[1:41:37] You buy a property and you can't grow it. And frankly, there are modernizations. You want a good kitchen,

[1:41:45] but you have this beautiful landmark piece and you just can't make that 25 foot setback or 9 foot setback on the

[1:41:51] side. So, I love the idea of the F and I think that's really giving people something. It's incentivizing them to

[1:41:59] keep the house as it is, but it's permitting them to live in today's world instead of penalizing them. And so, I'd

[1:42:06] love those two, especially um the matching funds for historic rehab. If they're doing a new project, I would be

[1:42:14] very much in favor of it. But I would have a floor amount so that it's not, you know, like a $5,000 window treatment

[1:42:22] type of thing that we're going to pay for their new windows because like me with the landmark house and all single pane, I'm out of my mind with the, you know, when it's cold, but it's not.

[1:42:32] Okay. So, um I I like the idea if it's a larger project and I would leave that to staff to come up with some dollar amount

[1:42:38] where after that we do something to help those families with those homes. Um I don't like the idea at all of reducing

[1:42:47] the number of properties needed for a district. I think it's if people want to landmark their home, if two properties

[1:42:55] want to have the ceremony together and make it a community type of thing, I think that's great. I also don't want to disincentivize people from coming into

[1:43:03] this community or saying, "Oh, this is a non-ontiguous thing. Oh my god, how did I get affected by this long term?" And

[1:43:11] and that kind of concerns me. So, that was one. I like the number 10 because I think that and I don't mean to overuse

[1:43:19] the word trivialize it. I think it makes it really special when you get a group of houses like that by a particular architect or of a certain style. So,

[1:43:28] that one I was not in favor of. Um, I think once you're up to 365 days for demolition, so you do another six

[1:43:37] months. I I mean, if they're going to wait it out for that long, they're going to wait it out for anybody who can carry the property for another year and

[1:43:44] another 100 or 200 grand is going to wait another year. So, I don't really see other than the whole community and

[1:43:51] neighborhood being affected by having something waiting to go. and and I don't think that's fair to the rest of the community. So, I like staying where we

[1:43:59] are on that one. Um I love the idea of prohibiting the variances for redevelopment so that you know if you're

[1:44:07] going to take this house down, you're going to get it as it is and you cannot change the whole character and and put up a sixlexion.

[1:44:14] Yeah. Or McMansion. Thank you. Anyhow, I I think that's hitting. Thank you, Council Member Bloomberg.

[1:44:27] If you're talking, we cannot hear you.

[1:44:33] Okay, we'll come back to Council Member Bloomberg. Council member Ross. Sorry. Can you hear me now?

[1:44:37] Now we can. Yes. Thank you. You're like a cell phone ad. Yes, we can hear you now.

[1:44:43] Sorry about that. So, just two things that I want to address. Um there there are two separate issues. one is

[1:44:50] encouraging plan which I agree could be a positive effort. Um I I want to add

[1:44:58] that um the the issue of uh getting a certificate approach

[1:45:05] this commission has demonstrated is not a difficult process. They've been very generous. Um they have proceeded in the

[1:45:14] spirit that this is intended. They have recognized additions uh that are not necessarily identical um

[1:45:23] architectural uh styles to what is being added to. Uh sometimes it's important to distinguish

[1:45:31] what's being added from the existing structure to uh assure that we we appreciate the existing structure. So, I

[1:45:39] want to make sure that the public is aware that what what used to be considered an impediment of having a

[1:45:46] landmark building that you would have to go through a complicated process to add on anything to the exterior of the

[1:45:53] house, but really not. Um, this commission has demonstrated the spirit and intent of the certificate of

[1:46:01] appropriateness process um and made that easy. The other thing is that we want to discourage tear downs and that's hard to

[1:46:09] do in a positive way. We've attempted that in a variety of ways over the time that I've been on the city council. I

[1:46:16] agree that the issue of prohibiting uh variances if the structure is going to be torn

[1:46:23] down may get at the root of what causes tear downs to happen. Um

[1:46:31] often times the existing structure is smaller uh than could be built currently but for uh or smaller than somebody wants to build without variances.

[1:46:43] Um we recently saw this where variances were requested to move the building uh further forward on the property, put a

[1:46:52] swimming pool behind it. Um, so the idea of being very encouraging about being

[1:46:59] able to alter and expand an existing structure if you're able to keep it and if it's landmarked and at the same time

[1:47:07] telling you if you're going to tear this down, you you can't rebuild with something bigger. You can't move it around on the lot. You cannot apply for

[1:47:16] variances. And I think this is important because one of the things that I've heard from my fellow council members and

[1:47:22] I I am sympathetic to it uh is the idea of we don't want to remove property

[1:47:28] rights. And so this doesn't you don't have a right to a variance.

[1:47:35] You have a right to apply for it under some circumstances but you don't have a right to a variance. And if we say that

[1:47:43] you're tearing down a protected structure, um, a recognized structure, a structure that's been identified as important by

[1:47:51] this commission, you can only build back what's there. And there are good reasons for that that were that were pointed out

[1:47:58] by staff. Um, that it preserves the spirit of the neighborhood and the impact that the structure originally had

[1:48:06] on the neighborhood. I think that's an important element of discouraging tear downs. It's a separate issue from

[1:48:14] encouraging landmarking and I I just wanted to point that out.

[1:48:17] Wonderful. Thank you, Council Member Ross.

[1:48:20] Um, thank you uh, Mayor. um that I I guess I wanted to share that I've talked

[1:48:29] with a few residents who are passionate advocates for historic preservation and I've said it uh at a public city council

[1:48:37] meeting um that that I I felt we need to make it so attractive to apply for landmarking status that owners say

[1:48:46] absolutely I'm I'm going to seek it. Um and um I I

[1:48:53] uh like the idea of pretty much everything that has been proposed. Um

[1:48:59] the uh I'd like to see, you know, as much um tax relief as as possible for

[1:49:07] longer period of time. Um I love the idea of creating a a grants fund um and

[1:49:14] the idea of a demolition tax that would go toward funding it. Um, I'm not as certain. I have to give more thought to

[1:49:23] the non-ontiguous district. Um, I'm I'm open to anything at this point. I just need to think about it some more.

[1:49:33] Uh, but I I appreciate um all the the work that has gone into these proposals.

[1:49:40] I appreciate uh the commission's work and and staff's work. Um I'm I'm really encouraged by this. I think it's uh great work toward um a goal we all have.

[1:49:54] Yeah.

[1:49:54] Thank you. Thank you, Council Member Center.

[1:49:56] Thanks. Um yeah, I mean I agree largely with uh the feedback so far. I have a

[1:50:03] few questions that I think will influence a little bit of kind of where I shake out or what I'm recommending a little bit. Um,

[1:50:12] Sir Fontaine, what uh following up a little bit on Council Member Litter's question, help me understand a little bit more the economics of the financial incentives.

[1:50:23] So, let's take a $500,000 home. Mhm.

[1:50:26] Like you know what's the kind of the aggregate average benefit from

[1:50:33] the proposed property tax abatement for the fee waiver for the

[1:50:41] you know other suggested kind of economic benefits that are listed there. Can you give me a ballpark?

[1:50:46] Um we we didn't do that that math per se. Um but what it would be is the the city is about 8% of the property tax

[1:50:55] bill. So it would be 8% of the property tax bill. Um and the question would be is you know would that be something that goes with the regulated status in

[1:51:04] perpetuity that you know has significant you know impact or would it be for a duration of time kind of like the state

[1:51:12] uh where it's 8 years I believe the state is or it could be some other time period that the council so chooses. So that's one. So it's, you know, those

[1:51:20] those alternatives and things like that would be further developed if we were asked to look into them and we would provide the information that you're looking for to kind of compare the

[1:51:29] different incentives in a financial context. Um the bill the permit fees would be 1% of the value of the construction. We'd set a minimum value

[1:51:37] of construction associated with the improvements to to make sure that they're significant in terms of what they're going to do to save the

[1:51:44] property. Um, you know, the demo tax is the demo tax. We probably recommend, I mean, from a staff perspective, something about the same size as the

[1:51:53] current demo tax. Um, that could provide funding for these incentives as well. It doesn't have to be that same number, but

[1:52:00] you know, the affordable housing uh initiative is an important initiative. This is an important initiative as well.

[1:52:06] So, you know, if we did 15,000, then it would be 30 as a disincentive to demolition, you know, added.

[1:52:12] Thank you. Thank you. So, I'm just running some like math in my head, right? If it's somebody's trying to build a million dollar house at 1%, that's $10,000 and they're probably

[1:52:21] saving 6,000 for with 8% on their tax billish.

[1:52:26] So, $15,000 like in my opinion that is just not enough incentive. Um, and I don't have the answer obviously, but I

[1:52:34] think we need to think about how can we create more benefit for incentive. And I don't know if there's any type of

[1:52:42] historical look back or tax refunds or something more meaningful. I don't know what we we legally allowed to do, but I'd love to explore increasing those benefits from a financial perspective.

[1:52:52] Um on the flip side, the demolition tax, I wanted to ask C corporation council what is legally allowable?

[1:53:01] Well, um we have we have sustained we have become the model um in in Illinois of a demolition tax that relates to our

[1:53:10] affordable housing. We have created in when we first drafted that ordinance back in 2000 or around there. We made a

[1:53:17] we established a nexus between the demolition of of a home and the need for additional housing or bedroom um space.

[1:53:27] And if we were to bring it into historic preservation, we would have to simply make sure that there's a nexus between

[1:53:35] um the the um the tax and its use, unlike a fee.

[1:53:41] Um and we've talked about this where there has to be a we have to use the fee directly um for whatever purpose it's

[1:53:49] it's collected. This is a tax. So, it's a it's a little different. We just have to have a nexus for its use. But it's a

[1:53:56] we have it's a as as m as far as the law is concerned, we have a lot more flexibility.

[1:54:02] So if we determine a nexus, are we is there some cath?

[1:54:07] I believe that we can find a nexus. By the way, the way that the historic preservation has drafted their resolution, I believe that we will be able to find a nexus.

[1:54:14] When we find a nexus, are we rate capped with what we can charge?

[1:54:19] Not necessarily. Um the market is free.

[1:54:26] Yeah. Okay. Right. I mean from Yeah. I'm not going to say a number right now, but like again I think we have to I think Joel has one thing I just wanted

[1:54:33] to add and you know like Steve said um there's the ability to do it. One thing when studying attacks you know you you

[1:54:41] might want to just keep in mind the overall policy of involuntary landmark right and how we don't have that. We

[1:54:48] have voluntary landmark. Right. If you set a demo tax so high, you will de facto cause

[1:54:55] involuntary landmark. So I just put that out to the council because the policies that you've set forward are just so that

[1:55:04] but my answer from a legal perspective is sky's your limit. You have to you have a lot of policy and political considerations that you have to take into consideration. Correct.

[1:55:14] Demolition is different than rehab though. Yes. Yeah.

[1:55:18] I'm just I'm just I'm just thinking about the involuntary component. housing you're Yeah. And that's where that nexus Yeah. If you set a demolition tax that

[1:55:25] is so high that no one can demolish it, then you're de facto it's it's a fair it's a fair point. So it's kind of contrad Okay, I get it. I

[1:55:33] get it. That said, um again, I think we need to be thoughtful around what really is the penalty, right? cuz we're I think

[1:55:40] what we typically deal with in history is these beautiful large homes and people build beautiful large homes and

[1:55:47] so that the the financial means for the people who are doing this it needs to be impactful.

[1:55:55] The good news is we're not reinventing the wheel. We have neighbors who really have treasured preservation and have already done a lot to preserve homes. So

[1:56:03] we can look to them as well as our peers.

[1:56:06] And one, let me just give one com uh caution to council member um the cent's comment. I let's be very careful in

[1:56:15] describing this that we're not describing it as punitive. Um that's the one concern I would have from a legal perspective. We've we've established a nexus. We're doing it for incentive.

[1:56:24] That's a good word. I just want want to avoid using the word punitive because preservation is Yep.

[1:56:31] Um Okay. Thank you. Thank you. Uh maybe going back to my point around the benefit,

[1:56:39] is there an ability to throw a restrictive covenant on the

[1:56:46] title to prevent tear downs for 99 years x x amount of time legally

[1:56:53] um involuntarily? I mean we impose by if the no if if an owner says oh I'm I'm

[1:57:00] willing to accept X uh benefit and in exchange for that I will put a restrictive covenant on my on my deed.

[1:57:08] Yeah it's it's done quite frequently and that but it would be a voluntary restrictive covenant. Um, it could be a

[1:57:16] restrictive covenant that the owner could then release or a restrictive covenant that would enure to the benefit of the city or to an open lands or some

[1:57:23] other or a preservation society or group, a third party that would make it more difficult for the owner or subsequent owner to release.

[1:57:32] Yeah.

[1:57:33] obviously wasn't something that was on your list, but I'm just trying to think creatively of some other things that might be out there as we continue to make sure that we're putting belt in

[1:57:41] suspenders, if you will, and and coming at this from different angles. There's something that that that came to my mind. Yes.

[1:57:46] The concern was that maybe you give benefits these people and then 3 years later they get knocked down some process. I think the requirement that

[1:57:54] Joel pointed out is that they would voluntarily landmark their house to even qualify for any benefit. So as soon as they do that, that's with the property forever.

[1:58:04] Okay.

[1:58:04] So you would not be able to demolish the structure then. Yeah.

[1:58:07] Yeah. Except in rare cases like Sure. Yeah. Yeah.

[1:58:13] Um Okay. And the last piece is on u the districtricting. I want to just make sure I understand what the proposal here is. Are are are we saying

[1:58:23] I I hear that the trying to reduce the number? Are we trying to to eliminate the voluntary component to that? No, not make it involuntary.

[1:58:33] Basically, non-ontiguous historic zoning districts don't exist anymore.

[1:58:38] So, it's just just reduce it to two and it doesn't matter if two people want to voluntarily landmark their houses together and go through that process, then just let them.

[1:58:45] But the issue that came across earlier this year was sort of the potential involuntary which doesn't exist anymore. Okay.

[1:58:53] Yeah. So, I mean, from that perspective, I think I I I I like where you I like your example of saying like there's a few people who really are who are passionate about this

[1:59:02] and right now they're not allowed to to designate. Correct.

[1:59:04] Right. As a district, correct? Okay. I get something else.

[1:59:08] There's there's literally no point to argue about it. It's just like just reduce it to two and then who cares anymore because it doesn't exist anymore.

[1:59:16] That's all I got. Thank you.

[1:59:17] Um we're wrapping up getting close to 8:30. Any followup? Yes.

[1:59:22] Just a couple comments. Um, number one, just so that you all know, the work of the commission is always about the

[1:59:29] exterior of the building and or the property. Okay? So, when we talk about matching grants, it has nothing to do

[1:59:38] with the interior other than if somebody wants to build out. So, a certain portion of that buildout would be, you

[1:59:45] know, the exterior, but putting in the new kitchen and all that other kind of stuff inside the house. That's not what

[1:59:53] we're talking about here in terms of grants. The other question or the other, this is getting into the weeds a little

[2:00:00] bit, if you will, of tax pol of of tax um procedure, if you will. Mhm.

[2:00:07] When we talk when we talk about the possibility of doing a local property tax abatement, it would only be for, as we already

[2:00:15] said, it would only be for the city portion. So, if you have a property that's got a $500,000 assessed value or whatever that comes out to be, the

[2:00:23] city's portion is the one that's being considered for an abatement, right? But here's here's my question.

[2:00:31] And I don't know if anybody here can actually answer this, but when you reduce when you take properties and and

[2:00:38] give them an abatement, that reduces the assessed value of all of the properties of all the of the total number of properties that Highland Park is taxing.

[2:00:48] The city of Highland Park is taxing. Others are bearing the burden.

[2:00:50] That's what my question was. It's just a transfer and and I would say it's an equitable transfer and it's also a reasonable

[2:00:58] transfer because we're trying to en enhance the value of your property by limiting tear downs etc. etc.

[2:01:06] You're diminishing what a person can do with their property to some extent and by virtue of saying I like your house keep it that way the rest of us are bearing some of that.

[2:01:16] Yes. and I'll bear it on their behalf because my house isn't, but I'm going to get taxed, you know, $5 more a year

[2:01:23] because you don't have these properties that are paying the tax. I just wanted to make that clear. It's not a loss of revenue to the city. It's just a re

[2:01:32] allocation, reappropriation, but it can be done it can be done more as as we're familiar with sales tax in

[2:01:40] where the city rebates, right? um once received rebates that portion that the city has received from

[2:01:47] um real property tax. There's there's different ways to get it. So you could do that as a second second.

[2:01:52] Yeah. And that way the city is losing um revenue, but no one else is it's it's more like providing a grant.

[2:01:58] That's an expenditure from our general fund, right?

[2:02:01] The the tax levy portion is we levy a property tax amount. We get that

[2:02:09] regardless of what happens in the community, right? So, for example, like solo cup properties being developed, some people had a, you know, misunderstanding that

[2:02:18] you're going to get more property tax revenue as a result, and that's not the case. That's not the case. What's happening, as the mayor indicated, it just gets redistributed,

[2:02:26] but we're still getting exactly what we levied. Right.

[2:02:30] Commissioner comment, we want to thank the historic preservation commission.

[2:02:35] like to thank Manny and Zilman for their tremendous uh efforts into checking out the this wasn't us creating the baby.

[2:02:44] They looked at other towns similar to us and some dissimilar like Kinsdale or Oak Park and they found and they gave us

[2:02:52] proposals and it was a brilliant job by both of them in presenting that to us.

[2:02:58] It helped us tremendously and we'd like to thank city council too because you put this to us and it was something that

[2:03:06] we needed to be doing. It should have been done by the historic preservation commission 20 years ago and you proposed

[2:03:15] and came to us and said well we're not happy. You're not happy. Let's propose something. And so we did come back with

[2:03:22] our proposals and they can all be workable and you know the economics of it can be looked into further. But that's what we'd like to say.

[2:03:30] Perfect segue to my question which is director Fontaine Corporation council what needs to be done to take official action next.

[2:03:37] Okay. So the um historic preservation commission has spoken. They've made a recommendation in the form of a formal resolution adopted at their January

[2:03:45] meeting. Um it is now um before you you've considered it at a committee of the whole meeting which is tonight. We

[2:03:52] did this so that the historic preservation commission could be part of the conversation and add to um whatever u consideration. It now is up to the

[2:04:01] committee of the whole to determine what you would like staff to do with this.

[2:04:05] Would you like us to draft um an ordinance in including parts of it for the build for the city council to

[2:04:12] consider? Would you like to have another committee of the whole discussion on it?

[2:04:17] Um, that that's up to you. You can't take action tonight. Of course.

[2:04:21] I hear interest. I'm not quite sure I have consensus on each of the individual points. So, I almost feel like a half an

[2:04:28] hour committee the whole conversation of this is what we heard. I know you've been taking copious notes. We're recording the meeting. If you could kind of pull together where we all have

[2:04:36] landed, I think then we can and you're of course welcome to be at that meeting.

[2:04:41] Well, I know not as an official group, but as observers, we can throw paper airplanes.

[2:04:46] Um, but you know, I think and then we can kind of figure out what the consensus of the council is to then move forward and take appropriate action.

[2:04:54] That makes sense. Great.

[2:04:56] Um, cannot thank all of you enough, not just for tonight's meeting, but for all of the heavy lifting and and pre-work that has gone into both of these

[2:05:04] conversations. It's really been deeply appreciated. Thank you. And this is a nice thing to do to have two different

[2:05:12] groups together and you know you're it's sort of like you know you're just not swimming at the end of the pool there with nobody else around. You know

[2:05:20] there's is anybody listening? Yeah, exactly.

[2:05:23] Appreciate it. Um with that, Chair Weider, I'll ask you to ask for a motion to adjourn your group and then I'll adjourn the council.

[2:05:31] I'll make a motion. Second roll.

[2:05:44] All in favor? I. Any opposed? Motion to agenda the whole meeting.

[2:05:53] All in favor say I. I. Thanks. We stand adjourned and we thank you all for your time. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you.