Oak Park Trustees Delay Vote on Comprehensive Plan

The Oak Park Village Board will schedule a special meeting to dig into an updated comprehensive plan in more detail before officially accepting consultants' proposed vision statements, statements of importance, goals and objectives.

The plan is comprised of 11 vision statements, broken down into 53 goals and 241 objectives—a beast of a document for board members wanting to go through it with a fine-toothed comb. 

Consulting firm Houseal Lavigne Associates this year has engaged community stakeholders to come up with core components of a plan that will serve as a foundation for decision-making in Oak Park for the next 10 to 15 years, John Houseal told board members Tuesday. 

Houseal Lavigne has held more than 40 community workshops, engaging community members in select neighborhoods, business owners, students, commissioners and other interested residents. Houseal said consultants hope to have a working draft of the plan sometime in December.

The 11 main chapters include:

• Land use and built environment
• Arts and culture
• Parks, open space and environmental features
• Neighborhoods, housing and diversity
• Education
• Community health and safety
• Transportation, infrastructure and communication technologies
• Community life and engagement
• Economic health and vitality
• Environmental sustainability
• Governmental excellence

Village President Anan Abu-Taleb described the plan, so far, as, “a lot of material, but no substance.”

“I have a tough time getting my arms around it… I couldn’t come up with one mission statement that tells me what this plan is going to do for our community,” he said. 

Lueck said while there is a lot of work that needs to be done, she felt comfortable accepting the document Monday, knowing it's still a work in progress. She added, "I like that some of the goals (and objectives) are very broad-reaching and complex... and some are very specific (and would be easy to do right away."

Trustee Ray Johnson said he started to become concerned when he saw the number of goals and objectives—and how many of them are out of the village's price range.

Trustee Adam Salzman said the plan will need to be a functional governing document for the village.

“While I think it’s wonderful to be aspirational… (We) have to be practical.” He added the number of participants in the planning process only represented a small fraction of the people who live in Oak Park.

For more information on the comprehensive plan, go to www.envisionoakpark.com.

Read through the comprehensive plan presentation above. 

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