Hoffman Estates recommends revised development pact
Hoffman Estates village board members voted unanimously Monday to recommend approval of a significantly revised annexation and development agreement for 185 acres at the northwest corner of routes 59 and 72.
Though local school district officials - and Hoffman Estates Mayor Bill McLeod - still called for greater clarification of a future school site on the Plum Farms property, the agreement's revisions quieted some earlier concerns.
One of the major ones for Barrington Unit District 220 Board President Brian Battle was a line that the development partnership can only renew its past request for a partial property tax refund through a tax increment financing (TIF) district with a letter stating that neither his district nor Community Unit District 300 objects.
The revised agreement also lowered the limit for the number of dwelling units of various types from 1,325 to 1,250. However, the current concept plan stayed the same with the still lower number of 1,035.
While some South Barrington and Barrington Hills residents have objected to the building and traffic density enabled by the agreement, officials from school districts 220 and 300 have been particularly concerned by the number of students they think it will generate.
The largest portion of the site consists of 145 acres disconnected from Barrington Hills, where the minimum lot size for homes is 5 acres. The annexation agreement is up for final approval at 7 p.m. Monday. It would put this land in Hoffman Estates and rezone it for a much higher density.
Investors and representatives of the development partnership, some of whom live in the area themselves, have argued that higher residential density is what both retailers and future homebuyers are looking for today.
The developers' attorney, Matt Norton, said the currently unknown amount of land needed by the school districts is the only reason a site hasn't been identified yet.
The developers dropped their request for a $21 million property tax refund through a TIF district earlier this month. They originally argued such an incentive would help overcome such obstacles to the site's development as wetlands, buried construction debris and a natural gas pipeline that would need to be removed or relocated.