Buffalo Grove residents got a chance to tell village officials where they think their community should be heading. But during a recent Plan Commission public hearing on the village’s draft version of its comprehensive plan there was a touch of irony in what they said.
Some of the same people who have been contributing to the village’s growth since 1980 now are complaining it is growing too fast.
Because of the rapid growth, said resident Gordon Kasper, his taxes have gone up 50 percent in the last four years and his children are attending overcrowded schools.
“Our schools in District 102 are almost packed to the gills,” Kasper said, asking whether the plan included any provisions for new schools. “Stevenson (High School) is also pretty crowded.”
Village Planner Robert Pfiel replied that there was nothing in the plan because no school districts have asked to reserve land for a school site.
Jeff Taub, a village resident, said he was concerned that land designated as commercial will end up supporting new strip malls. As it is, he said, current strip malls are having trouble keeping tenants.
“I don’t understand the need to build more strip malls that are half empty,” he said.
Plan Commission member Jeffrey Berman responded that commercial property doesn’t necessarily mean strip malls but could be occupied by other facilities such as professional buildings that would house offices for doctors and lawyers.
Cynthia Hautzinger who lives in unincorporated Lake County near Buffalo Grove, described the village as “a cancer that’s growing.”
Hautzinger said she has seen more deer in her yard recently as their habitat is disappearing. And traffic in her neighborhood, she said, is triple what it was 17 years ago when she first moved to the area.
“I want to know if traffic impact has been studied,” she said.
The comprehensive plan is updated roughly every five years by the village, which uses the document as a tool to handle growth in areas that are a focus for development.
In recent years, residential growth has been a hallmark of Buffalo Grove, where farmland has given way to strip shopping malls and cul-de-sacs.
And as space for creating more homes becomes scarce, the plan proposes a possible way of getting more land for single-family dwellings.
Unincorporated Prairie View, to the village’s north, is a possible site of future expansion, but it would first have to be annexed by Buffalo Grove before any such idea becomes a reality.
The population of Buffalo Grove has grown to an estimated 42,200 residents this year from 22,230 in 1980. Village planners say that if the community annexes every area designated in the plan, the population would grow to 50,000.
Lured by the favorable images of such local amenities as the school system and recreation options, Buffalo Grove has become a popular destination for young families with children.
At the same time, however, the community’s elderly population has grown. Officials say the number of senior citizens has doubled since 1980, creating an increasing demand for housing for the elderly.
