With time slipping away, the DuPage County Forest Preserve Commission again has realigned its committee that has been struggling to find the best place for a new headquarters.
The new Headquarters Committee is expected to begin work next week on collecting information and determining the costs involved in five potential sites: the east side and west sides of Danada Forest Preserve in Wheaton, the St. Paschal Friary at the Mayslake Forest Preserve in Oak Brook and two commercial properties.
The committee is expected to bring a decision to the commission’s Feb. 3 meeting. It is the third panel formed specifically to find a new headquarters site.
The latest committee consists of Commission President Dewey Pierotti (R-Addison), Michael Formento (R-Glen Ellyn), William Maio (R-Itasca), Robert Schroeder (R-Naperville), Gwen Henry (R-Wheaton) and Robert Day (R-Hinsdale).
“There will have to be compromises,” said Pierotti. “We’re running out of time.”
The district must vacate its present Glen Ellyn headquarters by Dec. 31, and the Glen Ellyn Park District will assume ownership of the site on Jan. 1, 1999. No negotiations to extend the deadline have been undertaken and no contingency plans have been drawn up so far, officials said.
The earliest the commission could occupy a Danada site could be May or June 1999, making a six-month extension necessary, Pierotti said.
The friary, part of the Peabody Estate in Oak Brook, was briefly considered last year as a potential site. However, the idea was scuttled at the time because the price tag to rehabilitate the building would have been more than constructing a new headquarters, according to commission members.
