Residents of two areas in Prospect Heights presented petitions to the City Council requesting creation of special service areas to tap Lake Michigan water.
Thomas Hartman, a resident of the Lake Claire Estates subdivision, presented a petition to the council asking for a special service area bounded by the north side of Camp McDonald Road, the east side of Wheeling Road, both sides of Coldren Avenue and south of and including St. Alphonsus Catholic Church.
The service area would include about 250 homes, Hartman said.
Although residents voted down a non-binding referendum issue in November calling for a citywide switch to lake water from well water, Hartman told council members that the homes in the proposed special service area are part of Wheeling Township Precinct 117, where the issue lost by only three votes. About half the city is now connected to lake water.
Thirty-six homes in the precinct west of Wheeling Road and east of Coldren Avenue, where most owners oppose replacing well water with lake water, are not included in the proposed special service area.
Hartman said his neighbors requested the special service area to have fire hydrants installed for fire protection, to obtain “a safe, reliable source of water” and to reduce the cost of operating wells.
The petitioners said they also fear they may lose the state allocation of Lake Michigan water if they don’t use it.
Hartman said the Prospect Heights police and fire stations as well as a Walgreens store on Camp McDonald Road and the Social Security Administration office on Elmhurst Road have all switched to lake water.
He said the Morava Recreation Center on Camp McDonald Road also wants lake water.
“They want it, but we can’t have it,” Hartman said.
The average cost for each homeowner who got lake water has been estimated at $20,000, to be paid in additional property taxes over 20 years.
Though Hartman asked city officials to conduct an engineering study to determine the actual cost, Mayor Edward Rotchford said, “I don’t know how the city will be able to do an engineering study without costs to the residents.”
Resident Jean Spiegelhalter presented a petition for a second special service area, in Precinct 13, where residents voted narrowly in favor of switching to lake water.
Spiegelhalter said the proposed special service area, bounded by Willow, Palatine, Wheeling and Elmhurst Roads, includes about 160 homes.
Lake Claire Estates resident Richard Kellerman, who opposes the special service area, said the cost of lake water for him would be $30,000 over 20 years.
“A group of homeowners who knowingly bought homes with wells don’t want to spend the money to treat them,” Kellerman said.
Kellerman said several engineering studies have shown the project would be too costly.
“There was a referendum,” Kellerman said. “Support the will of the majority. Don’t further divide the city. To vote yes on this issue is to put neighbor against neighbor. There are only 15,000 of us.”
Hartman and other petitioners asked the council to seek federal and state financing for the lake water proposal.
