In another escalation of tensions between Mundelein and its school districts, Fremont School District 79 and Mundelein High School District 120 jointly filed a lawsuit last month against the village over two residential developments.
Last November, Mundelein annexed and rezoned two properties, totaling nearly 250 acres, from agricultural to single-family residential. The smaller of the two properties is 80 acres, and will become Walnut Ridge, a 150-unit continuation of the nearby Sheldon Woods subdivision being developed by the Pulte Group.
Another 165 acres, just west of the future Walnut Ridge, is also planned for residential development by Pulte.
The “core” of the issue, as the districts said in a communication sent to parents, is a new ordinance Mundelein passed in April that they say has “significantly reduced” developer impact fees for the schools. The districts warn of a more than $3.3 million funding gap for local schools.
Walnut Ridge is the first development being done under the new ordinance. Mundelein Trustee Kara Lambert has previously voiced her concerns, noting lower per-house impact fees between Sheldon Woods and Walnut Ridge, and was the sole vote against the approvals in November.
In December, she said the Walnut Ridge development is “salt on the wound” after the division seen over Ivanhoe Village.
Escalating feud
The lawsuit is yet another step in a feud that has roots going back at least as far as last spring. Previously, D79 and D120 leadership had raised alarms over the massive Ivanhoe Village development, which will bring thousands of residential units to Mundelein over the next 25 years.
The school districts had warned that the influx of students would strain local schools and called for developers to shoulder more of the projected burden. But the village said it had far different student population projections, pointing to an overall decrease.
The dispute led to months of lengthy meetings, a protest resignation and critical public letters from the districts against the village.
The issue has gone on long enough to be passed down — from former Mayor Steve Lentz to current Mayor Robin Meier — but the new leadership did not calm tensions.
State legislators even weighed in, passing a bill intended to allow the village to raise impact fees on the development. It’s an option the village did not take, with Meier questioning the legal standing of the untested impact fee addendum and pointing to various concessions the developer took with the project, most notably a 10-year lookback and $1.1 million in cash up front for the schools.
Lawsuit
While the districts’ lawsuit is not about Ivanhoe Village — the impact fee ordinance was passed back in November and Walnut Ridge is the first development affected by the new rules — the issues the districts are raising are much the same as before.
The school districts have repeatedly accused the village of favoring the developers’ projections of student populations over those of the schools, while Mundelein leaders have argued their analysis lies between dueling projections.
D79 and D120, in their communication to parents, warned that the “gap” created by the new, lowered impact fees will be shifted onto taxpayers and affect school quality, predicting increased class sizes, reduced programming, overcrowding and additional tax burdens for taxpayers.
The communication included a graph comparing developer impact fees per student for each district between three developments.
The first, Sheldon Woods, was built in 2020 and resulted in about $8,600 and $21,300 per student for D79 and D120, respectively. In comparison, the Walnut Ridge development, also by Pulte, will result in about $4,500 per student for each district.
Meanwhile, in Round Lake, the Redwood Development — by Redwood USA — has impact fees of $14,202 and $18,000 per student for the school districts.
According to a D79 representative, those numbers were determined by taking the total amount of impact fees the districts will receive and dividing it by the total number of students expected from the development.
According to a timeline from the schools, the schools filed formal objections to the impact fees related to the two properties, which Mundelein denied in January.
With the lawsuit, the districts said they want the court to rule that the schools had the right to object to the impact fees, require Mundelein to review and hold public hearings on the districts’ data and objections, and find the village’s rezoning and approval of residential developments without “adequately and fairly providing for the cost to educate new students” unreasonable.
Despite the escalation to a lawsuit, the districts framed it as only “pursuing legal clarity,” saying they viewed it as “a principled disagreement between neighbors that requires a neutral third party to resolve.”
“We deeply value our long-standing relationship with the Village of Mundelein and continue to take pride in our daily collaborations with the fire, police, and planning departments,” the statement said.
The village, for its part, said the schools’ wishes are “not supported by law.” Their concerns have been “heard repeatedly in multiple public forums,” but “the village just disagrees with the schools’ conclusions.”
Mundelein said the districts have received dollar amounts greater than required by village ordinance, “yet this continues to not be enough.”
“It is a shame that this is the continued focus of D79 and D120; however, we are confident in our position and welcome the opportunity for the courts to opine,” the statement said. “Again, unfortunately, the taxpayers will ultimately end up paying for the legal fees of these taxing bodies.”
In the annual review edition of Mundelein’s village publication, The Insider, Meier wrote at length about impact fees, cautioning against letting emotions lead discussions.
“Impact fees are decided through ordinances, economics and formulas, not emotions,” she said.
Impact fees, she said, are largely based on factors like cost of land and the number of students anticipated, known as the “Naperville Formula,” and there is “significant conflicting information” regarding student enrollment.
Impact fees are optional in Illinois, Meier said, and developers are not required by law to pay. Not all municipalities require impact fees, and some can waive or reduce them to attract developers. New developments mean more revenue for taxing bodies, while high impact fees can deter projects, she warned.
Meier also argued that the Sheldon Woods project, built in 2020, could not be compared to the new Walnut Ridge development. The cost of land, labor and building supplies has increased, and interest rates today are higher.
However, the schools made a similar point in their communication; the costs of educating students and maintaining facilities are rising, yet the village’s impact fees were going “in the opposite direction,” creating “a deficit that local schools cannot sustain.”
