Excerpts from the DailyHerald.com:
Cook County commissioners on the county’s zoning and building committee Wednesday voted 14-0 against granting a special-use permit and zoning variances the Barrington Countryside Fire Protection District needed to build a new station at 36 E. Dundee Road near a middle school and early childhood center.
Fire district officials contended that the third station would have improved ambulance response times to parts of Inverness and elsewhere. But its planned location between Barrington Middle School-Prairie Campus and Barrington Area Unit District 220’s Early Learning Center drew opposition from school leaders and parents. District 220 Superintendent Brian Harris urged commissioners to vote against the plan, saying the schools never would have been built at that location had the fire station been there first. He said he hopes fire district officials instead follow a study’s recommendation indicating a need for a facility in the western part of the district.
Barrington Countryside officials released a statement calling the county board’s decision a setback for regional public safety. “It is also an overreaction to patently false information created and disseminated by a small group of individuals who seek shortsighted benefits for a select few at the expense of the long-term greater good,” the fire district said.
Barrington Countryside hoped to use the foundation of a house it bought for $500,000 in 2016 for the station. The new facility would have cost $900,000 to $1.1 million.
District 220 lodged a formal objection with Cook County, citing traffic concerns and the potential for reduced property values.
At a meeting last fall, school officials and teachers said noise from the firehouse could cause problems for the early learning center, where the most fragile children in the system are taught.
County Commissioner Kevin Morrison said his office received at least 50 calls and 70 emails against the project. Morrison said that while the county’s advisory zoning board of appeals recommended the station on the condition that no sirens be used, a site visit and feedback from both sides of the issue convinced him the project would be inappropriate.
Barrington Countryside Fire Chief James Kreher said work will resume to find another site to better serve Inverness and the eastern and southern areas of the district. District 220 has expressed interest in buying the district’s Dundee Road property, he said.
thanks Ron
