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http://www.dailyherald.com/news/dupagestory.asp?id=298455&cc=d&tc=&t=
Addison moves to stop gun shop
Officials want to use forced annexation to stop store from opening on Lake Street
By Elisabeth Mistretta
Daily Herald Staff Writer
Posted Thursday, April 05, 2007
To stop a gun shop from opening on Lake Street, the village of Addison will annex both a commercial building and a private home without the owners’ consent.
After more than a year of trying to negotiate with Don Navigato, who owns the commercial building at 19W641 Lake St. just outside village limits, Addison officials decided this week to resort to the unusual measure of forced annexation, which has been used only twice in 15 years.
Assistant Village Manager John Berley said the move is part of an ongoing effort to keep businesses of questionable repute off of Lake Street, such as a spa that was annexed recently.
“Those kind of uses are considered undesirable by our residents and don’t project a good image,” he said.
Village officials said Navigato planned to lease his building to a tenant who applied for a permit to sell firearms. Once his property is part of Addison, the business can’t launch because the village has forbidden gun sales since 1967.
Navigato could not be reached for comment Wednesday. The name of the would-be gun dealer was not available.
In order to bring Navigato’s land into the village, state law dictates that Addison will also have to annex five neighboring homes, because the Navigato property doesn’t abut current village boundaries.
Four of those homeowners have agreed to join Addison, which will happen April 18.
But Theresa and Wayne Reich did not, so their home along Eighth Avenue will also be involuntarily annexed.
Theresa Reich said she initially wanted to be incorporated so she could access village sewer services. But she ultimately declined out of concern over losing access to her water well, becoming subject to village housing codes and new costs like village taxes.
“I told (the village) I would gladly annex in if I could just keep my water,” Reich said. “I just didn’t want to seal my well up. I like to have plants and I like free water. Chicago water is very expensive.”
Berley said the village offered to waive annexation and water hookup fees to both the Reichs and Navigato. The Reichs said they were concerned that the village contract did not cover all costs. Navigato did not respond to the offer, village officials said.
“This is a free annexation,” Berley said. “We’ve been trying to approach Navigato for a couple of years. We’ve gotten virtually no response. We don’t know why, we can only guess.”
Last December, the village board also passed an ordinance forbidding the sale of firearms within a mile of its borders. But Berley said officials feared this was not enough.
“We are concerned the building will be used for other potential, undesirable uses,” he said. “Our history with (Navigato) is not very good. In one case, he had his real estate office in that building for years and some of his dealings have not been so honorable.
“He manages or rents out single-family homes in the village and we’ve had a lot of maintenance issues with them,” Berley said. “The homes were almost uninhabitable, with porches almost falling off, tall grass and weeds. We would get complaints and would have to follow up on them.”
After adopting an ordinance of intent to involuntarily annex both properties, the village scheduled a public hearing on the matter for April 23. At the hearing, residents can ask questions and voice support or objection. Only after this can Addison’s village board continue with the annexation process.
