Subdivision Residents Demand Street Services From Palos Heights

The average Palos Heights City Council meeting plays out in front of about a dozen people. On Tuesday night, around 100 residents of several subdivisions currently involved in legal action against the city packed the chamber demanding snow removal and street maintenance services.

Jeff Key, a resident of Westgate Valley subdivision, is running against Ald. Jean Gnap of the 1st Ward in the city’s only contested race this April. Key was first to speak and railed against what he believes is unfair treatment.

“You are supposed to be taking care of and protecting your constituents,” Key said. “We are all here for the same reason, to ask you to do the right thing and dedicate our streets.”

The dispute involves Forest Ridge at Westgate Valley, Laurel Glen Condominiums, Keystone Crossing Townhomes and other Westgate Valley associations and dates back more than a decade.

In 2007, the homeowners associations of those developments filed suit arguing that Palos Heights was legally obligated to dedicate their streets upon completion of the development.

The 1998 annexation agreement between the city and the developments specifically states that “All utilities, road, sidewalks shall conform to all ordinances of the city. Upon their completion, they shall be dedicated to and accepted by the city.”

After the meeting, Mayor Bob Straz said other sections in the annexation agreement and later documents indicate the streets were to remain private.

Resident Chuck Doerr said the group would request time to discuss the issue at further length with the City Council.

Toward the end of the residents’ comments, the crowd grew impatient with the lack of a specific response from the council. Straz maintained that due to the pending litigation they couldn’t talk about the specifics of the case in an open forum.

Gnap was the focus of a few of the complaints and argued that town home and condominium associations in Palos Heights maintain their own private roads.

“I, in my greatest amount of effort, tried to tell you that this was your private property and it was never the intent of the city to accept your private property and to maintain it,” Gnap responded.

On Tuesday, lawyers for the homeowners associations filed an 84-page motion aimed at knocking out many of the city’s witnesses, a source with knowledge of the case said.

To view the meeting in its entirety, courtesy of Channel 4, click here. Check back with Palos Patch for updates on this developing story.