Lake County Gazette

The Village of Lake Bluff held a special meeting of the Committee of the Whole Nov. 23.

The Lake Bluff Committee of the Whole includes the board of trustees, the Joint Plan Commission and Zoning Board of Appeals, the Architectural Board of Review and the Historic Preservation Commission.

The primary purpose of the meeting was to continue a discussion of the best way for the village to facilitate historic preservation of the village's buildings.

Trustee William Meyer suggested avoiding rules pertaining to taste or other aesthetic judgments and focusing instead on mandatory building materials, institutional zoning regulations and stronger historic preservation requirements.

The committee agreed to pursue institutional zoning, which would establish a separate zoning code for institutions such as schools that have different uses and needs than family homes.

As the discussion continued, committee members proposed other ideas, such as limiting the footprint of new buildings to the footprint of the previous building on the lot and working with the Historic Preservation Commission to identify and focus preservation efforts on the village's 20 most historic buildings.

The committee reached a consensus on finding ways to slow residential development, come up with more specific details on some of the ideas proposed by various committee members as well as bring the discussion back to a future Committee of the Whole meeting.

President Kathleen O'Hara said the committee's future meetings will focus on a land use plan for the Lake Bluff Park District. 

Trustee John Josephitis was absent.