BUCKTOWN/WICKER PARK — A much-debated 32-unit Milwaukee Avenue apartment complex, with almost all of the units studios, is moving forward after getting the OK from the City Council's Committee on Zoning, Landmark and Building Standards.
The committee unanimously approved a zoning change needed to construct the 5-story building anchored by retail on the ground floor.
The zoning change is scheduled to be voted on by the full City Council on Wednesday.
One member of the public, Teddy Varndell, objected to the project by LG Development and Construction Group.
Varndell represented the Wicker Park Committee, a neighborhood group that had previously voted against the zoning change needed to build the smaller units.
In a January letter to Ald. Brian Hopkins (2nd), the group said that they felt the requested zoning that would allow so many units was "inappropriate."
"The Committee has previously expressed to you its objection to this proposal to build 32 units in place of the previously agreed upon six condos with parking," the group told Hopkins, referring to condos proposed in 2014 before the site's owners said "there was no market for luxury condos on that stretch" of Milwaukee, which is competing with quieter side streets nearby.
Varndell said the project moved so quickly after the Wicker Park Committee's Preservation and Development Committee rejected the plan that the full Wicker Park Committee didn't have time to consider it. He also said the City Council committee’s action did not follow public notice rules, although zoning department staff members said regulation requirements had been met.
"It feels like a dorm the more I look at it," one Wicker Park Committee member said at a January meeting, where the group was concerned that there will be just three parking spaces for tenants and that the units would attract what the member called "transient" renters.
The plan calls for 32 "efficiency" apartments and 45 bike spaces in addition to the three parking slots. The building would offer a mix of studios from 343 to 372 square feet, as well as larger "junior" one-bedroom units of a little more than 500 square feet.
All of the apartments would have an in-unit washer and dryer.
Rents would be $1,250 for the studios and $1,450 for the one-bedroom apartments.
Three of the apartments would be for lower-income renters in accordance with the city's Affordable Requirements Ordinance, which requires that certain new buildings with more than 20 units either allocate 10 percent of units for affordable housing or pay $125,000 per unit to a city-managed trust fund that helps to develop low-income housing elsewhere.
Ald. Joe Moreno (1st) voted for the project after learning that all 10 percent of the affordable housing units would be on site. Ald. Brian Hopkins (2nd) voted for it after several other groups weighed in.
"After multiple public meetings, revisions and the earned support of the Bucktown Community Organization, Wicker Park/Bucktown Chamber of Commerce and the adjacent property's condo board, Alderman Hopkins is now ready to support this proposal," Christian Ficara, a spokesman for Hopkins, said in a statement after a community meeting last week with members of the Bucktown Community Organization, which supports the plan.
The proposed building, just north of the Milwaukee, Damen and North avenues intersection, falls along a two-block stretch of street between North Avenue and The 606's Bloomingdale Trail.
Philip Edison, president of the Bucktown Community Organization's planning and development subcommittee, said 77 percent of the group supported the studios and the positive feedback was given to Hopkins after the meeting.
Varndell said on a personal level independent of the Wicker Park Committee, he is wondering about the timing of the zoning committee vote and how the project got added to the agenda so soon after the Bucktown community meeting on Thursday.
On Tuesday, Ficara said the zoning change request was previously listed on the Committee's deferred agenda after a vote on the plan was postponed before.
"Nothing new was added, and this is standard process when a proposal is continued by an alderman or applicant. The committee hearing for March was announced on Feb. 23," Ficara said.
The project was first introduced at a public meeting in August.
Reader reactions to the plan. [NeighborhoodSquare/Screenshot]
