Delayed Elmhurst Nursing Home Project May Be Issue For City

ELMHURST, IL — Elmhurst resident Jay McNichols reminded the City Council this week that it's been awhile since the Elmhurst Extended Care Center got the city's permission to expand — more than 960 days.

The city has been granting the nursing home at 200 E. Lake St. extensions since April 2018. But McNichols is urging against granting another one. And the council may have less appetite to do so.

The 108-bed nursing home is proposing a major expansion that would extend close to houses on Fremont Avenue, including McNichols'. In his view, it is not a good fit for a residential neighborhood.

At Monday's council meeting, McNichols told aldermen the nursing home had not shown substantial progress with the project. Its latest six-month deadline was last Friday. It put up a construction fence last Thursday and dropped off a trailer to the site the next day, he said.

"There has been no activity since Friday," McNichols told Elmhurst Patch in an email Thursday.

Patch left a message for the nursing home's administrator, Love Dave.

On Oct. 7, the city sent a letter to the administrator, documenting the timeline for the extensions and permits. The permit would be null and void if the project was "not substantially underway" by the Friday deadline, the city warned.

In May, the City Council split 9-3 in its approval of a six-month extension. Alderman Mike Brennan, who supported the extension, said it would be the last time he would vote for one. Another backer of the extension, Alderman Scott Levin, also expressed concerns with the repeated delays.

In a May 7 letter to the council, Dave, the administrator, said the nursing home was seeking money from the Department of Housing and Urban Development for the project. One of the holdups was that the city and the nursing home were still discussing the designs, so general contractors were unable to submit bids without a finalized plan, the letter said.

The letter also contended the pandemic, which started nearly two years after the city's approval of the project, had caused further delays in the application process for HUD money.

"We are asking for a 6-month extension at this time," Dave said. "I am confident that funding can be secured and construction can begin within that time frame."

According to Medicare's website, Elmhurst Extended Care is rated "much above average" overall. It has had no coronavirus cases or related deaths, state reports say. The home is family-owned and started in 1960.