Mayor Acknowledges York High Project Delay

ELMHURST, IL — With the first day of school Wednesday, Elmhurst Mayor Scott Levin on Monday acknowledged the delay in the drainage project at York High School.

"The York project is coming along very well, but due to a little issue with the supplier of the (drainage) vaults, we're running two weeks behind," Levin said at a City Council meeting. "One of the major commitments we had in advancing the project with District 205 was that we were committed to having the project done before the school year, which we're going to miss by about two weeks due to no fault of the schools."

On Monday, he said he and other city officials met Monday with their counterparts at the school district about the project.

"We're going to continue to coordinate with the school district," he said. "We're quite confident that the two weeks will solve the issue."

Earlier in the summer, a city official warned a previous contractor that the delay would cause a "traffic nightmare" at York once school starts. And he told the company that its reputation was on the line in the Chicago suburbs. The city later canceled its contract with the firm and went with another one.

In an agreement with Elmhurst School District 205, the city is installing underground storage tanks to help with stormwater problems in the area. After that, the district is set to put in an artificial turf field.

Patch recently filed a public records request on the issue with the contractor and published a story about how the city handled the situation.