NorthPoint In Joliet: O'Dekirk Breaks 4-4 Tie Vote

JOLIET, IL — Joliet Mayor Bob O'Dekirk and City Councilman Pat Mudron are bitter political rivals, but on Tuesday night the two men joined forces to approve the highly controversial NorthPoint development project planned for Joliet.

At 8:35 p.m., Joliet's mayor broke the 4-4 council tie, to approve the project. Late Tuesday night, Joliet's two-term mayor issued a statement on why he broke the tie to move the NorthPoint project forward in Joliet.

"I campaigned on my record for four years of bringing in an unprecedented amount of economic development to Joliet," O'Dekirk said, referring to $1.4 billion in private investment dollars.

"With that we have been able to buy new police cars, new ambulances, new snow plows, expand our street improvement projects and invest $60 million the last three years on new water and sewer mains without raising taxes in Joliet.

"I saw this development as being another small piece to what is happening in Joliet. I will continue to work with our state, federal and county officials to improve the local infrastructure, but I think the recent capital bill, which has over $1 billion in road repairs to our city as being proof that we are moving in the right direction," O'Dekirk stated.

Several people in the audience were outraged by the final vote and someone in the crowd screamed "You're going to have blood on your hands!" One of the Joliet Police officers assigned to the City Council meeting to provide security got up from his seat moments later and he went to the other side of the council chambers to make sure there weren't any violent confrontations between the audience and Joliet politicians.

Earlier, when the Joliet city clerk began polling the council members one at a time, the first few votes were "No," so the eventual passage of the NorthPoint development rezoning petition appeared to stun the mostly anti-NorthPoint crowd in attendance for the meeting.

In the end, the Joliet council's split vote allows for the reclassification of 103 acres on the southside of Breen Road, a half-mile east of Rowell Avenue, from single-family residential and multi-family residential to light industrial zoning.

The proponents of NorthPoint coming to Joliet were Mayor O'Dekirk, Mudron, Sherri Reardon, Jan Quillman and Larry Hug.

The opponents of the NorthPoint development were Don "Duck" Dickinson, Terry Morris, Bettye Gavin and Mike Turk.

In July, Joliet Patch published an exclusive story highlighting Reardon's top campaign donors, noting that one of her big donors was the NorthPoint development. Reardon was just elected to the council in April and some local election observers viewed her victory over well-known Joliet Park Board member Joe Mutz as an upset.

The Joliet City Council chambers were packed for Tuesday's vote, and during the public comment portion, at least 23 people went to the podium to speak about NorthPoint. Seventeen speakers were against it, including several residents or public officials in Jackson Township. Six speakers representing labor unions and tradesmen urged Joliet to approve NorthPoint.

Some of the opposition speakers told the City Council that the labor groups representing thousands of workers in a multi-state area would not have shown up at Tuesday's meeting if they didn't already know NorthPoint has far bigger plans for Joliet and Will County.

"NorthPoint knows this isn't just a 103-acre project," predicted one of the opponents who addressed the council. "Union leadership knows this isn't a 103-acre project."

One of the speakers representing the skilled labor groups told everyone they need to realize that Joliet remains in a prime spot for economic growth and job growth, unlike most parts of Illinois. He urged the council to embrace NorthPoint, saying "economic growth and development is a good problem to have."

In April 2018, Joliet Patch reported the village of Elwood, after many months of controversy, had finally rejected plans from NorthPoint to build a massive warehouse facility on 2,220 acres near their community. At that time, Elwood's village president Doug Jenco spoke on WJOL proclaiming there was not enough support on the village board for the project to move ahead. "The people did not want it. I did not want it," Jenco told the Joliet radio station more than 18 months ago.

Now, NorthPoint is back, thanks to the state's third largest city, Joliet. A memo to the city council from interim city manager Steve Jones had recommended the city council approve the rezoning classification on the 103-acre parcel for the NorthPoint project.