Politics & Government
'Illegally Occupied Units' At La Grange Business Complex: Village
The property owner wants the village to issue certificates of zoning compliance.
LA GRANGE, IL – Most of the businesses in a La Grange commercial complex violate the local code with their parking and loading, the village says.
The complex consists of the next-door buildings at 608 E. Cossitt Ave. and 300 Washington Ave.
The businesses out of compliance are Bumblebee Truck Repair, 1st Platinum Freight, Massiv auto repair, ASAP Repair Shop and CTC Repair, the village said.
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On Thursday, the village's Zoning Board of Appeals plans to hear an appeal from the owner, the Beverly Christensen Trust, which bought the buildings in 2003.
The village said those companies have not obtained business licenses or certificates of occupancy.
Find out what's happening in La Grangefor free with the latest updates from Patch.
In 2023, car and truck repair became a permitted use in the area in question. Still, the village said in a memo last week, the complex fails to meet parking and loading requirements.
"(T)he parking spaces on the Property are designed for passenger vehicles and not box and semi-trucks," the village said. "The parking lot also does not have a sufficient number of handicapped parking stalls for all of the Illegally Occupied Units."
The trust said the space has been used for car and truck repair businesses since the 2003 purchase. But the village said that was not entirely true, listing past uses on the property, including a school fundraising company.
The village and the trust have battled for years, even in court. At one point, the trust declined to identify the tenants in the units, according to the memo.
In a Jan. 16 appeal, the trust's representative, Tad Christensen, disagreed with the village's position.
"The fact that some of the tenants were operating without a business license does not mean that the use had not been lawfully established for the purposes of zoning," Christensen said in a document prepared by the Chicago-based Patterson Law Firm.
The village is withholding certificates of zoning compliance, which is what the businesses are seeking.
The Zoning Board of Appeals meets at 7 p.m. Thursday at Village Hall.
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