School officials and residents urged the Village of Mundelein Board of Trustees on Aug. 25 to reopen negotiations over the Ivanhoe Village planned unit development’s impact fees, saying the project will add significant enrollment pressure to local schools and that the village can revisit fees under recently enacted state law.
Why it matters: Fremont School District 79 and Mundelein school officials said the development could bring roughly 750 additional K–8 students and that, under the current plan, much of the cost to accommodate that growth would fall on existing taxpayers.
Gabriela Whipple, president of the Fremont School District 79 board of education, asked the trustees to “reopen negotiations before final approvals are made so that our students, our families, and our taxpayers aren’t left bearing a burden they did not create.” Whipple said the district and the village have consensus on one key fact: the development will bring “approximately 750 additional K through 8 students to Fremont.”
Several speakers said the fee structure approved in April used outdated or inaccurate consultant data. Sean Kolacki, board secretary for Fremont School District 79, said the April 14 vote relied on information that later proved “inaccurate and outdated” and called on the current board to revisit the term sheet. “The vote on the term sheet for impact fees should be revisited by this board,” Kolacki said.
Mundelein District 120 vice president Mark Ponce and actuary David Ellsworth urged reconciliation of competing enrollment and impact estimates. Ponce said the schools were not afforded a chance to compare their numbers line-by-line with the developer’s consultants and asked the village to convene a collaborative review. Ellsworth said fair market impact estimates typically fall between the endpoints offered by two sides and warned that using the developer’s lower endpoint would shift disproportionate risk to taxpayers.
New state authority: Several speakers referenced House Bill 22, saying the law gives the village authority to renegotiate impact-fee arrangements. Corey Safoya, superintendent for Mundelein Districts 120 and 75, said the village “has the new authority with House Bill 22 to revisit those impact fees and ensure they truly reflect the scale of the project.”
Proposed remedies and requests: Speakers proposed a range of remedies trustees could pursue if they reopen negotiations, including (as suggested in public comments) escrow accounts tying payments to actual enrollment, updated escalator clauses to reflect construction-cost inflation, a special service area (SSA) to tax Ivanhoe Village homes directly, and other creative financing tools.
Trustee and mayor responses: The mayor said village consultants held a reconciliation meeting with the schools’ and developer’s consultants after the vote to identify differences in the data. The mayor also said “there’s some efforts underway to provide further information,” but no new motion or vote on the Ivanhoe agreements took place at the Aug. 25 meeting.
What didn’t happen: Trustees did not adopt any new ordinance, reopen the term sheet, or change impact-fee rates that night. Public commenters requested a formal response by Sept. 9; the board did not set a binding timeline during the meeting.
Context and next steps: Multiple residents and school officials asked trustees to use the authority granted by HB 22 to seek a fairer allocation of school costs. School representatives said enrollment is already rising—districts reported enrollment increases this fall—and that a new school will be required in the future. The board did not adopt changes on Aug. 25, but officials said additional information and reconciliation work is in progress.