A hearing on a petition from the Park District of La Grange to sell two parcels of land from Gordon Park to developer Atlantic Realty Partners (ARP) likely will take place on May 18 before Judge Susan Fox Gillis of the Cook County circuit court.
The hearing date was verbally agreed to this morning by all attorneys involved in front of Judge Patrick E. McGann, the chief judge of the court's county division, who held his own hearing to formally assign the case to Judge Gillis.
But the court order prepared by Park District attorney Robert Bush and signed by Judge Gillis omits any reference to a date. It does, however, state that the hearing will begin at 11 a.m. in Rm. 1703 of the Daley Center.
Among the first items Gillis likely will address is a motion to dismiss the petition from Joan Johnson, attorney for a citizens group who oppose the parkland sale. Johnson said she will argue that the petition is almost identical to one filed by the park district in Oct. 2007 and subsequently dismissed by Gillis in June 2008.
Gillis at that time ruled that legal descriptions contained in the sales contract with ARP and a title insurance policy included a vacant portion of Shawmut Ave that lies between the two parcels. Thus, the amount of land involved was 3.5 acres not 2.82 as the park district maintained. Under Illinois law, the circuit court can directly approve the sale of parkland only if it is less than three acres.
Johnson said she will base her dismissal motion on res adjudicata, a legal doctrine that bars rehearing cases in which there already has been a final judgment.
Bush has argued that the new petition involves a new contract between the park district and ARP, in which the legal description has been amended to omit the vacated roadway.
Johnson said any effort by the park district to amend the legal description should have taken place during the hearings on the first petition.
Park officials initially said they would appeal Gillis' ruling but ultimately did not, opting instead to ask district voters to authorize the sale in a public referendum in November. Voters did support the referendum by margin of 55 to 45 percent, and a public auction of the land was held Jan. 8 in which ARP was the sole bidder.
But a lawsuit filed by Orlando Coryell so far has prevented the sale from closing. A trial in that lawsuit is scheduled to begin June 1 in front of Judge Leroy K. Martin Jr. of the court's chancery division.
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