Oct. 04--Neighbors of Crystal Lake South High School woke in the summer of 2013 to the sounds of construction. The beep-beep of trucks. Screeching metal. Booms and bangs.
The football field's visitor side bleachers -- modest and old-fashioned with a square, open-air press box -- were being torn down. Within weeks, a blanket of steel more than twice the size of the old bleachers towered over the field and several homes bordering the school. The new bleachers, for the home team, stood 50 feet high. The neighbors, and Crystal Lake officials, said they were caught completely by surprise.
The Illinois Supreme Court has ordered that the bleachers must come down. The justices confirmed what lower courts found: The board of Community High School District 155 needed to comply with municipal zoning rules or get the city's approval for a variance from those rules to do the $1.2 million project.
What a waste of money, all because the school board and its lawyers stubbornly stuck to the belief that they could thumb their nose at the school's neighbors because the zoning rules didn't apply.
The city was "devoid of legal authority to impose its zoning restrictions on the district," Dean Krone, an attorney for the school district, told Crystal Lake officials in a letter.
"They're operating in an altered reality," Mayor Aaron Shepley said.
State law wasn't crystal clear, but as city officials pointed out, the school district had routinely sought city approval in similar cases over the years. Beyond that, there's a basic duty for the school to be a good neighbor. The school board should have informed the local residents of its plans and sought approval for a zoning change -- just as any property owner would be required to do.
The neighbors filed a lawsuit, and the courts -- ultimately the Supreme Court -- came to their rescue. Last week, the school board awarded a demolition contract. Some neighbors have graciously suggested that the bleachers could still be reduced in size, a press box moved, to accommodate the school.
So, to sum up.
The District 155 school board pursued a dubious legal argument for two years -- refusing to concede as it lost at each step, taking this all the way to the Illinois Supreme Court.
By the way, Illinois has a new law requiring civics education in high schools. We suggest the school board members and their lawyers take the course.
