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| Voters give go-ahead to open space purchase | |
| Apr 18, 2007 | |
| Jameel Naqvi, Staff Writer jnaqvi@dailyherald.com | |
| Daily Herald | |
| Pertains to Fox River Trail, Algonquin, Cary | |
| Voters approved a measure that will enable the McHenry County Conservation District to buy and protect thousands of acres of open space. The request for $73 million to preserve another 4,500 acres of open space passed soundly, 16,641 to 12,706 votes, according to unofficial vote totals -- not counting early voting. Conservation district officials said the success of their request was a validation of their management of open space and a recognition of the value of preserving undeveloped land. "A lot of the people who live here see how rapidly things change," district Trustee Nancy Williamson said. "I think they realize that open space ... provides services besides just being open space." The referendum was the conservation district's first since 2001, when voters narrowly approved a $68.5 million bond issue. Funds from that bond issue ran dry last year after the district used it to purchase and preserve about 7,000 acres, including the Gentry Ridge property in Cary and Camp Algonquin. The sites, a combined 279 acres purchased for $14.95 million, were two of the last developable pieces of Fox River shoreline in southeast McHenry County. Taxpayers will be paying for that bond issue until 2021. But MCCD officials said they could not wait that long for another referendum, particularly with development still spreading fast across the county, and the price of open land rising even faster. The $73 million sought, officials said, could purchase about 4,500 acres at sites scattered across the county already identified by the district. Besides preserving land, district officials also sold the bond issue as a means to protecting the county's water supplies from the strain of new residential and commercial development. However, those benefits would not come without a significant cost to taxpayers. Under the proposal, the tax rate would grow about 4 cents for every $100 of a property's assessed value. For the owner of a $250,000 home, that would mean a tax increase of a little more than $32 in the first year of the bond issue. |
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