Although Lynne Heidt joined the city’s Preservation Commission almost two years after the boundaries of the Northeast Evanston Historic District were set, the Evanston Board of Ethics is investigating whether she used her position to exclude from the district a building later converted to condominium units.

The board decided at its Oct. 18 meeting to further investigate questions raised by Stuart Novy, a member of Evanstonians for Responsible Preservation, the community group that opposed the district. Novy said he was concerned that Heidt — as a member of the Preservation Commission — had a hand in creating boundaries that omitted two Sherman Avenue blocks.

However, Novy said he found out at the end of the Oct. 18 meeting that Heidt did not become a member of the commission until August 1999 — almost two years after the district’s boundaries were drawn up. He said his questions have been answered, but he doesn’t plan to withdraw his request for an investigation.

“I’m perfectly willing to believe she had nothing to do with it,” Novy said. “But I’ll let the board come to its own conclusions.”

Heidt said she was “totally infuriated” that Novy had taken the issue to the Ethics Board because she said he knew she had nothing to do with the boundaries. She said she was especially dismayed that he had chosen not to withdraw the complaint and had never sent her a letter of apology.

“When you’re in real estate, your ethics are all you have,” Heidt said. “People like to believe certain things about real estate agents. He’s just trying to undermine my career.”

Heidt was one of the three Coldwell Banker agents handling the sale of condominium units in a building constructed at 1935 Sherman Ave. The Northwestern Hillel Center was located at that site until March 1999 and the property is part of a two-block area adjacent to, but excluded from, the district.

The boundaries for the district were set in December 1997, said Judy Fiske, a Northeast Evanston Historic District Association board member who helped draft the proposal to have the district named to the National Register of Historic Places.

Fiske and the four other association board members spent more than two years researching and documenting the architectural and social history of the area, a project that culminated in the district’s August 1999 listing on the National Register.

“To say that she influenced the boundaries two years (before she joined the commission) would be absurd,” Fiske said.

Mary McWilliams, another NEHDA board member who helped draft the proposal, said the state didn’t include the two Sherman Avenue blocks because many of the buildings were less than 50 years old and were multi-family dwellings. She said single-family homes — the type the historic district aimed to preserve — were in the minority on those blocks.

McWilliams said Heidt did not influence the establishment of the boundaries in any way.

“She had nothing whatsoever to do with the decision,” McWilliams said. “At that point I didn’t even know the woman.”

Novy said his concerns about Heidt’s participation could have been resolved in the spring, when at a public meeting about the district he asked why the two blocks were excluded. He said an association board member told him the state set the district’s boundaries but didn’t explain that Heidt was not a member of the commission at that time.

John Chatz, chairman of the Board of Ethics, was the only member to vote against investigating Novy’s questions. Chatz said he didn’t think Novy “made even the minimum case to suggest a violation of the ethics ordinance.”

But he said he understood the other board member’s decision to look further into the case.

“I think the board just wanted to get as much information as possible to make an informed decision.”

Fiske said the whole situation was “absolutely just a scandal.” She said it was unfortunate that Heidt was being attacked for something she had no control over.

“This is the Evanstonians for Responsible Preservation doing mischief,” she said. “It’s nothing short of that.”