Little more than a year after Northwestern’s request to remove the 1800 Sherman Avenue property from Evanston tax rolls upset many Evanston residents, another Northwestern property purchase is straining town-gown relations.
The purchase of a home at 1945 Orrington Ave. surprised members of the Northwestern University-City Committee, who said Northwestern did not discuss its purchase plans with the committee. Central to the controversy is a disagreement over an interpretation of the results from the 2004 lawsuit that created the committee.
The committee was created in February 2004 after a lawsuit between the university and the city over NU properties the school wanted to remove from the historic district. The group was designed with the intention to increase communication about any plans the school might have to build in a transitional area west of Sheridan Road.
The school can build in the transitional area, zoned T1/T2, but it is still not considered to be zoned exclusively for university use.
Eugene Sunshine, vice president of business and finance for Northwestern, said the lawsuit’s consent decree is “very explicit” about what is expected from the university. The community members of the committee have a different interpretation than the university of the decree’s meaning, he said.
“The issue here is that Bob Atkins and Dave Schoenfeld (community members of the committee) don’t want to focus on following the consent decree,” Sunshine said. “It’s very important to follow the breadth and scope of the decree.”
The language of the consent decree says Northwestern is required to discuss plans for properties Northwestern owned when the arrangement was negotiated, Sunshine said.
“The decree has many features having to do with the historic district, but the committee’s purview only pertains to those certain areas that are then university properties, meaning they were current properties at the time of the consent decree,” he said.
Robert Atkins, one of the committee’s community members, said he asked Sunshine at the committee’s last meeting if there were any plans pursuant to the T1/T2 districts. Sunshine told him there was “nothing new to report,” Atkins said.
Sunshine said he did not remember his answer to questions about the university’s future purchasing plans. But he said those questions would not have been answered because Northwestern did not own the new properties, and so they would not fall under the decree.
Atkins said he and David Schoenfeld, the other community member, wrote a letter to Sunshine asking to hold another committee meeting within the next ten days to discuss the university’s actions, but Sunshine said the meeting is not necessary.
Atkins said Sunshine’s understanding of the agreement does not match his or his neighborhood’s understanding of Northwestern’s responsibility.
“Our understanding is that any property within the (transitional or university-use) zones that Northwestern University owns or is interested in at the time of the meeting should be discussed and falls within the decree,” Atkins said.
The position is unfair to neighbors who have a right to know what the university is planning to do with land in their community, Atkins said.
“This is the first time we’ve heard this position,” he said. “We think that his position is unwarranted and that it violates the letter and spirit of the decree. We think it unduly restricts the matters which Northwestern is required to discuss with the committee.”
Atkins, who brought up the issue at Monday’s Evanston City Council meeting, said the next step is public discussion about whether the city feels Northwestern is acting appropriately.
“I think it’s something the city will have to discuss, and the aldermen will have to discuss, about whether the university has violated the agreement and whether to bring it before the court,” Atkins said.
Sunshine said the committee discussed the proposed expansion to the Searle University Health Service building at its last meeting. Searle also is located in the T1/T2 district, requiring NU to discuss any development plans for the building, he said.
Atkins and Sunshine agree the idea of a joint committee is a positive one. However, different understandings of the decree’s meaning have prevented the committee from achieving its goals.
“The committee is accomplishing things to the spirit and the letter of the consent decree,” Sunshine said. “Some people may have a large view of what the committee should be doing and I urge them to go back and read the consent decree.”
Reach Laura Olson at [email protected].
