The Village is hosting a community forum on affordable housing and the role of private landlords in assisting unhoused individuals from 6:30 to 8:30 p.m. on Monday, Dec. 18 at the Oak Park Public Library. Subject-matter experts will aim to help attendees better understand the unhoused crisis, while looking at the roles of landlords and agencies such as Housing Forward in identifying solutions. Participating panelists for include Kristin Faust, Executive Director of the Illinois Housing Development Authority, David Pope, Oak Park Residence Coroporation Executive Director, Perry Vietti, Interfath Housing Development Corporation President, Patricia Stokes from Housing Forward and Jeff Prior, Village of Oak Park Neighborhood Services Manager. The group will highlight success stories and review support services that are available to tenants. There will also be a Q&A portion during the forum. More information is available at www.oak-park.us/unhoused.

The Village, in partnership with UIC Great Cities Institute, is conducting a Racial Equity Needs Assessment for Oak Park and seeking a broad range of voices to provide community input. The assessment can be most comprehensive when people of all backgrounds, experiences, ages and circumstances participate. As part of that, a survey is available that asks all Oak Park residents for their insights and perceptions of racial equity in Oak Park. The survey should take about 15 minutes to complete. At the end of the survey, you can provide your phone or email to enter a raffle to win one of several $50 gift cards. Take the survey online at www.oak-park.us/racialequitysurvey. By filling out the survey, you will be directly contributing to the needs assessment and also helping to shape the Village’s racial equity efforts.

The Village is completing its first year participating in the ComEd Strategic Energy Management (SEM) program. The Village’s participation in the program led to the Village receiving a check from the SEM Program in the amount of $63,429. SEM is a utility-sponsored program offered through CLEAResult to help facilities achieve holistic energy savings through no cost/low cost incentive-based measures. The Village achieved significant and measurable energy savings through a reduction in overall building energy usage by successfully completing various impactful projects. These projects include repairing leaking ductwork at the Public Works Center, LED lighting upgrades at the fire stations and Public Works Center, de-lamping efforts and installation of timers on lighting fixtures at the Public Works Center and Village Hall, building automation system (BAS) upgrades at the Public Works Center, and the completion of energy audits at Village Hall, the Public Works Center, main and south fire stations and three water pumping stations. All of these projects in combination with the Village's ongoing focus on sustainability have had a role in strong savings in year one of SEM. Similar efforts throughout 2024 and continued participation in the SEM program could potentially result in more successful outcomes and additional funding that could be used to offset costs related to future building improvement projects.

Through October, the Village has collected $226,428 from the 4% tax that is paid by guests who stay in Oak Park’s local hotel, bed and breakfast and AirBnb-type short-term rentals. This total represents a 16% increase from the same period in 2022 and already marks the highest total of hotel-motel tax payments collected with two months left in the year. The Village’s 115 licensed short-term rental establishments continue to drive the increases. The new data continues to provide a strong indicator that vitality has returned to Oak Park’s hospitality industry and that visits from guests who live outside the community have significantly increased.

As is tradition on major holidays, on-street, overnight parking restrictions will not be enforced on most Oak Park residential streets from 2:30 a.m., Sat., Dec. 16 through the New Year’s holiday. Restrictions will resume at 2:30 a.m., Wed., Jan. 3. Please keep in mind restrictions are not lifted in paid overnight permit areas, including posted on-street zones. All other parking regulations also remain in effect, including daytime restrictions and regulations related to traffic and public safety. More information about parking rules and regulations is posted at www.oak-park.us/parking.

The Development Customer Services Department hosted its second two-hour Codes & Coffee chat this week. Nearly a dozen individuals attended the event, during which Chief Building Official Steve Cutaia presented information about the Village’s new electrification ordinance and discussed other newly adopted building codes. More information about the building electrification ordinance is available at www.engageoakpark.com/electrification.

The Village is seeking community feedback about composting. Residents are encouraged to complete a brief survey at www.engageoakpark.com/community-compost to help Village officials better understand the top composting issues within the community. For more information about the Village’s CompostAble program, visit www.oak-park.us/compost.

The PlanItGreen Leadership Forum is taking place from 3:45 to 5:45 p.m. on Tues., Dec. 19 at the Oak Park Public Library Veterans Room. The forum will feature updates on PlanItGreen and C4 projects, an electrification round table, strategy breakout sessions by topic area and youth engagement.

Forest and Ontario improvements – The construction area near the intersection of Forest Avenue and Ontario Street is shut down for winter. Some electric work will occur as materials are delivered to the site, but the detour will be down for the majority of the winter.

Street resurfacing project – Parkway restoration is complete, and roadway striping and symbols have should be placed by the end of the week at locations where street resurfacing was completed this fall. Bike lane striping will also be added where applicable.

Sewer televising update – The contractor for this year’s sewer televising project focused this week on locations south of the I-290 expressway and will move next week to the north part of town. Partial lane closures are anticipated while work is ongoing. Meanwhile, Nicor’s cross-bore sewer inspection project is expected to conclude this week.