COD: Glen Ellyn’s actions ‘incomprehensible’
A day after Glen Ellyn village attorneys filed a motion seeking “injunctive relief” to prohibit the College of DuPage from opening four new buildings without occupancy permits, school officials called the move “incomprehensible.”
“The village’s latest action affirms that their concern is not as they have publicly stated, the health, welfare and safety of people connected to the college,” COD President Robert Brueder said in a statement. “Rather it is simply about power and control.”
College and village officials met on campus Tuesday to discuss inspection reports completed by third-party architects and engineers hired by the college, which maintains the inspectors are qualified and the buildings meet or exceed standards. The village has argued the college’s inspection process isn’t the same as the village’s.
Still, village leaders have said they’re willing to issue certificates of occupancy after meeting with inspectors to verify that buildings were constructed to code.
But should those talks fall through, the village has said it would take legal action to prohibit occupancy of the buildings. The legal “pleadings” filed Wednesday give village attorneys a pathway to seek such an injunction.
College officials said the village never informed them during their Tuesday meeting about the court action.
“The village says in public that they are attempting to find a cooperative resolution, but does this sound like a cooperative approach?” COD board Chairman David Carlin said in a statement. “On the same day they met with the college, they filed in court to prevent our state-of-the-art teaching and learning facilities from opening.”
The college says it gave village inspectors a tour Tuesday of the college’s soon-to-be completed Homeland Security Center, Culinary & Hospitality Center, and renovations and additions to the Berg Instructional Center. A college news release characterized village officials’ opinions of the construction standards to be “exemplary.”
“At the end of the day, the village officials who went on the tour felt the buildings were well constructed, exceeding the standards used by others in the village,” Brueder said.
The college plans to open the buildings in August.