Religious group wants to remove land from South Barrington so it can build church, school

Members of a religious group seeking to build a church and school in South Barrington say they’ve grown tired of bureaucratic delays and want their property excised from the village.

In an open letter comprising a full-page advertisement in Wednesday’s Daily Herald, Schaumburg-based Fourth Avenue Gospel announced it’s pursuing disconnection of the land through the Cook County court system. If approved, the group intends to develop the property under Cook County’s zoning rules, the letter states.

“This is an extraordinary step, but we have no choice,” the letter reads. “Even though the property’s zoning allows for a church and a school, we have found ourselves stuck in the morass of South Barrington Village politics.”

Fourth Avenue filed a formal petition for disconnection from South Barrington on Tuesday, documents indicate. South Barrington officials learned of the maneuver through the newspaper ad.

“We will certainly review any legal documents the church files in pursuit of de-annexation once they are received by us,” Mayor Paula McCombie said in a prepared statement. “We will not negotiate this matter in the media.”

The fight centers on an undeveloped, 34-acre site at Bartlett Road and Route 59, often called Area N. Fourth Avenue’s letter, which also can be read at futureofarean.com, includes an incorrect size estimate for the land.

The property, which is just north of the Woods of South Barrington neighborhood, is zoned as a planned unit development and designated as parkland. To build a church and school, Fourth Avenue needs the village board to amend the development plan.

Fourth Avenue Gospel, which is owned and operated by a congregation of the Plymouth Brethren Christian Church, bought the land from the South Barrington Park District at an auction earlier this year for $2.3 million.

Fourth Avenue created a limited liability company called Area N Development to bid on the land and close the purchase. A representative later said the group used that legal entity to avoid publicly identifying itself as the buyer until after the deal was finalized.

That was the second time Fourth Avenue Gospel won an auction for the land. It first did so in May 2023.

Fourth Avenue was the only bidder at the first auction. But the park district board canceled the sale before a scheduled real estate closing because of community opposition to how the auction was run as well as concerns about the project and some of the church’s practices.

After the second auction, a group of those opponents sued the park district over the deal, claiming it was improper because the board approved a bid after the first auction. The plaintiffs also alleged Area N Development shouldn’t have been allowed to buy the property via the second auction because park district officials didn’t know the buyer’s real identity.

To build a church and school, Fourth Avenue needs the village board to amend a development plan for the land. The village’s plan commission was scheduled to resume a public hearing on the proposal Wednesday night.

But the question of who owns the property must be resolved before village officials can move forward on the redevelopment request, McCombie has said.

Fourth Avenue members are done waiting. They titled the open letter in Wednesday’s newspaper “Why We Have to Leave South Barrington.”

“That litigation became an excuse for the Village to delay progress on our approvals,” the letter reads. “Those delays that started as weeks then turned into months and now look like years.”

Fourth Avenue hopes to take the same path as Allstate, which successfully fought for the disconnection of its former Higgins Road campus from South Barrington this summer ahead of a possible redevelopment.

Fourth Avenue members insist they’ll be good neighbors to South Barrington residents.

“We just won’t be part of the village,” the letter concludes.

In her prepared statement, McCombie said village officials have been committed to “an open, fair, and transparent process for the project at Area N from the outset.” She noted the village has hosted numerous public hearings on the issue.

“Our goal has always been to follow the law and protect the interests of our community,” McCombie said. “We will continue to enforce all legal requirements to protect the health, safety, welfare, and morals of the Village of South Barrington and its residents.”