Gresk: Get Hubble on tax rolls

Wheaton Mayor Mike Gresk said Tuesday he hopes Wheaton Warrenville Unit District 200 sticks to its original plan of getting the old Hubble Middle School site back on the tax rolls and denies any future sale of the site to any not-for-profit groups.

“Any not-for-profit group is going to keep it off the tax rolls,” he said. “I encourage them to remain true to their original premise.”

On Monday, during a live auction for the 22-acre site, only one prospective bidder came forward: the College Preparatory School of America, a Lombard-based Islamic school looking to relocate to a larger facility.

However, the representative did not have a required deposit check and the auction closed with no official bids.

Gresk said the city's financial picture would improve if the site is sold for commercial development. On Monday, a park district plan emerged that would bring a Mariano's Fresh Market grocery store into town on the southeast corner of the property, at Roosevelt and Naperville roads.

“If there is an occasion where the park district can partner up with a community developer, I encourage my friends at the school district to look at it and examine it,” he said.

Although the city has no say in who ultimately buys the property, zoning variation requests would go through the city council.

However, city officials have said in the past that changing the zoning to commercial would most likely pose very little problems.

“It's important to the community, particularly in times of diminishing revenues where we can actually have more control over what we can earn as a city over the next 15 to 20 years,” Gresk said. “It's important that the school district stays true to their original intent.”