With awards and more, Oak Park Development
celebrates business in 1999

By ERIC LINDEN

With a touching tribute to a fallen leader, news of a major development
expansion on North Avenue, the annual Nicholas Awards for business
development, a nod to improvements in the Southtown Oak Park business
district and other activities, the Oak Park Development Corporation
celebrated at its annual meeting on Leap Day this year.

As usually happens at the OPDC meeting, more than 200 business, civic
and government officials met to hear reports on the previous year in Oak
Park business and then to watch the Nicholas Awards presentations. Those
awards, named for Robert Nicholas one of the early developers in Oak
Park a century ago, are given out to businesses that make "significant
commitments to the economic well being of the community," according to
OPDC.

The 2000 annual meeting was held Feb. 29 at Old Kent Bank, which last
year purchased Pinnacle Bank/Oak Park and moved into the Oak Park
location at 840 S. Oak Park Ave. Due to a licensing snafu, plans were
scrapped to hold a pre-meeting reception at The Ale House, a restaurant
to open next month across the street in the long-vacant former
Blackstone building at 825 S. Oak Park Ave.

The tribute near the start of the annual meeting was for the late Arthur
S. Replogle, who was the founding president of OPDC from 1974 until his
retirement in 1997. Replogle died last July after suffering a heart
attack while playing tennis on vacation in Wisconsin.

After universally positive reports on the business climate in Oak Park,
the evening's highlight was the Nicholas Awards, which went to the
following businesses or developments, in alphabetical order.

** The Economy Shop, 103 S. Grove Ave.
Operating out of a restored painted lady house, the Economy Shop sells
donated merchandise to benefit several local charities, including
Hephzibah Children's Association, the Oak Park-River Forest Day Nursery,
the Senior Citizens' Center of Oak Park and River Forest, Family Service
and Mental Health Center of Oak Park and River Forest and the clinics
run by the Infant Welfare Society of Oak Park and River Forest and by
West Suburban Hospital Medical Center in Oak Park. The Nicholas Award
went for the exterior work done on the Economy Shop last year.

** Fenwick High School, 505 Washington Blvd.
The Dominican high school in 1999 completed a $12.1 million renovation
and expansion that included a new library, gymnasium, swimming pool,
multi-purpose athletic facility and improvements for accessibility to
disabled persons.

** Flat Top Grill, 726 Lake St.
The stir-fry restaurant open for lunch and dinner, which has other
locations in Chicago, opened in Oak Park last year in a space occupied
for many years by Las Fuentes Mexican restaurant.

** Foley-Rice Collision Shop, 639 Madison St.
After the building's roof trusses collapsed from the heavy snowfall in
January 1999, the Oak Park-based Foley-Rice Cadillac & Oldsmobile
dealership spent $650,000 to rebuild a new steel-framed structure for
the collision shop. The move gives Foley-Rice, which has its main
showroom at 711 Madison St., operating businesses and parking lots on
2.2 acres on Madison Street.

** Jewel Foods--Oak Park Market, 438 Madison St.
An oft-criticized grocery store was remodeled last year into a prototype
Jewel-Osco that includes an upgraded Jewel store, drive-up pharmacy and
other new features.

** The McCarthy Building, 7053 W. North Ave.
Housing the Oak Park Eye Center business, the building gained $400,000
in improvements that brought about more medical space and exterior
design improvements.

** Penzeys Spices, 1138 Lake St.
Moving into a Downtown Oak Park space occupied previously by the
Nautilus activity and fitness centers and for about 50 years prior to
that by a Woolworth & Co. discount store, Penzeys, a Wisconsin-based
company that started with catalog sales, now offers some 250 varieties
of spices, herbs and seasonings in Oak Park. The Oak Park location is
the company's first retail spot in Illinois and fourth overall.

** The Pot You Paint, 121 N. Marion St.
The business in the high-profile location offers pottery for purchase by
customers, who can also at the store paint the pottery themselves. Store
owner Kerri Ebert said, "The Pot You Paint found its niche in a
community that appreciates art in many forms."

** Schafer, 830 North Blvd.
Taking a space once occupied by a House of Teak furniture warehouse,
business owner Robert Schafer relocated his graphics and design firm
from Oak Brook to a building that then was renovated. A staff of 60 now
operates out of the Oak Park location.

** Scoville Block Number One, southeast corner of 
Oak Park Avenue and Lake Street
After the Springers Office Supply business left and two levels in the
building became vacant, owners James and Noreen Bushouse worked with the
Oak Park commercial real estate firm David King & Associates to divide
the space and attract seven new tenants: Papaspiros Greek Taverna
restaurant, Alternative Fitness Center, Oberweis Dairy, Wolf Camera &
Video, Victor Shade Company and Hourglass Antiques.

** United Cerebral Palsy--Levinson Center, 332 Harrison St.
A part of Harrison Street for more than 20 years, the center last year
undertook a $300,000 renovation of the facility, where the staff works
to integrate persons with disabilities into community life.

The final Nicholas Award for business activity in the 20th century then
went to the Southtown Business Association, owners of property in that
business district at and around Oak Park Avenue and the Eisenhower
Expressway and village government. Those parties worked together to
bring a new streetcaping package that is designed to bolster the
business district.

The package worked out among the parties saw property owners voting to
increase their property taxes to fund new sidewalks, street furniture,
landscaping, lighting and other improvements to the business district.
The project, OPDC said in an announcement, "has had and will continue to
have, a positive impact on the economic development of this area."

Among other business news to report at the OPDC annual meeting was the
upcoming expansion of The Charter One at St. Paul facility at 6700 W.
North Ave. in Chicago across from Oak Park. Officials at Charter One,
which last year purchased the large St. Paul thrift, said the Ohio-based
company would  keep and expand the corporate office on North Avenue. The
expansion would take four or five months to complete, it was said, and
would bring an estimated 100 new jobs to the location adjacent to Oak
Park.

In an extensive history of civic involvement in Oak Park, Replogle
served on the board of Oak Park and River Forest High School and
countless other agencies in both villages. He became known in later
years for his annual impersonation of "Oak Park Ernie" at events to mark
the life of author Ernest Hemingway in Oak Park.

"Art truly was a remarkable person," said John Eckenroad, who succeeded
Replogle as OPDC president and holds the position today.

"Art was Oak Park's and OPDC's best cheerleader," said Martin Noll, the
president of Community Bank of Oak Park River Forest who is chairman of
the OPDC board of directors.

Those comments and others were followed by a slide presentation in honor
of Replogle that was put together and narrated by OPDC vice president
Sara Rickert.

In another development note, Rickert said OPDC was instrumental last
year in ongoing or coming improvements to the commercial and residential
building at 300 Madison St.; to the Walgreen's store at 6412 W.
Roosevelt Road; to the southwest corner of North Avenue and Austin
Boulevard, in what is now commercial property owned by First Bank of Oak
Park; and to the offices at 101 Madison St., which Rickert said had been
acknowledged as "the ugliest building in town."