Judge sets mid-July deadline for developer to clean up stalled Elgin Memory Care site

The site for the long-stalled Elgin Memory Care development on Route 20 in Elgin must be cleaned up by mid-July, a Kane County judge has ruled.

judge has ruled the long-stalled Elgin Memory Care construction site on the city’s far west side must be cleaned up by mid-July.

Kane County Circuit Court Judge David Akemann signed an order last week mandating that Bright Oaks Group, developers of the Elgin Memory Care facility at Route 20 and Nesler Road, demolish all above-ground structures and remove all materials and equipment stored at the construction site on or before July 15. If the work is not done by that date, the city will have the authority to use developer funds being held in escrow to clean up the site.

Under the order, the foundation and block elevator core can remain for 12 months. But If construction doesn’t restart by July 15, 2019, Elgin can remove what’s left.

Developer Nader Kameli said the court’s ruling was “a joint decision between Elgin Memory Care ownership and the city of Elgin. Since the wood material onsite had been sitting exposed to the elements for too long, the ownership decided that the saving from reuse of material did not outweigh the cost of engineering evaluation and salvage of what is still usable. The intent here is to make sure the material used in the construction is of quality grade and is not in any way questionable, now or in the future.”

Kameli said the plan now is “to take down the wood structure this summer and prepare the site for restart later on this year.”

Elgin Community Development Director Marc Mylott said, “This is a balanced decision that gets the immediate problem taken care of, while allowing the developer to reconstruct with the existing foundation or pursue other options.”

Elgin filed the lawsuit last fall seeking repair or demolition of the partially built senior housing project.

Christine Lopez, who lives on Middleton Court across the street from the project, said the developer broke ground in 2014 and stopped when the weather turned cold.

“It became clear the following spring and summer that progress wasn’t being made,” Lopez said. “For the last three years, we’ve had to deal with a number of issues as a result of the stalled construction. The site has turned into a garbage dump.

“We have, on occasion, seen kids playing in there, which is scary because the structure doesn’t appear to be stable or safe. Given our proximity, we’ve also experienced debris, separated from the framework, pelting our house and littering our property,” she said.

Kameli said several issues contributed to the delay in the Elgin project.

Bright Oaks had been using the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services’ EB-5 program to finance its projects. According to the agency’s website, the program offers green cards for foreign investors who contribute a certain amount of funding for U.S.-based projects and plan to create or preserve 10 full-time jobs for American workers.

“They have stopped adjudication of investors in these projects since 2014. This caused many investors to pull out of the project and go to other projects or other countries,” Kameli said.

The agency and U.S. Securities Exchange Commission tried to to prove fraud in the fundraising process for Bright Oaks projects, but have not been able to do so, he added.

“Even though they have realized that their suspicion was misplaced, they are holding all the investors hostage and therefore, putting a hold on all of these projects,” he said.

Another contributing factor is that since the recession in the mid- and late-2000s, banks and other financial institutions have made it more difficult to borrow money, Kameli said.

Bright Oaks has a 60-unit building in Aurora, and 44 residents now live there, Kameli said. Other projects, including one planned for West Dundee, are ready to go but need financing, he said.

Wood and other debris have been allowed to stagnate on the site of the half-built Elgin Memory Care site since 2014.

http://www.chicagotribune.com/suburbs/elgin-courier-news/news/ct-ecn-elgin-memory-care-update-st-0523-story.html

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• Elgin Memory Care, LLC

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• Illinois