The Cook County Planning & Zoning Department is working on defining some of its conditions for gravel pit permit renewals after recent inspections resulted in questions about what constituted compliance.
At its December 22 meeting, the county board approved renewal of 11 of 13 permits for gravel pits located throughout the county. One that raised questions was a pit owned by Stan Bautch. Aerial photographs appeared to show mining outside the north boundary of the parcel and mining of more than five acres of the property, a limit imposed by one of the conditions of the permit.
Planning & Zoning Administrator Bill Lane told the board that Bautch said the photograph was taken in the spring before green plants had a chance to establish themselves in the soil. A document outlining the Planning Commission’s recommendations to the county board stated that on December 9, Bautch stated that the definition of “open area” was subjective and that compliance with a condition of their permit that allowed no more than five acres to be open at one time could not be determined. Lane indicated that gravel pit inspections have traditionally been fairly casual and that some of the terms in the conditional use permits were undefined in county ordinance.
One of the two permits not renewed yet was for a county-owned pit near Devil’s Track Lake. Nothing about the pit was called into question. County Engineer Shae Kosmalski simply asked the board to table the permitting process until Russell Klegstad, the new highway maintenance supervisor, is more familiar with the renewal process.
The other permit not renewed yet was for a pit owned by Dean Berglund. Lane told the county board that Berglund had not removed non-combustible materials from the burn pile in his gravel pit as required by the permit and had actually added more non-combustible materials since the 2008 site review, when the Planning & Zoning Department had instructed Berglund to remove them.
Commissioner Jim Johnson said he had spoken to Berglund earlier in the day, and he promised to remove the non-combustible materials.
On December 9, the Planning Commission document states, Shari Baker of the Planning Commission stated that conditions associated with all gravel pit operations needed more uniform standards. The document states, “Commissioner Baker made a motion to approve all renewals except the Berglund pit, to table the Cook County highway pit review until logistically favorable to the new maintenance supervisor, and to encourage the Office of Planning & Zoning to develop comprehensive criteria to assess renewal requests in the future.”
On January 5, Lane said the Planning & Zoning Department is working on defining the terms that have been ambiguous in the gravel pit conditional use permits.
The county board approved the permit for the Bautch pit and postponed considering permit renewals for the Highway Department and the Berglund pit until its first meeting in February.
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