New survey open for Sugar Grove residents to sound off on village’s new comprehensive plan

Sugar Grove residents can complete a community survey through July 22 about the village’s new Comprehensive Plan. This current survey is the second of three that have been issued in the planning process.

According to the village’s website, the questions in this survey are focused on collecting community feedback on the plan’s draft themes.

In addition, residents are invited to the second in-person community workshop from 6 to 7 p.m. Wednesday, July 13 at the Sugar Grove Public Library. The last in-person session was in March.

The village is working on the plan, which is expected to be a roadmap for the village for the next 20 or 30 years, said Walter Magdziarz, community development director for the village of Sugar Grove.

The village’s previous plan was adopted in 2006, and Magdziarz said it’s time to update it as much has changed in the past 16 years.

“We’re attempting to address all of the normal and usual things like transportation, housing, open space. But we also want to address issues such as climate change, sustainability, both environmental and fiscal, as well as diversity issues among the population and housing choices,” he said. “Obviously, a lot has changed since 2006. The assumptions and some of the trends [that were] prevalent at that time don’t exist anymore. So we felt it was necessary to completely overhaul the plan to reflect the current state of affairs and what’s going on in the world.”

Sugar Grove has partnered with the Chicago Metropolitan Agency for Planning to create the plan.

According to a plan document from CMAP, the village will explore land use, growth and development; transportation and mobility; quality of life issues; environmental justice; affordable housing; conservation and natural resources; and infrastructure and utilities.

The planning process officially began in October 2021 and will conclude in early 2023. More information about the comprehensive plan, as well as upcoming community workshops and surveys, is available at https://engage.cmap.illinois.gov/sugar-grove.

“At the conclusion of this, what we’ll have is a plan to provide staff and elected officials as to how the community prefers to grow and develop and deal with change,” Magdziarz said. “The plan will be the marching orders. So then staff will be charged with implementing it.”