Will County Gazette

In the past few weeks, residents of Will County, Illinois have witnessed important developments in a 5-year-long saga of the development of Compass Business Park, a plan that may upend the lives of families in several of its working-class communities. The $1.5 billion development is one of the latest efforts to capitalize on America’s largest inland port located in the heart of our region.  

Over the last year, I have gotten to know the residents of this region and hear their concerns about how this project will impact their community. As I have supported and prayed for these working families engaged in a struggle to gain a voice in a process that has been dictated to them by powerful politicians and large corporations, I am reminded of a similar struggle that played out in the Englewood neighborhood of Chicago when I was transitioning into pastoral ministry there.

Englewood is a working-class community on the South Side of the city of Chicago. It was a destination for many Black Americans arriving from the South during the Great Migration of the mid-20th century. Homes, wealth, and memories have been handed down from generation to generation. Despite decades of redlining, divestment, and the 2008 foreclosure crisis, nearly half of families owned their homes outright when I began my preaching ministry in that community. But the families and all they had built there were under threat of the expansion of a nearby freight yard. The local politicians worked with the corporation and excluded the voices of residents. In the end, despite our organizing and struggle, familial streets with lifelong connections were razed or left empty to make way for concrete and railway cars. 

On May 17th, the Joliet City Council approved developer NorthPoint Development’s plan to start building a 2,300-acre industrial park. The plat represents part of NorthPoint’s plan to create Compass Business Park, one of the largest industrial developments in the nation at 3,800 acres.

Just as with the Norfolk Southern expansion in Englewood, the Will County project has moved forward with little to no input from the residents whose lives stand to be upended. The development plan has drawn the approval of Illinois political elites from US Congressman Bobby Rush to US Senator Dick Durbin, who praised Compass’s potential to “create thousands of jobs”. The project’s website echoes this optimism, predicting the creation of a total of 66,000 new jobs and the generation of $32 billion for the local economy within a decade.

But I have listened to town hearings where not a single local resident supported the project, instead voicing concerns about the 16,000 new trucks that it will add to the area’s already-overburdened roads. “I have small children,” said one mom at an April hearing. “There’s so much traffic as it is already.” Local residents have asked for an environmental impact report on this project for years; they have yet to receive one. And county board member Rachel Ventura noted that the developer still has not looked at Moving Will County Forward, a study written by local researchers detailing the changes in the area’s road infrastructure that would be necessary for its truck routes to be appropriate for its residents.

The residents of Will County are not being displaced like the families I worked with in Englewood, but they are having their way of life disrupted. In both cases, corporations and elected officials have overlooked the importance of the deep connection between families, communities, and the places they call home. 

For too many, “creating jobs'' or “boosting economic output” has become more important than making sure that families are secure and able to flourish holistically. Jobs are important. But the families living near Compass recognize that the jobs this development will bring are disproportionately low-paying, low-security, and likely to be replaced by automation. The promised “improvement” is simply not worth the wholesale displacement of a community’s way of life.

Empowering their community means more than the dollar signs that developers like NorthPoint see in the Compass project. “We moved out here,” said one Jackson Township resident, “because we didn’t want to see concrete; we wanted to be safe. We wanted to feel like we had something to look forward to and to have our kids grow up in a safe area.” Will County is a place where families go to create a legacy, to build fellowship and lifelong friendships with fellow residents, to plant faith groups and community organizations. Its residents need to see these aspects of their hometowns preserved even as their economies grow and develop.

I have long argued for a humanity-centered approach to economic development. Our markets should serve our families, not the other way around. When families are forced to sacrifice their and their children’s health, safety, and livelihood for some abstract notion of economic stimulation, we can’t honestly say that our well-being has improved. Holistic community development considers the community’s culture and character, its small businesses and family establishments. Economic growth cannot come at the expense of these factors. That’s what the Will County residents want NorthPoint and its proponents to know.

For opponents of this project, last month’s defeat is not the end. Just Say No to NorthPoint, for example, is confident that with the numerous lawsuits against NorthPoint, residents will ultimately win out. Still, this community deserves supporters in this fight – leaders who will truly put their families first. Our nation's leadership must rally around their efforts to protect their families and towns. And across the country, we must learn to put the “community” back in community development.

– Chris Butler is a democratic Party candidate for Illinois 1st Congressional District