Northfield giving land back decades after annexation gave village out-of-town parcels

A land annexation that happened more than 40 years ago and led to Northfield owning property outside of its borders is being rectified, with that land returning to the Village of Northbrook.

The fix to transfer parcels that Village Attorney Mallory Milluzzi said were “incorrectly part of Northfield” to the neighboring Village of Northbrook received a unanimous vote by Northfield trustees on Tuesday, Sept. 17, to “disconnect” the boundaries.

In a memo to the Village Board, Melissa Jewett, Northfield’s director of administrative services, wrote that in preparation for the upcoming Skokie Valley Trail project, village engineers discovered an issue with ownership and annexation of the northern portions of the project from Astor Place to Voltz Road.

The Skokie Valley Trail is planned to be constructed along abandoned railroad tracks that run through several North Shore communities, including Northfield and Wilmette.

It was eventually discovered that, in 1983, Chicago and Northwestern Railroad deeded the ownership of three parcels of land to Northfield. The northern parcel, according to the memo, “is located within the Village of Northfield but is not contiguous to Northfield’s borders,” while the second parcel is physically located in the Village of Northbrook.

“Staff has discussed this complication with Northbrook, who has agreed to accept ownership of the land, as well as construction and maintenance of the future (Skokie Valley Trail) planned for those segments,” the memo stated. “This change would bring Northbrook to the table as an additional partner community supporting the planned trail.”

Milluzzi told trustees that Tuesday’s vote was the second step in a multi-step process that will eventually transfer the land to Northbrook.

At the August meeting, trustees approved an intergovernmental agreement with Northbrook as the first step.

“Now, this is the ordinance granting and disconnecting (the northern parcel) from the Village of Northfield,” she said. “The next step would be Northbrook annexing that parcel, and likely at the next meeting is when we’ll have an IGA transferring those parcels to the Village of Northbrook.”

During the August meeting, Milluzzi said that finding the legal record for who owned the parcels of land was a challenge, with Village President Greg Lungmus adding, “It’s interesting how we ended up with this.” 

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