Evanston Action Coalition

09/19/2026

$74.85 million. 110 apartments. Two City properties. Nearly $48 million in tax-credit equity.

Evanstonians didn’t see it.

When Evanston selected Celadon for Harley Clarke, the public story was a roughly $29.3 million “private investment” to rehabilitate the mansion as a boutique hotel and event venue.

Even that financing model included $9.7 million in equity generated through federal and Illinois historic tax credits—public tax subsidies equal to roughly one-third of the modeled capital stack.

Behind the redactions, however, was something considerably bigger: a separately modeled development scenario pairing Harley Clarke with Evanston’s Civic Center at 2100 Ridge Avenue.

That approximately $74.85 million alternative included 110 low-income apartments, a $6 million acquisition assumption, detailed rents and development schedules—and nearly $48 million from federal and state tax-credit programs, approximately 64% of its proposed sources.

None of this means City Council secretly approved redevelopment of the Civic Center. It didn’t.

The question is different: Why did the public version disclose the Harley Clarke proposal while not disclosing the existence and scope of this second, developed—and heavily tax-credit-financed—alternative?

Part Four examines exactly what Council and the public were told, what was behind the redactions, and what the records now show.

Read “Part Four: What Council and the Public Were Told” in Evanston Action's Newsroom.

When Evanston selected Celadon to negotiate a Harley Clarke lease, residents were presented with a $29.3 million rehabilitation plan. The same proposal contained a developed $74.85 million alternative pairing the mansion with the Civic Center—an option absent from the public copy and later describ...

09/08/2026

Part Three is now live.

What was actually behind the redactions in Celadon’s Harley Clarke submission?

The answer goes well beyond isolated financial figures.

The unredacted records reveal an alternative development plan involving the Evanston Civic Center, substantial public financing, and a projected development cost per housing unit significantly above the prices of many existing market-rate condominiums in Evanston.

These were not trivial details. They help show the scale, cost, and implications of what Celadon was proposing — information the public could not see while the Harley Clarke proposal was moving forward.

Read Part Three in the Evanston Action Coalition Newsroom:

The redactions concealed more than financial details. Part Three examines what was actually behind the black boxes — including Celadon’s alternative development plans for the Civic Center, the projected public financing involved, and other material the public could not see when the Harley Clarke...

09/06/2026

On March 10, 2025, Evanston resident Margaret “Meg” Welch warned the City Council that the public had been given a heavily redacted version of Celadon’s Harley Clarke proposal — with entire pages blacked out — and urged Council to delay action.

EAC’s subsequent review of the records shows why those redactions compromised public understanding.

Among the concealed material were details connecting Celadon’s Harley Clarke proposal to a much larger 110 low income unit development concept involving another major City-owned property: the Lorraine H. Morton Civic Center at 2100 Ridge Avenue.

Welch’s warning is now an important part of the documentary record.

Watch her March 10 public comment.

Then read Part Two: What Was Withheld From the Public Record in the Evanston Action Coalition Newsroom.

09/05/2026

Part Two of our investigation is now live.

In Part One, we examined what Celadon actually submitted for Harley Clarke — including the alternative development concept that paired Harley Clarke with Evanston’s Civic Center at 2100 Ridge Avenue in a single transaction for 110 units of low income housing.

Part Two asks a different question: What was withheld from the public record?

Evanston Action Coalition has reviewed multiple versions of Celadon’s 259-page submission, including an earlier redacted copy, the version later released by the City, and a substantially unredacted copy.

Our comparison found that the later City-disclosed version contained three additional redactions not present in the earlier copy. All three concealed references identifying the Evanston Civic Center from Celadon’s combined Harley Clarke–Civic Center financial materials.

We also examine the City’s explanations for the redactions, the legal challenges to them, and the still-unresolved question of exactly what members of the City Council were provided before the Harley Clarke lease moved forward.

Part One generated a tremendous amount of interest and discussion. We appreciate everyone who took the time to read it, share it, and dig into the underlying records with us.

Read Part Two in the Evanston Action Coalition Newsroom:

A forensic comparison of Celadon’s 259-page Harley Clarke submission shows that the public record was materially incomplete — including three additional City-only redactions that concealed references to the Evanston Civic Center. Part Two examines what was withheld, the City’s explanations for...

09/03/2026

We’ve published the first installment in Evanston Action Coalition’s investigation into Putting Assets to Work, the future of Evanston’s Civic Center at 2100 Ridge Avenue, and the related redevelopment of Harley Clarke.

Part One begins with a significant discovery in Celadon’s May 2024 Harley Clarke proposal.

The submission contained more than the $29.3 million hotel-and-event redevelopment later presented publicly. It also included a separately developed 110-unit low-income housing proposal that would have combined Harley Clarke with the Evanston Civic Center at 2100 Ridge Avenue in a single transaction.

We examine what Celadon actually submitted, how far that combined project had already been developed, and how it intersects with the broader Putting Assets to Work process that followed.

This is the first installment in a larger series examining the documents, timelines and decisions surrounding these publicly owned properties.

Read the full piece in the Evanston Action Coalition Newsroom.

Celadon’s May 2024 proposal for Harley Clarke contained far more than the $29.3 million hotel-and-event redevelopment later presented publicly. The full submission also included a separately developed 110-unit low-income housing plan combining Harley Clarke with Evanston’s Civic Center at 2100 R...

08/31/2026

Evanston’s proposed repeal of its panhandling ordinance is back before the City Council — and newly obtained public records raise important questions about who helped shape the proposal before it reached public review.

The constitutional issue is genuine. Evanston has legitimate First Amendment reasons to remove or rewrite provisions of its existing panhandling law.

Our review of City records also found something residents should know.

Months before the proposal reached a public committee, City staff was working directly with the ACLU of Illinois, Chicago Coalition to End Homelessness, and People’s Law Office on more than legal analysis. All three organizations approach the issue from a broadly similar perspective centered on homelessness advocacy and protections for people engaged in solicitation.

The organizations reviewed draft ordinance language, proposed legislative findings, suggested ways to answer anticipated objections from the public and discussed how repeal could be presented.

The correspondence went further. City staff specifically asked the advocates for examples of the federal government “weaponizing panhandling ordinances specifically.” The advocates subsequently supplied an argument that removing homelessness-related ordinances could help insulate Evanston against federal enforcement or “militarization.” Similar language later appeared in the proposed ordinance’s legislative findings.

When the proposal formally entered the legislative process, those three organizations were the outside groups City Hall identified as the “relevant stakeholders” already involved.

The City now says businesses, residents and other affected parties were also consulted. It has not identified most of those participants or explained when they were consulted, what they were shown, what concerns they raised or whether their feedback changed the ordinance.

Residents and merchants can support First Amendment protections while also expecting clear, enforceable rules against intimidation, obstruction, trespassing, unwanted touching and other genuinely disruptive conduct. The records raise a straightforward process question: did City Hall seek comparably meaningful input from people approaching the issue from other perspectives while the policy was still being developed?

There has been one meaningful improvement since the proposal was first considered in February: City staff has now produced a detailed crosswalk explaining which existing laws could address some of those behaviors after repeal.

Before final action, important questions remain — including whether police evaluated that replacement framework, whether businesses and residents had a meaningful role while the policy was actually being developed, and why the panhandling repeal remains packaged together with separate changes to Evanston’s commercial peddling laws.

Our new report examines the FOIA records, the constitutional issues, the six-month delay and what the City Council can still ask before voting.

Read the full investigation with resources from Evanston Action Coalition in our newsroom.

FOIA records and City statements show repeal advocates helped shape Evanston’s panhandling repeal, its legislative findings and the public case for eliminating the ordinance.

08/30/2026

If PAW was genuinely supposed to determine what should happen to the Civic Center, why were a developer and City staff already talking as if there would be a future redevelopment RFP?

Newly reviewed public records show Scott Henry of Celadon discussing how the financing model used for Harley Clarke would also be used for the Civic Center “if we are the selected developer during the RFP process.”

That is difficult to square with the public understanding that Putting Assets to Work was still evaluating whether Civic Center, Noyes Cultural Arts Center, and the Evanston Police and Fire HQ should be redeveloped at all, and what their future uses should be.

The records do not prove that a redevelopment decision had already been made. In fact, City Manager Luke Stowe later declined to sign a Celadon-requested financing consent because PAW was still unfinished and City Council had not provided direction.

But that makes the discrepancy more important, not less: why were developer-selection, financing and redevelopment discussions already underway before the public process had answered the threshold question?

Read our investigation and the underlying records in our newsroom.

Newly obtained public records show Celadon was seeking City assistance to position an adaptive-reuse project at Evanston’s former Civic Center for tax-credit financing weeks before its proposal appeared in the public Putting Assets to Work process—raising new questions about what was happening b...

08/29/2026

What was happening behind the scenes while Evanston residents were participating in Putting Assets to Work?

Newly obtained City records show that weeks before Celadon Partners and Scott Henry publicly submitted their low income assisted-living proposal for 2100 Ridge Avenue, the Wilmette-based developer was already discussing the Civic Center with City staff and seeking City assistance to position the project for tax-credit financing.

Staff prepared and revised the requested consent letter. City Manager Luke Stowe ultimately declined to sign it because, in his words, there was still "much more work to do on the PAW process" and Council had not provided direction.

The records also show Celadon's lobbyist, former Chicago alderman Joe Moore, later asking whether "Scott Henry's group" could take a private assessment tour. Economic Development Manager Paul Zalmezak rejected that request, writing that he wanted to "keep process clean" and didn't think a private tour would be fair.

On August 18, EAC sent Luke Stowe, Sarah Flax, and Paul Zalmezak eleven specific questions about these communications, what PAW consultants knew, what comparable opportunities were offered to others, and what safeguards would protect a future competitive process.

City staff have not responded.

We've published the complete chronology, source records, and unanswered questions. Residents are highly encouraged to read the newsroom article and express their views to their respective alders.

Public participation only works when the public has the same basic understanding of the process as the people administering it.

Newly obtained public records show Celadon was seeking City assistance to position an adaptive-reuse project at Evanston’s former Civic Center for tax-credit financing weeks before its proposal appeared in the public Putting Assets to Work process—raising new questions about what was happening b...

07/31/2026

Renovating 2100 Ridge deserves a serious look.

EAC has published a 2025 rough estimate from Redmond Construction placing a partial renovation of the former Civic Center at approximately $20–25 million. The estimate includes HVAC, plumbing, electrical and ADA upgrades, along with improvements to major interior areas.

Redmond also concluded that most or all City operations could fit within roughly three-quarters of the building—potentially leaving an entire floor for another civic, nonprofit or revenue-producing use.

This is a preliminary estimate, not a final construction bid. But it is concrete evidence that renovation is a credible option and should be fairly compared with continued leasing, demolition, new construction and the permanent loss of this publicly owned site.

Read the estimate and EAC’s analysis via the link. Then support EAC’s proposal, A Complete Civic Campus at 2100 Ridge, on Evanston PAW.

A written estimate from Redmond Construction supports treating renovation of Evanston’s former Civic Center as a serious option. The firm estimated a partial modernization at $20–25 million and found that most or all City operations could fit within roughly three-quarters of the building.

07/08/2026

We have momentum on Evanston PAW, and voting could close at any time.

If you support keeping the Civic Center site publicly owned, preserving the historic Marywood Academy building, improving Ingraham Park, and creating a true Civic Campus for city services, public safety, open space, and community use, please take a moment to vote for EAC’s idea and leave a supportive comment.

Every vote and constructive comment helps show that Evanston residents want this land kept public and used for the public good.

Link to PAW via our website below:

EAC’s vision for a renewed 2100 Ridge Civic Campus: restore Marywood Academy, modernize public safety, and protect Ingraham Park.