Palos Park Mayor Nicole Milovich-Walters told audience members some things they liked to hear.
She also told them some things they didn’t like to hear.
But when she was done issuing her 2026 State of the Village Address on May 13, more than 100 people at the Kaptur Center gave her a standing ovation.
Milovich-Walters was elected in April 2023 and this is the first time she held a standalone address. In the past, she has used video as well as making the address at village council meetings.
This year, the mayor tackled the good and the bad in addressing a wide array of topics about what’s happening in Palos Park with her bottom line being keeping the community quaint.
“What we all love about Palos Park is that it feels so small-town and you feel like you are in this little neighborhood where you know everyone,” she said. “And we want to maintain that.”
But that neighborhood can get a little noisy. In recent years, traffic noise and speeding have become a bigger burden and those living near busy LaGrange Road are nearing the brunt of it.
“That route has changed over the years,” she said of LaGrange Road. “It’s grown and the speeds have increased. Since it is a state roadway, it means the village does not control the speed. We don’t repair the road. We are not in charge of traffic signals.
“Mind you, we have e-mailed IDOT with suggestions and ideas over and over again of maybe reconfiguring the road or changing the speed limit and their professionals study it to see if the road is good the way it is or not.”
Milovich-Walters said the road gets more than 33,000 cars a day but that the village can only control a one-mile stretch.
“We keep increasing our visibility on LaGrange Road,” she said. “Our police department is out there daily. We have one-mile from Route 83 to 131st. That is all that is in the limits of the Village of Palos Park.”
Despite an ill-fated attempt to put a decoy police car on a median to try to put a scare into speeders, the village has been issuing tickets.
The mayor said from Jan. 1 through March 31, 300 negligent speeding tickets were issued and she compared it to much-larger Orland Park, which wrote up 74 in that timeframe. Palos Park also wrote up tickets to those with loud mufflers in those three months.
“We’re not looking to make money off the tickets, we just want people to observe the speed limits and maybe to try not to rev their engine,” Milovich-Walters said.
Another thorny subject is rising property taxes.
Milovich-Walters said there wasn’t much the village could do about that and that a miniscule amount of money from those taxes goes to the village.
“Of every dollar you pay, 7 cents comes to the village,” she said. “That’s the reality of it. Sixty-two cents go to the schools and 13% goes to the fire district. And 18% gets broken down into Moraine Valley, the forest preserves, Cook County and the library.
“But, don’t fret, we are fiscally sound. We require 25% of our general fund for reserves for emergencies. But we have 45%.”
She said that having an abundance of reserves came in handy when the pandemic hit in 2020 and the village did not shut down or cut services.
Looking ahead, Milovich-Walters said the village continues to move forward with western expansion with a master plan to bring in housing and commercial uses in the Bell Road area.
A new Recreation Foundation has been established this year for more development on outdoor recreation facilities and activities.
Milovich-Walters added that she wants to keep the character of the community intact while “thoughtfully panning for its future.”
“Palos Park is strong not just because of its government, but because of its people,” she said. “Thank you for your continued trust, your involvement and your pride in this place we all call home.”