ComEd wants to build the tallest building in Homer Glen

The short version

Homer Glen needs electricity that stays on. The equipment at this power station is more than 50 years old, and ComEd says some of it is worn out. Replacing it is a real need, and Heidi is not asking anyone to cancel this project.

But this is the biggest building the Village has ever been asked to approve, and almost nobody in Homer Glen heard about it. The Village posted one short notice. ComEd held an open house and seven people came. The commissioners who voted on it said they had the plans for six days.

First: what is a substation?

Power plants make electricity far away. To get it to your house, it travels on very big wires at very high voltage. A substation is where those big wires meet. It switches power from one line to another and steps it down so it can keep going toward homes and businesses.

Think of it like a train station. Trains do not get built at the station — they stop there, switch tracks, and head somewhere else. That is what this place does with electricity.

So where does the electricity come from? From many places at once. Nuclear plants make about half the electricity produced in Illinois, more than any other state makes, and the closest one — Braidwood — is right here in Will County. Wind farms, natural gas plants and other sources feed the same grid. One of the power lines that ends at this Bell Road site is actually named for a wind farm. Once it is all on the grid, it mixes together. You cannot point at a wire and say which plant that electricity came from.

Why this spot matters

Nine big power lines end at this one property. Five of them carry 345,000 volts, which is about as high as power lines go. They run toward Blue Island, Bedford Park, East Frankfort, Elwood, and Crawford in Chicago.

That is why ComEd calls it “a critical part of the regional transmission system.” The power crossing this site is not just Homer Glen’s power. ComEd’s project manager told the Plan Commission that the way the station is wired today, one broken piece of equipment could knock out whole transmission lines at once.

What ComEd wants to build

• A main building 58 feet 8 inches tall, about 82 feet wide and 515 feet long — nearly two football fields end to end. It has two floors, about 84,000 square feet inside.
• A second building, 25 feet 9 inches tall, built in two stages.
• A wall 12 feet 6 inches tall around part of the site, made of stone-look block, with a foot of barbed wire on top. Today that edge is mostly mesh fence.
• Taking out 11 power poles and putting up 21 new ones. The old lattice towers get replaced with single poles. Village rules do not cover these — the Village cannot say no to them.
• A bigger stormwater pond, a new driveway off Bell Road, and 158 new trees and 303 shrubs.
• A small rest area at the southeast corner by the bike path, with a bench, a bike rack, a shade structure and a butterfly garden.

The equipment goes inside a building instead of sitting out in the open. ComEd says that protects it from storms and takes up less land than spreading it across a field.

The nine rules it asks to skip

To build this, ComEd needs the Village to make exceptions to nine of its own rules. This is the part almost nobody has seen.

What neighbors actually said

Four written comments were read into the record at the June 18 hearing. Two came from neighbors, two came from county organizations.

A neighbor who lives directly west wrote that the substation’s lights already shine into his yard, that they are not shielded, and that they go past what the code allows at his property line. He said the lighting changed within the last year. He asked the Village to confirm the lighting follows the rules as part of this approval — and said that with that fixed, and with a nicer wall along Bell Road instead of a fence, he had no objection to the expansion.

Another neighbor asked simple questions that still deserve simple answers: does a building this size fit the image of Homer Glen? What happens inside it? What hours? How much traffic, noise and light?

The Will County Center for Economic Development and the Will County Governmental League both wrote in support, saying the upgrade modernizes a 70-year-old facility and makes the grid more reliable, especially during bad storms. At the hearing, a Carpenters Local 174 representative, the business manager of IBEW Local 9 — a 30-year Homer Glen resident — and a retired power plant engineer who also lives here all spoke in favor.

Where Heidi stands

Heidi supports upgrading the grid. She is not asking the Village to reject this project. She is asking for five things, and every one of them comes straight out of the Village’s own record.

• Tell people. One five-sentence notice for the tallest building in town is not enough. Big projects should get real notice, in the newsletter and by mail, before the vote — not after.
• Answer the lighting complaint. A neighbor said in writing that the lights already break the rules at his property line. That should be measured and answered on the record, not folded into an approval.
• Make the conditions stick. The Plan Commission asked for the wall to be extended and for a signed letter from Homer Township before construction staging happens. Those need to be real requirements at the final vote, not good intentions.
• Protect the streets during construction. Trucks would run on Bell Road into 2028. Routes, hours and road repair should be in writing before the first truck rolls.
• Get a straight answer on cost. ComEd’s own two representatives gave different answers about who pays for this in the same meeting. Residents are entitled to one answer.

And when the power goes out

This summer showed why any of this matters. On August 11, 2026, storms knocked out power to about 3,270 Homer Glen customers. Two weeks earlier, on July 27, more than 22,000 Will County customers lost power, and ComEd said some would not be back on for four days.

When the power is out, it is not an inconvenience. It is sump pumps that stop, medicine that needs refrigeration, oxygen machines, traffic lights, garage doors, well pumps, and seniors sitting in the heat with no way to call anybody.

As mayor, Heidi will push for the basics after every major outage:

• A straight answer from ComEd on what failed, how many homes lost power, and how long it took.
• Village updates that actually reach people, including those who are not on Facebook.
• A real plan for seniors and residents who depend on medical equipment during long outages.
• A public follow-up when the same neighborhoods keep going dark.

Questions & answers

How to speak up

Written comments about this case go to the Village’s Planning & Zoning Department at cgruba@homerglenil.org. Reference case HG-2518-SPPUD, 14546 S. Bell Road. Village Board meetings also have a public comment period, and the agendas are posted at homerglenil.org.

Tell us what you think

Two quick questions. There is no right answer to either one — we want to know what Homer Glen actually thinks, and we will share the results.

And the decision itself. These are the same four choices Village staff gave the Plan Commission the night they voted.

Keep me posted

We’ll update this page as the Village Board acts on it.