Redesigned Everts Park Dedication Kicks Off Highwood's Festival Season

HIGHWOOD, IL — Local officials last week dedicated a renovated Everts Park at the opening of the 2023 season of Highwood's Wednesday Gourmet Market.

Highwood Mayor Charlie Pecaro, City Manager Scott Coren and Aldermen Eric Falberg, Jim Hospodarsky, Mike Fiore, James Levi, Andy Peterson and Brad Slavin were on hand at a new band shell to begin the city's summer festival season.

“We are thrilled to officially recognize the opening of our redesigned Everts Park,” Pecaro said in a statement. “Since the unofficial opening we have danced to songs emanating from the new bandshell, gotten soaked with our children in the new splash pad, screamed with our toddlers going down the slide for the first time, and relaxed on the new benches under our bright string lights."

Everts Park, at 111 North Ave. and across Green Bay Road from the train station, is named after William Wallace Everts, the city's founder.

Everts was anti-slavery preacher and New York native who spent two decades in the Chicago area, where he helped found Chicago University and the Chicago Baptist Union Theological seminary in the 1860s. The Highwood City Council named the publicly owned park after Everts in 1999.

The park serves as the location for community events all summer long, from the Wednesday night markets to Highwood's annual Garlic Fest, Margarita Night, Taco Fest and its Great Highwood Pumpkin Fest.

The latest additions to the park include an updated playground, the city's first splash pad, a new band shell, a walking trail, swing benches, power stations, native trees and more lighting and security cameras, according to city representatives.

The new playground replaces wood mulch with rubberized material and features a new swing set, tot play area and accessible equipment. And the splash pad incorporates a rain garden to return water to the aquifer and promote the use of residential rainwater capture to aid drainage issues.

The cost of the renovation was covered in part by a $400,000 grant from the state and a $10,000 grant from Commonwealth Edison. Staff said the city's budget covered the remaining $872,667 of the cost.

City officials are currently in the planning phase to propose improvement for the former site of Javier's Garage at the corner of Green Bay Road and North Avenue.

"This central public space represents the best of Highwood’s rebirth and the wonderful community that comes together during good times and bad," Pecaro said. "We look forward to celebrating the ideas members of the community brought to provide vision for the project and the hard work that brought the new park to fruition.”