Clancy Bros. Coffee Roasters Looks Toward Mid-November Opening

MOKENA, IL — Downtown Mokena is ready to welcome its latest business, Clancy Bros. Coffee Roasters, after the Mokena Village Board of Trustees at its Monday meeting unanimously approved modifications to its site plan.

Clancy Bros. Coffee Roasters will be located at the southeast corner of LaPorte and Wolf Roads at 19931 S. Wolf Road in the old Allegiance Bank building.

The business and property owner, Michael Clancy, can now begin working on improvements to the building, including white-washing the entire exterior of the building and installing concrete planter boxes on each side of the building, according to a presentation to the board by Community and Economic Development Director Matt Ziska.

The projected business hours are from 6 a.m. to 4 p.m. daily, Ziska said.

Nick Clancy, who will run the business along with his brother Chris Clancy, told the board the coffee shop is scheduled to open in mid-November.

The Village of Mokena will help cover some of the cost to eliminate the existing egress/drive-thru lane on Wolf Road through the use of tax increment financing, of TIF, funds. That decision was made during a Village Board of Trustees work session Sept. 26, according to Village documents.

TIF funds are widely used by municipal governments to offset development costs for businesses while generating future money for the municipalities in the form of property taxes, which would increase over time as the value of the developed property increases.

Work sessions differ from official Village Board of Trustee meetings in that the board does not vote an any actions during the workshop; rather, the board gives direction to Village staff on which direction it would like to see a project go, and Village staff then work to make the board's wishes reality.

Work sessions are open to the public, but those meetings are not video recorded or broadcasted, as Village Board of Trustee meetings are. Minutes from work sessions recorded by the Village Clerk are generally only publicly available after the board approves them at its meeting following the workshop meeting.

Nick Clancy thanked the board for working with the business to provide the TIF funding, citing previous statements made by Mokena Mayor Frank Fleischer in regards to his desire to make downtown Mokena "a viable option for people in this community."

"And we just couldn't agree more," Clancy said. "We just feel that with this grant, what that communicates to us, is that you mean exactly what you say. So, we're super excited and we're super grateful to be recipients of this awesome grant, beautifying this building to make it less of a bank and more of a coffeehouse."

Clancy Bros. Coffee Roasters will offer home-brewed coffee drinks, and an assortment of breakfast sandwiches and pastries, Ziska said. The business plans to employ six to eight part-time workers and one full-time manager/roaster.