Lake in the Hills declares local disaster, closes village hall

The Lake in the Hills Village Board declared a local disaster emergency through April 9 during a meeting on Wednesday.

According to a news release, this is being done in accordance with the Illinois Emergency Management Act.

This declaration will allow the village to perform emergency response action items and make reasonable emergency purchases, according to the release.

Because of the declaration, Lake in the Hills has closed its Village Hall, public works, airport office and LaBahn-Hain House facilities to the public and suspended all programs and events through March 31.

According to the release, the ability to reopen these places to the public and reinstate programming will be assessed on an ongoing basis after March 31.

All programs and events intended to draw more than 50 participants also will be canceled in compliance with and for the duration of the Gov. JB Pritzker’s mandate.

Instead of in-person programming, the village’s recreation division will be providing opportunities to recreate online through the village website and social media pages, and village staff will remain available and able to contacted by email and telephone. Staff can be reached by phone at 847-960-7400 and additional contact information is available at lith.org/contact-us, according to the release.

Services available through the website may be found at lith.org/ resourcecenter. All water shutoffs and late fees have been suspended for 45 days beginning Wednesday, and water bills can be paid online at lith.org/finance/page/water-billing. Residents also have the option of mailing in their bills or using the drop box located at the Village Hall drive entrance to deliver payments to staff.

Both First National Bank locations, as well as the Home State Bank within Lake in the Hills, also may be used as dropoff locations.

At the Lake in the Hills Airport, staff still will be on hand to provide full-service fuel but the bathrooms and lobby will be closed.

Building permits and essential inspections can be done with the village's Public Portal for online permits, scheduling inspections and license applications.

A PDF building permit application is available online for projects not available through the public portal. Completed applications and materials may be emailed to cd@lith.org.

The Lake in the Hills Police Department has temporarily adjusted its police response to reduce the potential exposure of first responders as well.

Lake in the Hills' Committee of the Whole and Village Board meetings will be combined through April. Updated meeting dates will be posted on lith.org/meetings.

To file a report or complaint that is a non-emergency nature, residents are being asked to continue to call the nonemergency line at 847-658-5676. A dispatcher will take the required information and an officer will re-contact the citizen as soon as possible to handle calls for service. The department will continue to physically respond to all high priority, emergency, exigent, in-progress calls that affect life safety issues, according to the release.