Drive-thru health clinic gets thumbs down from Crystal Lake planners over ‘warehouse-y’ look

The McHenry County Department of Health hit a snag in its plans to renovate and add onto its building in Crystal Lake, as city planning commissioners denied the request over concern about the concrete material choices.

The health department is looking to change the architectural design, improve parking lots with more spaces, add an accessibility ramp to the building, create additional office and lobby spaces, and add a clinic with a drive-thru.

“It’s a drive-thru facility. Really a result of COVID, when there was a lot of testing,” Chris Hansen of Kluber Architects and Engineers said. “I would like to point out that the owner has received a grant to fund a large portion of this project for this purpose.”

The 3-acre site at 100 N. Virginia St. has been home to the McHenry County Department of Health and Animal Control and Adoption Center since the county purchased the building in 2006.

The Crystal Lake Planning and Zoning Commission unanimously agreed Wednesday not to recommend the plan to City Council. The proposal will go to council for a vote Feb. 4, City Planner Elizabeth Maxwell said.

The main issue between petitioners and commissioners came from the language of the city’s code that requires at least 60% of the facade to be brick or stone. Architects say they meet that 60% facade requirement for the total building, but not for each side of the building.

“I feel like because this is facing [Route] 14, that more brick should be definitely on that east-facing and north-facing side,” Commissioner Natasha Teetsov said.

The existing structure is made of red brick with a “silver metal mansard roof,” according to city documents. Architects are looking to add “thin brick veneer” and gray fiber cement accents that look similar to metallic panels, Hansen said. The 1.5-inch-thick panels are as durable as brick and are similar to materials used for the Lake County Health Department Center that Hansen’s team also designed, he said.

“It’s actually technically made of concrete fibers,” he said. “It’s very similar to what you would see product-wise on a modern day home.”

Commissioner Kathy Repholz said she wants to see a design that looks more welcoming.

“I think the cement board is a mismatch with the mission,” she said. “It looks warehouse-y to me.”

The project is on a time crunch because the bonds the health department plans to use to fund it have an expiration date, Hansen said. The project already went to bid, and exploring alternative materials would delay construction. The design team made the plan with an “extremely limited budget” while creating a modernized look that the health department is looking for, Hansen said.

“It may be modern,” Commissioner Jeff Greenman said. “Modern doesn’t necessarily means it’s improved.”

The building is located on the Crystal Lake watershed, and the plan calls for an increased surface coverage of almost 2,600 square feet. City staff have no concerns about the plans regarding the watershed, as they will be adding landscaping and abiding by all of the city’s guidelines, Maxwell said.