VILLAGE OF MATTESON ON AN UPSWING

Matteson Mayor Chalmers-Currin. Photo provided by STH Media
Matteson Mayor Chalmers-Currin. Photo provided by STH Media

VILLAGE OF MATTESON ON AN UPSWING 

By Tia Carol Jones

The Village of Matteson seems to be on a rebound in the last couple of years. The Village is projecting approximately $2 million being received from revenue and sales tax of recent developments which include Amazon, Pete’s and Sam’s Club coming into the Village.

In February, Amazon gave $1 million to Rich Township High School District 227 and Elementary School District 159 to enhance their STEM programs. When Dominick’s left Matteson the Village was faced with almost becoming a food desert. In February 2021, Pete’s Market opened in Matteson. The store is flourishing, and people are coming from other municipalities to come to the grocery store.

Sam’s Club left Matteson in 2018 but the store got a second life as a Sam’s Club Distribution Center. The distribution center has about more than 500 employees. The revenue will come back into the Village.

The current population of Matteson is less than 20,000. Seventy Eight Percent of the population is Black. The Village sits close to Will County, which has a different tax base than Cook County, which it is part of. Sheila Chalmers-Currin, President of the Village of Matteson, said on April 25th, the Village had a balanced budget.

“A balanced budget in the midst of everything that has gone on with COVID and all the other things that could go wrong in a small community, we are very excited about the future of the Village of Matteson,” Chalmers-Currin said.

 Chalmers-Currin said the $2 million projection was extremely conservative, given the revenue the Amazon Fulfillment Center in Monee has received since it opened in 2017. The Monee location is smaller than the Matteson location.
At its full capacity, the Amazon Fulfillment Center in Matteson, which opened in Oct. 2021, would have more than 2,000 employees working there. Chalmers-Currin believes the fulfillment center will not just help Matteson but the Southland region as a whole.

Chalmers-Currin acknowledged that while Matteson did not receive the South Suburban Casino License, the casino was just a small portion of the Market Square development, which was proposed for the former Lincoln Mall site. The Village of Matteson will go back to the comprehensive plan. Chalmers-Currin said there are still parties interested in the development, without the casino.  “Infrastructure has been done and we have done the basic work for that project. Now, what we’re looking for is making sure we bring the right partners and retail to that area,” she said.

The Village will be the site of a new cannabis cultivation company, with what is expected to be the largest indoor manufacturer in the State of Illinois. It also recently completed building more than 400 new homes and there are currently plans to build more homes.

Chalmers-Currin said the car dealerships in the Village had record sales. When she came into office, the Village did not have a full capacity car dealership. Now, there are 12 dealerships up and running in the Village. “We are all working collaboratively together for good partnerships with all of our businesses. With doing that, when they win, we win,” she said. “As long as I’m here, we’re going to work in good partnership with our businesses, because we need to not only work with them in a partnership, but in order to retain them, we want to continue that partnership.”

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