They're skeptical, this group of about 50 Markham residents.

It's healthy skepticism. People who have lived in Markham a long time know to question city leaders and take what they say with a grain of salt.

Markham residents are like mushrooms. You might be familiar with the expression. Mushrooms grown for produce are kept in the dark and fed manure.

So, when city leaders told citizens Wednesday night that no one would be forced to sell their home, residents were understandably skeptical.

During a public hearing at Markham City Hall for a proposed tax increment financing district, city officials repeatedly told residents no specific development is planned for the roughly 140-acre area south of 159th Street east of the Tri-State Tollway and west of Dixie Highway.

It's prime real estate. Developers are salivating over the potential to build a large-scale industrial project such as warehouses, manufacturing facilities or a distribution center with access to three interstates: I-57, I-294 and I-80.

Or maybe developers want to build a big retail center that would generate sales tax revenue in addition to property taxes after the TIF tax breaks expire in 23 years.

Developers have wanted that property for years, Mayor David Webb Jr. told residents.

“Amazon was interested in it,” Webb said. “You're still looking at something in that magnitude. I can't give you a name. I don't have a name. But Amazon was looking at that. Home Depot, at one time. Target.

“Before you go unveiling peoples' names, they want a contract,” Webb said. “They want something on the dotted line before it gets out there, and it gets in the paper that ABC is coming in, and you don't have a contract.”

Later, Webb said he believes the first phase of development would create 800 jobs and a second phase would add 2,200 jobs. He is scheduled to meet with a developer on Feb. 4 and learn more details, he said.

“We have no development in front of us,” Ward 1 Ald. Ernest Blevins testified. “If the right development does come our way hopefully we'll be in a position to accept that, and that will be of great benefit to everybody in Markham.”

I, like many at the public hearing, got the sense that Markham officials may be aware of a specific development proposal for the land. They just can't reveal the developer or even acknowledge a proposal exists. That's how the process of creating a TIF district works.

To create a TIF district — which freezes property taxes in a blighted area to encourage redevelopment — municipalities commission studies and gather evidence to show the public value of granting economic benefits.

Markham's studies show the 942 parcels in the area have a collective assessed valuation of about $2.1 million. If an estimated $51.3 million is spent acquiring land, demolishing structures, cleaning up an illegal dump site and putting in new infrastructure such as roads, water and sewers — and if a big development is built — the area's assessed value would increase tenfold to $21.5 million.

After 23 years, that would generate a lot of additional property tax revenue for schools and other local taxing districts. Job creation, blight removal, expanded tax base — there's a lot of public good at stake. It's just that in this instance the process is complicated by the fact people live in the area.

Markham is doing everything to the letter of the law. The process dictates that a TIF district is created without a specific development proposal in mind.

Markham City Attorney Steven Miller said it's similar to how the city of Los Angeles agreed to build a new NFL stadium before it knew it would lure the Chargers franchise from San Diego.

“It's like a city building a football stadium without a tenant,” Miller said.

Markham has to play its hand close to its chest, officials said, because it doesn't want a neighboring community such as Harvey, Country Club Hills or Hazel Crest swooping in to steal away the potential development.

“We can't tell you because it's classified,” Ward 2 Ald. Clifton Howard told residents. “But I'm telling you, all these other little towns will just cut our throat and you know what we'll be looking at? A whole bunch of blank land over there where trees were cut down.”

Crews from Homer Tree Service began working in the neighborhood in November, removing hundreds of trees from land the city or another party has acquired. In at least one case, a property owner said, trees were removed from private land without permission.

Iacob Merca said trees were cut down on a vacant parcel he owns in the 15900 block of Artesian Avenue.

“They told me afterward, ‘I apologize,'” Merca testified at the public hearing. “I've been advised by my attorney to sue for trespassing.”

Somebody spent a lot of money removing trees. Webb told me a few weeks ago he figured it must have cost about $300,000. At the public hearing, the figure $2 million was cited several times, but nobody knows because it's a private transaction and not a matter of public record.

On Thursday, I spoke by phone with a representative of Weitzman & Powers, a Chicago-based law firm that specializes in real estate transactions. Agents of the firm have been knocking on doors, calling Markham residents and making offers for homes and land.

“We're not going to comment on the cost of removing trees,” Howard Powers told me.

Markham has acquired much of the land from which trees were removed. In response to a Freedom of Information Act request, a representative of Cook County's Bureau of Economic Development provided documents showing the city has acquired 98 parcels at no cost through the county's No Cash Bid Program.

Of the 942 parcels in the neighborhood, 35 contain occupied residences. County property records show the city owns at least two of the 35. More recent transactions may not yet be recorded.

Homeowners say if they have to sell homes where they've lived all their lives, they want a fair price.

“We understand it's very competitive out there,” said Carolyn Croswell, whose mother lives in the 2500 block of Thorndale Avenue.

“But there are people who own houses there, and there are people who own vacant lots,” Croswell testified. “Then there are people who own homes, and there's a difference. For the people who own homes, they just want a fair opportunity to sit down with someone.”

The county lists the value of Evelyn Segers' home on Elmdale Avenue at $94,670. She told me she was offered $52,000 for her property, plus a $38,000 relocation allowance for a total of $90,000.

The problem is, Markham's own housing impact study shows residents like Segers would likely have to pay $150,000 or more to buy a home of comparable quality elsewhere in Markham.

“It's insulting,” Segers said of the offer. “Fair market value is simply not enough.”

“Negotiate,” Webb told residents. Get an attorney and an appraiser and come to the table with a counteroffer, he said.

“Yes, we'd like to take up all the area there,” Miller told residents. But if people refused to sell, the city would work around the pockets of privately owned land remaining and assemble the best layout it could for potential development, he said.

Residents know they can't be forced to sell. The city cannot condemn their land through eminent domain because the potential development is private, as opposed to a public project such as a highway or library.

But residents worry life in the Coral Gables and Old Markham subdivisions could become so miserable, nobody would want to live there anymore.

The removal of trees left a bleak landscape in the formerly beautifully wooded area. When I drove through the neighborhood during a thunderstorm the night of the public hearing, a large branch blocked part of Artesian Avenue.

Streets were not plowed after a recent snowstorm, residents said. They worry that water and other city services could be disrupted. During the public hearing, I overheard several residents talking on cell phones with family members back home.

The power was out. The electric company estimated it would be restored in two hours. Their loved ones were back at home, literally being kept in the dark.

Meanwhile, their family members sat through the public hearing, feeling like they were being fed manure.

tslowik@tribpub.com

Twitter @tedslowik