Glenview's Old Navy Base Is Paying for Its New Downtown Restaurants

The building at 1843 Glenview Road has been a restaurant, a tavern, a hotel, a house of worship and a government center. In 1899 it hosted the first Glenview Village Board meeting. The new owners went back to that year's branding and spell the name "Glen View" as two words. Since August 20 it has been Foxtail at Glen View House, with a Mediterranean-inspired menu of seafood, steaks, pasta and a raw bar, as Patch reported.

Foxtail is one of a handful of restaurants that have opened, moved or are finishing up along a few blocks of Glenview Road. Much of the money behind them comes from somewhere most residents would not expect. It traces back to the Glenview Naval Air Station, the base that closed more than a quarter century ago and became The Glen.

A fund started with base land money

When the base closed in 1999, the Village Board set aside 20% of the land sale proceeds in a new account called the Permanent Fund. A Village budget workshop record from September 2024 says the fund was meant for capital projects and economic development "outside The Glen," to spark redevelopment elsewhere in the village.

For years the fund mostly sat in reserve. According to the same Village budget workshop record, the balance was $29.8 million in 2024. That year the Board aimed it at downtown. The Village bought the Patio Shops at 1755 Glenview Road for almost $1.9 million and committed money to six downtown restaurant projects. The six were:

1. The Filling Station
2. Ballyhoo Hospitality's Jackman & Co.
3. Ballyhoo Hospitality's Zenzi Den
4. Hometown Coffee and Juice
5. Foxtail Glen View House
6. Spiro's Deli

The total commitment was $12.295 million, split into $5.2 million in grants and $7.095 million in loans. Money is released only after each restaurant meets the conditions in its agreement. In 2024 the Village expected the full amount to go out by the end of 2025. That figure is a commitment from 2024. It is not a confirmed final total of what was paid out.

So the 1990s redevelopment of the base, which built the shopping, offices and homes of The Glen, is now paying to rebuild the older downtown a couple of miles away.

What the money built, address by address

The plan behind all this goes back to "Glenview Connect," a 10-month community process that led to the downtown strategic plan adopted in August 2021. In a March 2026 report, Journal & Topics noted that Village President Mike Jenny and other officials have defended the incentives as a necessary tool for reviving downtown. Here is what stands on Glenview Road this October:

Zenzi Den was set to open in late March. Its own website now lists dinner hours from 4:30 to 9:30 p.m. Sunday through Thursday and until 10:30 p.m. on Fridays and Saturdays. The menu centers on a binchotan robata grill, along with sushi, dumplings and shareable plates. A separate Tatami Room offers a chef-curated kaiseki dinner. Ballyhoo also runs Jackman & Co. a short walk away, which opened with significant financial help from the Village.

Spiro's has the longest history on this list. It opened in 1962 on East Lake Avenue, stayed there 27 years, then spent about three decades at 1210 Waukegan Road. Journal & Topics reported that the family tore down a former dry cleaner at 1880 Glenview Road to build a 1,400-square-foot counter-service restaurant with 25 seats. It sits across from the Glenview Public Library near Lehigh Avenue. In September 2024, trustees approved a 10-year, $595,000 forgivable loan for the $1.25 million project. In that case, Permanent Fund money covered nearly half the cost of the building.

Cerca was held up for years by lawsuits challenging it, all of which failed. The Village sold the former Bess Hardware site to the Drake Group for $1.81 million in 2020 and provided more financial help after that. The building's site now advertises apartments available for immediate move-in. Its ground-floor shops are less settled. In March, The Record reported that the owner of The Bagel had signed a letter of intent and hoped to open there by Labor Day weekend, pending Village approval. No opening has been confirmed since.

The 700-seat room that closed the same season

Over the same months the new places were opening, Glenview lost its biggest restaurant. Hackney's on Lake, at 1514 E. Lake Ave., closed permanently in September after 71 years. It had 700 seats.

"A 700-seat restaurant made sense in the 1960s," co-owner Mike Masterson told Journal & Topics. "It doesn't in 2026." In the same article he thanked everyone who had come through the doors "for celebrations, school banquets, first jobs."

The newspaper offered a comparison. Jackman & Co. has 110 dining room seats, 66 at the bar and 88 on the patio, or 264 in all. That is fewer than two-fifths of the old Lake Avenue room. Spiro's new building has 25 seats. The incentive program is paying for restaurants built at the scale Masterson described as workable today.

The family is putting its effort into Hackney's on Harms at 1241 Harms Rd. That location has 72 indoor seats and a 144-seat patio. Interior work was scheduled from July 27 through August 27, and the patio stayed open during construction. Masterson said the project refreshes the bar, lobby and booths, with much of the work in behind-the-scenes infrastructure. He described the goal as "a classic but updated look that keeps the charm and history of our roadhouse roots."

The Masterson family opened Macushla Brewing Co. next to the restaurant about a decade ago, and it is staying open. Masterson said food trucks would take over from Hackney's kitchen there, and the Lake Avenue property will be put up for sale.

One large room is still coming, on Waukegan

Lago, an Italian steakhouse at 1808 Waukegan Road, is slated to open in November. In an October 2 report, Journal & Topics described a two-story, 10,119-square-foot building with about 205 seats under construction. Lago did not appear on the Village's list of six Permanent Fund restaurant projects. Its November date is still a target, and openings in this group have slipped before. In March, Spiro's was expected in April and Foxtail in May.

Downtown dinner, plus the rest of October

Most of Glenview's other October events are within a short drive of the Glenview Road restaurants:

• Glenview Farmers Market at Historic Wagner Farm runs Saturdays from 8 a.m. to noon through October 24. It is free, with local food, live music and a LINK card match of up to $25 per customer, according to the Glenview Park District calendar.
• Halloween SKELEbration is Friday, October 16, from 5:30 to 8 p.m. at Park Center, with indoor and outdoor activities and food trucks. Admission is $20 per child ages 2 to 12 and free for ages 13 and up.
• "The Roots of Kindness" opens October 27 as a new permanent exhibit at Kohl Children's Museum and is included with admission. CEO Mike Delfini called it "our first exhibit to address character traits directly."

For a Saturday, the farmers market can be followed by lunch at Spiro's across from the library. On a weeknight, Zenzi Den starts serving at 4:30. Foxtail, in the building where the Village Board first met in 1899, now sits on a block the Village has spent years and Navy base money rebuilding.

The Hackney's on Lake property and Cerca's ground-floor storefronts are the next pieces of this story to watch. If you are curious how these changes fit into your own plans, Cornelia Matache is glad to talk it through over coffee, with no pressure, and can start with a complimentary home valuation and expert consultation.

This article is general information, not legal, tax or financial advice. Consult a qualified professional about your situation.