Growth Tops 2006 News Immigration, Expansion Issues Become Hot Topics
Carpentersville and Elgin were at the epicenter of the illegal immigration debate.
In July, the Illinois Minutemen converged on Elgin’s city hall, demanding the police department enforce immigration law.
But Elgin Mayor Ed Schock argued local governments can do little to enforce federal immigration laws.
Carpentersville Village President Bill Sarto echoed Schock’s statement when the immigration debate landed on Carpentersville’s doorstep in October, in the form of a proposed ordinance cracking down on illegal immigrants.
The proposed measure, cosponsored by trustees Paul Humpfer and Judy Sigwalt, would fine landlords and business owners who rent to or hire illegal immigrants. It would also recognize English as the official language of the village.
When more than 2,000 protesters converged on village hall, trustees voted to table the discussion until a larger venue that could accommodate the huge crowd was found.
But those plans were thwarted when trustees voted 4 to 3 to hold off finding a larger venue until pending litigation in other towns is resolved.
In November, both towns sent resolutions to Congress and the president. Elgin’s resolution called on the federal government to enact and enforce a comprehensive immigration policy, while Carpentersville demanded the federal government effect law enforcement and reform.
Hospitals look west
Sherman Hospital wanted to build a new $310 million facility on the city’s west side.
But Provena St. Joseph Hospital, two miles away from where the new Sherman building will be, said it would go out of business if Sherman was allowed to build. A state panel rejected St. Joe’s arguments and gave Sherman the approval it needed to build.
St. Joe’s wasn’t finished yet. It mounted a lawsuit against Sherman and the state planning board, alleging that the board violated its own standards by approving Sherman’s plan to build a new hospital at Randall and Big Timber roads.
The case will be heard in January. Meanwhile, Sherman has since broken ground on its new facility, set to open in 2009.
Sherman wasn’t the only hospital that decided it needed more space. St. Joe’s is building a new $97 million addition, and Centegra Heath System officials plan to build a campus on 110 acres in northern Huntley.
Tough year for cops
2006 was a tumultuous year for certain officers in the Elgin Police Department.
In September, probationary officer Claudia Murphy was let go for a variety of infractions that surfaced after an Elgin couple complained she harassed them. She is now suing the city to get her job back.
That same month, Lt. Henry Smith received an unpaid 30-day suspension for many reasons, including insubordination; however, Smith, who is black, says he was suspended for speaking out about racism. He may be fired because of a separate court issue.
Five weeks later, Police Chief Lisa Womack terminated Jesus “Jesse” Padron, an 18-year-veteran officer. He was fired at the conclusion of an investigation he says falsely determined that he intended to steal from a Schaumburg department store.
He’s now seeking his job back through arbitration.
Meanwhile, Steve Jones, an officer Womack fired in 2005, won his job back after an arbitration proceeding last month. He is now entitled to thousands of dollars in back pay.
Deadly year on river
Seven people drowned between May and August.
Bruce Sperling, 31, of Lombard, and his brother Mark, 27, of Yorkville died in May when the two men attempted to rescue kayaker Craig Fliege, a 38-year-old Villa Park resident, from a dangerous current.
Less than two weeks later, 12-year-old Pedro Solis of Carpentersville died after police said he fell into a deep hole in the river’s bed. Solis and a friend were wading in knee-deep water about 40 feet from the shore near Singapore Drive in Carpentersville when the accident occurred.
The body of a 47-year old Melrose Park man was pulled from the river in South Elgin also in June. For three days, the identity of Norman C. Lewis remained unknown until South Elgin police matched fingerprint records.
A South Elgin toddler with a penchant for slipping out of his family home and wandering through his neighborhood, drowned in the river in July. Chase Rumachik, 2, was found about 75 feet from the shoreline.
An attempted getaway turned deadly in August when a 19-year-old Wisconsin man jumped into the river in Algonquin after a traffic stop. John Kotiw of Pell Lake, Wis., a passenger in the vehicle, was wanted for failing to appear in court on a charge of resisting a police officer.
Kotiw ran from police, who later spotted him in the Fox River. Despite attempts to rescue the man using several flotation devices, Kotiw’s head slipped underwater. An hour later police recovered his body.
Elgin reshapes center
The razing of two buildings in downtown Elgin have cleared the way for the area’s future.
The city bought and toppled the mausoleum-like Unilever margarine factory that had shut down in April and blocked river views for years. The site will become part of Foundry Park, and could include a sculpture walk and a gardening haven.
Meanwhile, the city began demolishing the old Gail Borden Public Library to create what will become Elgin’s tallest building.
The 16-story Water Street Place will include 154 homes, four restaurants and 18,400 square feet of retail space. As part of the plan, the city gave $10.8 million in incentives to the project’s developers.
Big step for U-46
All 40 elementary schools in the state’s second-largest school system met state and federal standards for the 2005-2006 school year.
Elgin Area School District U-46 accomplished the feat for the first time since the government started tracking the progress of every public school in the nation as part of the federal No Child Left Behind law.
As recently as 2004, only 24 of the district’s elementary schools were meeting state standards.
Shopping South Elgin
South Elgin Crossing, with its Home Depot, Best Buy, Staples and PetSmart stores, opened at Randall and McDonald roads, making it the largest retail strip in village history.
The shopping center is expected to generate roughly $700,000 annually in sales taxes and about $560,000 in initial property taxes – $334,700 of which will be funneled to the St. Charles school district.
The village has agreed to pay the developer about $1.5 million from its share of the sales-tax revenue to offset a portion of construction costs, including an overhaul of parts of Randall Road.
Pingree Grove grows
2006 was a year of firsts for Pingree Grove, which is beginning to grow in earnest.
The Rev. John Greve became the first pastor in the 116-year history of St. Peter’s Evangelical Lutheran Church.
The village hired Hanover Park police officer Carol Lussky as its first-ever police chief.
The village earned a Kane County grant to create a plan for its village center.
Looking ahead, the village plans to run a special census in hopes of securing additional government funding. The 2000 census said 124 people lived there; officials say the number now is closer to 1,800.
Tax cap overhauled
State lawmakers this year passed sweeping changes to the 15- year- old property tax cap law, seeking to stymie taxing bodies that were collecting millions of dollars more than promised from voter- approved tax-rate increases.
The old tax cap drew heavy criticism when a 2005 Daily Herald analysis showed taxing bodies collected hundreds of millions of dollars more from voter-approved tax-rate increases than many taxpayers – and school officials – anticipated.
The new truth-in-taxation law, shepherded by state Sen. Don Harmon, an Oak Park Democrat, and state Rep. Mike Tryon, a Crystal Lake Republican, changes everything about the process, from the ballot question to the way county clerks calculate property tax increases.
Storm wallops Elgin
An angry storm in July walloped the Fox Valley, and hit Elgin pretty hard.
Trees blocked more than a dozen city streets and power outages also affected traffic signals, causing backups. Ten thousand ComEd customers were without power.
But two weeks after the storm, residents complained crews weren’t working fast enough to clean up the storm’s remains.
At that point, public works worked 12-hour shifts to get the job done, and the city enlisted the help of private contractors to handle some of the work, doubling the cleanup cost to $120,000.
Other headlines
There were several other big stories that also made headlines in 2006.
Two convicted in slaying: Two men were convicted in the April 8, 2005, slaying of 19-year-old David Steeves Jr. in Elgin. In April a Kane County judge found Robert J. Guyton Jr., guilty of multiple murder counts and later sentenced him to 56 years in prison. Armin V. Henderson awaits sentencing after a jury in October convicted him on similar offenses.
DUI alleged in deaths: A Wayne man was charged in a crash near Elgin that killed a pregnant Yorkville woman and her unborn fetus, and a friend the Wayne man had been with drinking with at a strip club. John D. Homatas is fighting drunken driving offenses in the Jan. 4 wreck on Route 25. Killed were April M. Simmons, 27; her 8 1/ 2-month-old fetus, later named Addison; and John A. Chiariello, 25, of St. Charles.
Eight kidnapped, rescued: The kidnapping of eight people from a Lake County restaurant didn’t end in tragedy, but the crime horrified the Carpentersville community, where the day-long ordeal unfolded. The eight people, including a father, his wife and four children, were taken from a Round Lake Beach restaurant to a house in the 100 block of Tee Road in Carpentersville by a gang of gunmen who stormed the restaurant.
Tied up and blindfolded, the victims were beaten at gunpoint and burned with cigarettes. The eight, who were not seriously injured, were rescued when police raided the house.
Six men accused in the abduction are in custody; one man accused in the abduction is on the run.
Santa’s Village closes: A week after the longtime owner of the suburban landmark Santa’s Village auctioned off the theme park’s signature attractions, the property owners conceded that the park had almost certainly ended its 47-year run in East Dundee. Uncertainty had lingered over the future of the park ever since a group of East Dundee businessmen were unable to secure investment to reopen the park for the summer. A series of financial problems were resolved with a pair of lawsuits, whereby the property owners recovered unpaid taxes, rent and utility bills.
New high school firsts: It was another year of firsts for the two- year old South Elgin High School. The fifth Elgin Area School District U-46 high school welcomed its first batch of juniors, and participated in its first varsity season – in a variety of areas including football and cheerleading. Storm athletes Dana Hildebrandt and Lauren Ferry this fall became the first SEHS athletes to qualify for a state competition. The duo finished third overall in the sectional tennis meet.
Water woes loom: It seemed like in 2006 government officials on all levels realized the need to make sure Chicago’s suburbs never run out of water.
Gov. Rod Blagojevich issued an executive order for a pair of pilot projects to measure water availability, and figure out how to make sure two regions in Illinois never run out of water.
If the pilot projects prove successful, they will be duplicated statewide. This led to a kickoff meeting in November launching a project to see how much water lies beneath the 11 most northeast counties of Illinois. That project will likely take until 2009 to complete.
The reason for the concerns is that no new towns will be able to tap into Lake Michigan water. Some studies have suggested that certain portions of northern Kane County and southern McHenry County might one day need more water than the underground aquifers can supply.
But the state wasn’t the only government body looking for water. While Kane County is wrapping up work on its brand new water study, due to be released in 2007, McHenry County board members decided to hire someone to oversee county water supply issues.
(c) 2006 Daily Herald; Arlington Heights, Ill.. Provided by ProQuest Information and Learning. All rights Reserved.