If you live in Naperville and are looking for a place to dispose of some old motor oil, or out-of-date prescription drugs you may be in for a long ride after next year. Due to a $25,000 budget shortfall, the city's household waste disposal facility may have to shut its doors after 2009. It's one of only three such facilities in all of Illinois - the other two are in Rockford and Chicago. Those are pretty long hauls to get rid of nasty items you might find hanging around your garage, especially now in this spring-cleaning season. Will the funds be found to keep the place going? Hopefully, but it's not a sure thing by any means as The Sun examines today (Wed., 4.30) in a story highlighting another revenue woe in these tough economic times. What do you make of it? We'd like to know.
Community: April 2008 Archives
Late Friday afternoon (4.25), it became official. Former Naperville fire chief and the city went their separate ways. It was three weeks ago that Wu, apparently because of job performance issues, was given the choice to resign or be terminated. Law allowed a 21-day grace period for Wu, presumably, to contest that city's action. With no follow-up from the ex-chief, the 21-day period ended Friday. Wu, according to interim city manager Bob Marshall, reached an "equitable" agreement with the city and is gone for good.The move was announced in a terse city statement with little detail, so little that Marshall, according to our report, didn't even know if Wu still lived in Naperville. We're still curious as to what really happened here - the whole thing remains shrouded in mystery. But now that it's all done and over with maybe someone would like to come forward and enlighten us as to what really happened in the strange case of John Wu. We're all ears.
Is it all gloom and doom on the real estate front? Well, maybe it is in places like Florida, Las Vegas and California. But things are starting to look a lot brighter in the Midwest. In today's Sun (4.24) we crunch some local real estate numbers that may surprise and even delight you. Naperville home sales prices posted a solid 9.77 percent gain over the past two years, despite a national and regional slump in prices. In April 2006, the average sales price was $471,724 and in April, 2008, the average was $517,791. And, currently the city has just under an eight-month supply of homes, compared to the regional average of 11. So, don't believe all that doom and gloom...it's probably coming from a different part of the country. Tell us what you think.
In Sunday's Sun (4.20) we feature an informative piece about how the Naperville Police Department plans to cope with a City Council directive to cut overtime spending by 5 percent, to $3 million this year. The comprehensive investigation also looks at the amount of money officers rack up in OT.Though the dollar numbers look big, the annual percentage is actually lower than one of our neighboring municipalities that is comparable in size. We also look at the cops and how they can make money working various summer festivals etc. and where those dollars in police overtime actually come from. The answers may surprise you. A natural reaction might be to say, well, why not just hire more cops instead of paying stiff overtime? That question is answered, too. We're curious what you think - since it's your tax dollars at work - and whether you think the NPD can be successful in following the Council's mandate to cut overtime spending and maintain the quality of public safety Napervillians are accustomed to. Let us know right here.
Monday's Sun includes a feature about Antiques on Jefferson, at 34 W. Jefferson Ave. in downtown Naperville, announcing that the store will close at the end of May. It's just the latest venture that will become nothing more than a memory. What were some of your favorite people and places that are gone from Naperville? They could be downtown shops or restaurants, fields or parks on the outskirts that have been developed, even people that you once knew. Share your nostalgia and tell us what's gone from Naperville that you miss most.
Naperville resident and SS Peter & Paul parishioner Doug Delaney leaves for Washington D.C. Monday (4.14) for a special job - he'll be helping coordinate events and smoothing things out for Pope Benedict during the Pontiff's visit this week to Washington, D.C. and New York City. The humble Delaney, whose full-time job is executive assistant to Joliet bishop Peter Sartain, calls his duties a "leap of faith" since he won't know the exact nature of his assignment until he arrives in the nation's capital. If you'd like to wish Doug good luck on his papal mission or offer a message to or even a prayer for the pope in conjunction with his first visit to America, this is the place to do it. We're sure Doug would love to see your words of support and, though we can't speak for the pope, we're pretty confident he'd be happy to get plenty of good wishes and prayers. We hope you agree.
In a special report in today's Sun (Sun., 4.6) we look at the teardown phenomenon that has gripped Naperville over the last few years. Simply put, a teardown is when a developer - or an individual - buys a small, older home, razes it and then builds a modern, state-of the-art house on the property. The buyer's interest is obviously in the property, and not the existing structure. Just drive around Naperville, especially the downtown area, and you'll see plenty of completed teardowns, some in harmonious Victorian style which seem to blend in perfectly with the area and some that look like huge, brick monstrosities. We look at the impact of this trend, what it does to neighborhoods and the city at large. Are teardowns destroying the historical charm of Naperville or is it just the inevitability of progess? How do you feel about teardowns - are they good or bad for Naperville? We'd like to know.
It was a story that broke late in the afternoon, fairly typical when governmental officials want things to fly under the media radar. At first we thought the tip was a late April Fool's joke, until we determined it was true - John Wu was out, effective immediately, as Naperville's fire chief. It was a difficult story (Thurs. 4.3) to get anyone to comment on, and it was strange that the comments we did get - while not addressing the "performance" issues (why he's out) - all basically said what a great guy the chief was and how everybody wished him well. It's all kind of strange for the man who one day was the city's fire chief and then the next day is not. Do you know something we don't about this situation? If you do, maybe you could share it with us.
