McHenry County Blog

July 1st, a year and almost a half ago, Crystal Lake Mayor Aaron Shepley and all of his city council but Jeff Thorsen enacted at 75% city sales tax increase.

It went into effect the same day as the Todd Stroeger’s Cook County Board’s sales tax hike.

What’s the difference?

One is about to be repealed in whole or part.

And it took legislative action.

The Chicago Tribune’s editorial board has made repeal its number one reform issue since mid-summer 2008.

The Chicago Sun-Times follows along, but thinks only half of the sales tax hike should be repealed.

In Crystal Lake, on the other hand, the Northwest Herald did not even run a mid-summer article informing readers that the tax had or was about to increase.

Shows the difference editorial policy can make.

Traffic will be a major sticking point on Metra’s proposed Ridgefield commuter station the same was it was for the baseball stadium proposed for McHenry County College.

The Crystal Lake City Council unanimously approved Councilwoman Ellen Brady Mueller’s motion to reject SEC, which used to be called Smith Engineering, as the firm to provide the traffic study for the Ridgefield station which Metra wants annexed into the city.

Council members decided they would rather have one of their already authorized consultants do the study.

Metra preferred SEC because it had been contracted to do a study for a future Lily Pond Road site called East Woodstock, as well as for Ridgefield.

Questions about traffic arose from all quarters.

Carolyn Schofield: “My main concerns will be traffic and the watershed.”

Brett Hopkins: “I’m concerned about traffic”

Jeff Thorsen concurred, “You’re engineer hasn’t addressed the western development we know is going to come…I’d rather go with our pool of traffic consultants. I’m already looking at two studies that are pretty opposite.”

Thorsen also made the same pitch he made in the baseball stadium traffic discussion–that Briarwood and Route 176 be included.  He pointed out that there had been another accident there earlier in the day.

Kathy Ferguson:  “I have some concerns about traffic. You’re going to change the whole tone and tenor of that area.”

Ferguson also told of driving to the courthouse on Country Club Road for jury duty. She commented negatively on the current danger at the curve.

“The line of sight when you’re coming around those corners has to be addressed.”

During extended public comment by Craig Steagall, the owner of land Metra considered buying across the tracks from that which is half-owned by McHenry County Board Chairman Ken Koehler, he bent his arms to demonstrate the intersection problem in Downtown Ridgefield.

Mueller talking about traffic: “I don’t know how to make it work without moving the houses that are out there…I myself cannot support having a traffic consultant not going through the normal process.”

Mayor Aaron Shepley empathized with Metra: “It would be awfully difficult to change (horses in midstream).”

Ralph Dawson took a different approach: “What are we going to get out of it? How long will (it take for) my police cars have to be dispatched out there? Why do we want to annex it? We’re already stretched out. I have a county police department that is more than adequate to police that station.”

Metra attorney Joe Gottemoller explained that he thought Crystal Lake wanted to annex the entire watershed of Crystal Lake. The station is within that watershed.

Mayor Shepley summed up the reason for annexing the property: “With an annexation into Crystal Lake you have a greater control on what the project will look like,” adding the city would have more influence over the traffic problems.”

His conclusion: “The deal breaker here—it’s all about the traffic.”

Shepley specifically mentioned the inadequate Ridgefield railroad crossing.

Both Mueller and Steagall are candidates for a Republican nomination for the McHenry County Board, Mueller in District 2 and Steagall in District 3.

Type “global warming” into MicroSoft’s new Bing search engine and one of McHenry County Blog’s “Messages of the Day” is on the second row of images.  It is from March 30, 2009.

It didn’t make the images under “global warming.”

Word has reached me that one of my former ministers at the First United Methodist Church of Crystal Lake has died in Florida.

The Rev. James Paulson was 84 and expired in Cape Coral.

He wrote about conducting my sister Jan’s wedding in his autobiography, observing that the baptism of my soon-to-be brother-in-law Mike Peters was one of the highlights of his career. Read why in the story I’ve linked to above.

The autobiography is entitled,

That journey is now completed.

An email dropped into my inbox that you might find of interest.  It was an invitation to the launch of a new local newspaper published by the Chicago Tribune.  It will be accompanied by a web site,  which is already active.

Thursday, October 1st, the Chicago Tribune is rolling out a new local newspaper for southeastern McHenry County. It looks it intends to cover all but the most rural county townships.

“We are launching a new local paper called TribLocal for Crystal Lake, Huntley, Woodstock, Lake In the Hills, and McHenry,” writes Brian Newcomb.  “Also, has a online portion at www.triblocal.com.”

“Triblocal is a hyper-local Web site and weekly newspaper that is created through joint cooperation of citizen contributors and Triblocal reporters,” Katie Cousino added.

“We currently have 19 papers covering communities in the Chicago region,” she continued. “On Oct 1st we launch two more papers of which one covers Crystal Lake, McHenry, Huntley, Woodstock, Lake in the Hills and Algonquin.”

“We are targeting everyone who is interested within these communities and surrounding areas to get involved,” Newcomb said.

“Whether it is posting an event or story online for free or spending money to advertise online or in print,we have a solution!” the advertising salesman said.

This sounds a bit like the Little Trib of the 1970’s. That’s where I met reporter Bill Barnhart, who went on to become the editor of the Tribune’s business section and to co-author a biography of Otto Kerner with former State Rep. Gene Schlickman. It was a good read.

Here is a curtain of toilet paper on Eletson Drive in Crystal Lake south of Berkshire is the location.  It’s Homecoming for Crystal Lake Central High School.

Want the full effect?

If I still drove or walked my son to South Elementary School, I would have seen the activity in my neighborhood before 2.

As it was, I noticed cars on Meridian Street in front of our home.  As I drove down the driveway, I noticed more toward the lake, so I decided to see what was up.

At the corner, I noticed a Crystal Lake Service League House Walk directional sign.

My mother wanted to buy it, but my conservative father did not. The price at the time was $40,000. They could have afforded it, I figure. We kids were out of college.

And, it still had the side lot then.

With the last lot on the lake–a tear down–having just sold for what I’ve heard was $450,000, we probably couldn’t afford to pay for the taxes.

It was a “Not in My Back Yard” kind of night at Crystal Lake City Hall last night.

Not only was the Crystal Lake Park District Viking Dodge site nixed by a 6-0 vote, but a private recreational activity, miniature stock car racing run by HobbyTown, USA, did, too. (Cathy Ferguson did not attend the meeting.)

Traffic ended up being the downfall of the Crystal Lake Park District’s attempt to put offices and recreational facilities where Viking Dodge used to be.

From the beginning, when McHenry County Blog broke the story on February 12, 2009, I couldn’t see how people living down Route 14 would be able to make a left turn from Route 176 onto 14 safely.  If you click to enlarge the map above, you can seen how IDOT wants to bring Ridgefield Road into Route 14 at a “T” and how residents of Andrea and The Breakers Chinese restaurant would have a somewhat better (but not much better) shot at getting out onto Route 14.  The park district proposed making the current Viking Dodge parking lot a right in and right out only entrance and exit.

Even though the park district

• backed off from sending any traffic east through residential streets after being rejected by the city council last month, 
• sought to have most traffic enter at the eastern edge of the property on Route 176, and 
• proposed moving traffic onto Route 14 near the funeral home, 
• with eventual plans for an exit on Ridgefield Road,

its proposal did not pass muster.

Mayor Aaron Shepley took the lead in both zoning discussions.  In both, the goals of the petitioners were lauded, but the location criticized.

Noise KO’ed  HobbyTown.  The site selected was next to JA Frate.  There is a berm behind the trucking company.  There was room for one behind the proposed outdoor track as well, but the council was unwilling to take the chance that it would diminish the noise from the race cars enough to satisfy neighbors.

Cardiff Drive residents even presented a video with the buzzing noise of the cars being tested in back of what used to by Crystal Auto Body.  It’s a deep lot, but needing to get all but one vote provided impossible.  After all, the Republican precinct committeeman for the neighborhood, Ellen Brady-Mueller, sits on the city council.  The mother with two autistic sons whom she home schools certainly tugged at hearts.

Even though the park board is back to square one with the council’s “Do Not Pass Go” decision, others are talking of expanding the Crystal Lake YMCA facility with a much upgraded pool.  Whether such a facility would be totally privately financed or a combination of private-public financing remains to be seen.

And I don’t mean. “Look up to the right.”

An emotionally distraught young woman abandoned her car at Lakeside Center last night.

The search for her included a helicopter flying a search pattern over Crystal Lake (the lake) and environs that woke the adults in the Skinner family.

I thought about going out and taking a photo, but that’s as far as I got.

She was found this morning.

Lots of stuff.