Wednesday Journal 052621

W E D N E S D A Y

May 26, 2021 Vol. 41, No. 43 ONE DOLLAR @oakpark @wednesdayjournal

JOURNAL of Oak Park and River Forest

Shooting at Oak Park Airbnb rental leaves one injured Police have three in custody

By STACEY SHERIDAN Staff Reporter

Photo provided by The White House

GO EAST, YOUNG WEST: How did a former Wednesday Journal staff photographer end up working in the White House? Read on.

From WJ to WH

Chandler West is now the White House deputy photography director

By MICHAEL ROMAIN Editor

Chandler West, 31, had just been hired in his new position as deputy director of photography at the White House when he was assigned the surreal task of photographing the “flip.”

“It’s one of the craziest things I’ve done since coming here,” West said. “My first job on day one [Inauguration Day] was to get to the White House and be there to capture the flip as it was happening. So I spent like four or five hours just standing in the Oval Office watching people physically carrying furniture out,

putting in new rugs and hanging art.”

The moment was all the more surreal, considering that just six years earlier West was working in Oak Park as Wednesday Journal’s staff photographer — a job he held from late 2014 to mid-2015.

“The job I had at the Journal was truly one of my favorite jobs, probably second to this one,” West said. “I really liked the community and the way people get excited when we’d show up and say we’re from the Journal.”

After his stint in Oak Park, West was lured to New York for more editing and photography experience. He landed jobs in photo editing at the Daily Mail and Reinfery29 before a moment of serendipity changed his career. In 2016, he came across a job opening on the website of Hillary for America.

See WEST on page 18

Three people are in the custody of Oak Park police after a shooting occurred at an Airbnb rental property located at 642 S. Lombard Ave. at 2:53 a.m., May 23. One person received a non-life-threatening injury during the altercation, but it is unclear if the person was shot, according to Commander William Rygh.

“The injury may have occurred as someone was trying to seek shelter to avoid being struck by a bullet,” said Rygh.

Kevin Radzinski, who lives four houses down, told Wednesday Journal he was awoken by the gunfire and went outside to see what caused the racket.

He said he saw at least three cars flee from the area and about 15 to 20 people disperse. The event looked like it could have been a graduation party, according to Radzinksi.

“They all looked like high school kids to me,” he said.

Radzinksi said the experience felt like something out of a movie. He managed to capture some of what happened on video before his reverie was broken by his daughter screaming at him to get back inside the house.

“She yanked me back inside and locked the doors,” said Radzinski.

See AIRBNB on page 18

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Wednesday Journal, May 26, 2021

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Wednesday Journal, May 26, 2021

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I

3

Allies wanted, but ‘woke’ artists need not apply

n June 2019, Dr. Karen Smith, California’s top public health official, exited her position, leaving Dr. Charity Dean to fill the role in the interim.

Dean had been chief health officer for Santa Barbara before her unusual tenacity and care for a job nobody noticed garnered the attention of a few bigwigs. By the time Smith departed, Dean had risen to become the state’s second-highest public health official and was positioned to be her boss’ natural replacement.

Commentary If California Governor Gavin Newsom had appointed Dean — whom author Michael Lewis, in his new book The Premonition, described as “clairvoyant” for her ability to anticipate the pandemic before it happened — the state might have been in a better position to serve as a national model for pandemic management. After all, seeing the organizational flaws her colleagues couldn’t was Dean’s unique gift.

“In any large organization, the solution to any crisis was usually found not in the officially important people at the top but in some obscure employee far down the organization’s chart,” Lewis wrote, referencing others who had noticed that Dean fit the trait of an “L6.”

“The L6,” Lewis explained, is “the person buried under six layers of organization whose muzzled voice suddenly, urgently needed to be heard.”

For years, Dean worked competently in the shadows, doing what most people in her position would avoid. That’s why she was dispatched to the U.S.-Mexico border.

“I’d heard that Trump was trying to create a crisis,” Dean told Lewis, “trying to turn people against immigrants. It was just a rumor. But when I get there I find this is all true.

They’re just dumping families on street corners at two in the morning. They were trying to create a disaster.”

Dean’s task was to “mitigate the health risks posed by the new arrivals,” and for that she had to get up close and personal with the people affected by Trump’s policies. In Our Lady of Guadalupe Church, there was a shelter, where Dean “found hundreds of tired, scared, and obviously unhealthy refugees.”

She found terrified mothers and babies, who had been kept in cages, and shell-shocked toddlers. She treated them with medical supplies obtained from the home medicine cabinets of church volunteers. Dean learned that San Diego County and the Red Cross didn’t want anything to do with the migrants (the latter because the nonprofit “didn’t want to offend their Republican donors,” Lewis writes).

Dean risked her own health to offer medical treatment to these new arrivals, jerry-rigging the response into an unmitigated success.

But even after all of this, the state’s number two health officer got overlooked. Instead of appointing Dean to succeed Smith as top health official, Newsom appointed Dr. Sonia Angell, a former employee with the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) who had experience “in neither California nor communicable disease.”

Angell’s most recent job before her appointment had been working on heart disease in New York City’s health department, Lewis writes. Later, after Angell abruptly resigned amid the pandemic, Newsom explained that he had appointed her, in part, because of “her work in righting racial injustice in health care.”

Dean was later told “that she herself had never been a serious candidate” because it would have been bad for “optics.”

MICHAEL ROMAIN

“Charity was too young, too blond, too Barbie,” Lewis writes, quoting a senior official in California’s health system. “‘They wanted a person of color.’ Sonia Angell identified as Latina.”

For someone hired, in part, because of equity, Angell’s reported workplace treatment of Dean was rather appalling.

“The first thing Karen Smith had asked Charity to do was to resolve a crisis on the U.S.-Mexico border,” Lewis writes.

“The first thing Sonia Angell asked her to do was to figure out how to set the time on the clock on her desk phone.”

Dean also “found her new boss a tailor, a hairdresser, and a dry cleaner,” and worked to “dismiss the thought that her new boss was asking her to do these things to remind her of her place.”

An expert in infectious disease who would sit in front of a whiteboard in her office “coming to terms with exponential growth,” Dean may have literally been the only person in California government who knew what even the CDC refused to recognize until months into the COVID-19 pandemic: the fact that we were in a pandemic.

But Dean was labeled an alarmist when she attempted to broach the topic with her new boss. Eventually, Angell banned Dean from using the word “pandemic” in meetings and told her to “erase the math and the tsunami curve on her whiteboard” before banishing Dean from important planning discussions altogether.

When California officials realized the crisis they were dealing with, it was too late. Many thousands had already died, with many more deaths to come.

Angell would eventually resign during the pandemic due to what state officials reported to be a “tech glitch that resulted in an undercount of coronavirus cases and confusion about the scope of infections as the state’s death toll crossed 10,000,” according to a statement officials released at the time.

Ironically, in a parting email to staff, Angell wrote: “We have led with science and data, and with equity at the core of our intentions.”

The situation with Angell is a case study in what I’ll call the equity industrial complex, which is less interested in erasing the foundational basis for systemic inequities than in treating the symptoms — or to switch metaphors, applying mascara to conceal much deeper problems.

In a recent piece for the New York Times, Talmon Joseph Smith put his finger on the equity (or anti-racism) industrial complex when opining on why the globe-spanning racial justice movement that sprung up since the death of George Floyd last year has yielded such tepid systemic results.

“Talk of social justice efforts and antiracism reached new levels of influence in the Zoom-layered corridors of the intelligentsia, corporate America, and other upper-middleclass or elite-controlled institutions,” Smith writes. “Yet this reckoning often didn’t have ambitions for systemic change as much as it concerned itself with matters like representation, diversity, promotion and renegotiating the terms of corporate social responsibility.”

In other words, the movement inspired by a poor Black man in Minnesota has much to show for itself in the way of book deals, six-figure salaries, speaking engagements and consultant fees (an environment ripe for exploitation by ‘woke’ artists), but much, much less in the way of, say, protection against systemically racist policing for Black and Brown people like Floyd.

“Protest leaders didn’t march last summer to widen the trend of Black Lives Matter signs in tree-lined progressive neighborhoods, where Black neighbors are often conspicu-

ously absent because of classist zoning laws,” Smith adds.

“While many cultural shifts have been welcome, it’s not clear that people were protesting for things like greater demographic variety in the ads, magazine covers or entertainment that we consume.”

Quiet as it’s kept, in Oak Park and River Forest, there are a lot of Sonia Angells — high-achieving professionals who preach and “perform” equity in public, but who in their professional lives are working to uphold not only systems and practices of oppression, but also the worst aspects of modern institutions, including their tendency toward blind arrogance and rigid, often counterproductive, hierarchies.

In his 2020 book Toward Freedom: The Case Against Race Reductionism, Toure Reed writes that, since “the Cold War, liberals have tended to “abstract racial disparities from the political-economic forces that generate them,” tracing those disparities “to whites’ ingrained prejudices and poor blacks’ cultural deficiencies.”

According to this framework, embodied in the likes of Obama and Oprah, the antidotes to racial injustice are opportunity, education and personal responsibility. But as the case of Angell shows, simply installing Black and Brown faces in high places does not translate into institutional reform.

Frameworks of equity based on racial representation, diversity, “the culture of poverty” and ethnic pluralism touted by “postwar liberal policymakers” like t Clintons and Obama may result in the h historically diverse presidential cabinets a much breaking of the ubiquitous and g glass ceiling, but they often ignore much d deeper root problems.

“Liberals’ tendency to divorce race from cl class has had dire consequences for Africa American and other low-skilled workcan er Reed argues, I believe correctly. These ers,” po policy-makers “have generally ignored the im impact of issues such as automation, deindu dustrialization, public-sector retrenchment an the decline of the union movement on and Blacks.

“Instead, modern liberal antipoverty efforts have generally bound macroeconomic growth agendas to a mix of antidiscrimination policies, cultural tutelage, job training and punitive measures ranging from welfare reform to the carceral state.”

We need an equity framework that goes beyond racial reductionism and is based on the public good, which unfortunately isn’t currently en vogue among the jet-setting political class (just consider Obama’s and Clinton’s disdain for Bernie Sanders’ gruff championing of popular and necessary policies like Medicare for All and the Green New Deal).

It’s time we rethink our conception of ally-ship, placing a serious understanding of social structures, raw political power, economic solidarity and the public good at the center of any cross-racial alliance.

For example, if I’m governor and deep change means appointing a “too young, too blond, too Barbie” doctor who gets public service and can model true equitable leadership, then the job is hers.

And if I’m a white-collar, salaried employee at Amazon’s comfortable corporate offices in the Loop, then I’m speaking and acting out against the exploitation of wage workers at Amazon’s distribution centers.

If an institution has to endure bad optics in order to start genuinely looking at its own system and culture through a racial equity lens that is laser-focused on the economic and material roots of inequity, then so be it.

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Wednesday Journal, May 26, 2021

How to Make a Memoir Starting Tuesday, June 1, 6 to 8 p.m., Virtually with the Oak Park Public Library This summer, learn how to put your journal of notes, life experiences and more into memoir form. Meet twice a month, June through August. First, work on what makes a memoir. In July, the different types and themes of memoir writing is the focus, and in August, learn the specifics on how to write a memoir. Sessions begin with discussion and end with memoir-focused writing exercises. Continues Tuesdays July 6 and Aug. 3, 6-8 p.m., and Saturdays, June 26, July 24 and Aug. 28, 2-4 p.m. Register: oppl. org/calendar

Grief Journaling Workshop Sunday, May 30, 2 to 4 p.m., Zoom with the Oak Park Public Library For those experiencing the loss of a loved one, you are invited to try journaling. Session begins with prompts followed by time to journal. At the end, there is time to share (optional). Resources for writing, grief, where to get help and more are provided. Feel free to attend any or all sessions. Next up: June 27. Register: oppl.org/ calendar

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BIG WEEK May 26-June 2

Honor Veterans on Memorial Day Monday, May 31, 11 a.m., Peace Triumphant monument, Scoville Park, and on Zoom Hear welcoming remarks by Village President Vicki Scaman; Officers from the Oak Park Police will post the Colors and offer a rifle salute; The History Singers will lead patriotic singing; and “President Lincoln” will deliver his Gettysburg Address. The focus of remarks will be on the sacrifices made by our Vietnam War veterans. he ceremony will, of course, also recognize and honor all of our veterans, especially those who lost their lives in service to the country. Please turn out and help us do just that. Zoom meeting ID: 814 1081 4589, passcode: Decoration. Zoom via phone: 1-312-626-6799, meeting ID: 814 1081 4589, passcode: 432343900. Lake St. and Oak Park Ave., Oak Park.

The No Shush Salon

Piano Trio Concert

Thursday, May 27, 6:30 to 9 p.m., Zoom with the Oak Park Public Library Listen to performances by local creatives and share works-inprogress or newly finished endeavors. Presentations limited to 15 minutes. Spectators welcome. Register: oppl.org/calendar

Sunday, May 30, 3 p.m., Virtually with the Unity Temple Restoration Foundation Unity Chamber Music Series presents a performance with MingHuan Xu, violin, Alexander Hersh, cello, and Winston Choi, piano, pre-recorded at Unity Temple. The trio will perform William Grant Still’s Summerland, from Three Visions for solo piano; Claude Debussy’s Prelude to the Afternoon of a Faun; and Schubert’s Piano Trio in B-flat major. $20, household; $10, students. Event available for 48 hours. Register: utrf.org/event/piano-trio-concert

Sideyard Sounds Friday, May 28, 7 to 9 p.m., Compound Yellow See Angel Bat Dawid, who is “traversing the intriguing waters of experimentalism and the avant-garde to forward-reaching jazz and other modes that are expanding our vision of music.”

Concert held safely outdoors in the art-adorned yard. Next up; Friday, June 4, Marvin Tate and Bill MacKay, and Sunday, June 6, Kolmar Collective. $15. Register (or cash or card at the door): eventbrite.com/e/sistazz-of-tha-nitty-gritty-at-compoundyellows-side-yard-sounds-tickets-151832297489. 244 Lake St., Oak Park.

Rare Bird Preserves Mini-Market Thursdays, 8 to 10 a.m., side alley by Rare Bird Preserves Pick up pastries, produce, eggs, meat, beverages and more from Rare Bird and a curated selection of local vendors. 211 W. Harrison.

Fit/Lit Challenge Exhibition of Items from the Philippines Wednesdays through Saturdays, 1 to 5 p.m., Purple Sun Arts This Oak Park Arts District studio and gallery is celebrating Asian American and Pacific Islander Heritage Month in May with items including books, furniture, pineapple fiber clothing, jewelry and photos. 142 Harrison, Oak Park.

Register now. Runs Friday, June 4, through Saturday, September 4, Zoom, Discord Channel and various sites with the Chicago Literary Hall of Fame Here is a way to combine physical fitness with reading this summer. Join weekly socially-distanced outings to places like the Eugene Field Memorial in the Lincoln Park Zoo or the Gwendolyn Brooks statue in Brooks Park. Once, every other week, typically Sunday evenings, join Zoom sessions to talk about what’s been seen and read. Free; donation optional. More/register: chicagoliteraryhof.org/events_entry/ summer-2021-fit-lit

Alberto Aguilar and Alex Bradley Cohen Closing Exhibition Saturday, May 29, 5 to 9 p.m., Compound Yellow Celebrate the two artists who did a three-month Takeover Residency this spring. Both “This” (in the YZ Galleries) and “That__” (in the XGallery) will be on view.

See the final exhibit, “Everything!” by the artist pair. 244 Lake St., Oak Park.

Wednesday Journal, May 26, 2021

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5

Roosevelt becomes COVID vaccination HQ for students

By F. AMANDA TUGADE Staff Reporter

Faith Power doesn’t like needles, but on May 18, she mustered the courage to face her fears and joined over 160 students at the Roosevelt Middle School gym to get the COVID-19 vaccine. The 12-year-old Power was the last member of her family to receive the shot.

“I wanted my mom to be proud of me,” said Faith Power, turning to her mother Donna Power, as they sat in a designated observation area inside the brightly lit gym.

Moments before a nurse administered the shot, Faith, a Roosevelt sixth grader, placed her soccer ball on the floor and buried her face against her mother’s chest. Donna held onto Faith, wiping away her tears afterward.

When Donna first learned that Roosevelt was hosting a vaccination clinic for children between the ages of 12 and 15, she didn’t think twice about signing Faith up. Like many other parents and caregivers in the River Forest School District 90, Donna received an email with all the information. In just “two clicks,” she registered Faith for the May 18 clinic and filled out the consent forms.

“I’m very excited that the school put this opportunity out here for the kids,” said Donna, of River Forest. “It’s very important. …

Having the school do this was really good, because otherwise I wasn’t sure how I was going to get her vaccinated.”

The vaccination clinic held at Roosevelt was part of an ongoing effort by D90 to offer resources to families during the coronavirus pandemic. In the past few months, the district has partnered with Jewel-Osco, 7525 Lake St. in River Forest, and the Village of River Forest to provide the COVID-19 vaccine to its staff and local seniors 65 and older. With the May 18 clinic, D90 also reached out to other schools in the area and invited children who were eligible for the vaccine.

A total of 162 children received the first dose of the two-shot Pfizer COVID-19 vaccine at the May 18 clinic, said Dawne Simmons, communications and community outreach coordinator. While a majority of the children – approximately 150, according to the district’s final count – registered ahead

of the clinic, the district also welcomed eight walk-ins. Children are required to return June 8 to receive the final dose.

“I always believe that the schools are the hub of a community, and if there’s an institution in a community that could bring people together, it’s the school,” Roosevelt Principal Larry Gartski said. “If we’re talking about children being vaccinated, what better place to have it than at the school they go to?”

Superintendent Ed Condon mirrored Gartski’s sentiments and added the district was fortunate to partner with the local Jewel-Osco and the village. Together, they were able to work together and be resourceful, especially during a critical time.

“All of those things are writ large reflec-

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tions of the way in which the community thinks and acts in accordance with the principles and values they believe in,” Condon said. “That’s an amazing testament to the village of River Forest.”

Like Donna Power, Therese Menezes was among the group of parents who came to the clinic and sought to get her son vaccinated.

Like Donna’s daughter, Therese’s son, Luke, was also the last member of the family to get the COVID-19 vaccine.

Therese’s husband, who is a physician and considered a frontline worker, was the first in their family, while she and her 16-yearold daughter followed soon after. With Luke, 12, now eligible, Therese said she could not wait to start planning her family’s summer vacation.

“If we don’t do our part, we can’t travel,” Therese said.

As Luke waited in line for his turn, he gave a thumbs-up to indicate he was OK and not nervous. And after the nurse administered the shot, Luke gave the same gesture – another thumbs-up – and headed over to find a seat in the observation area.

Outside the gym, the Powers settled on the school’s soccer field. After sitting in the observation area for 15 minutes, Faith Power and her mother decided to kick the ball around, enjoying the warmth of a late spring day, before going home. The moment Faith feared earlier was now behind her.

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Wednesday Journal, May 26, 2021

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Oak Park wins pension case against former manager Village not required to authorize pension credit purchases

By STACEY SHERIDAN

so,” Barwin’s original filing argued.

Following the judgment, Barwin told Wednesday Journal in an email that he Oak Park’s former village manager, Tom planned to appeal, stating that the village Barwin, will not receive a pension for his was denying him his retirement despite time serving as the village’s top adminis- his service to Oak Park. trative official, according to an April 30 “As someone who has worked to be fair court ruling by Judge Mary M. Rowland. to all employees over four decades of pub“The terms of Barwin’s emlic service, we will continue to ployment agreement are unseek justice in my case,” Barambiguous and did not require win wrote in the email.

Oak Park to authorize the Unless an employee purchaspurchase of pension credits,” es out-of-state pension credits, Rowland wrote in the summary the Illinois Municipal Retirejudgment. ment Fund pensions require Citing breach of contract, eight years of employment.

Barwin attempted to sue the vilBarwin had worked just over lage of Oak Park for refusing to five years with the village at the time of his resignation, during allow him to purchase out-ofwhich was under the leadership state pension credits following TOM BARWIN of then-president David Pope. his compulsory resignation in Barwin was given the option 2012. The case against the village was filed two years after on Aug. 6, of resigning or being fired during a private meeting with Pope and then-trustee 2014.

“Additionally, after Mr. Barwin’s forced Colette Lueck, according to his original filresignation, the village refused to allow ing. If he resigned, Barwin would receive a Mr. Barwin to purchase reciprocal out-of- board-directed severance package.

“Any manager works at the pleasure of state pension credits, despite the fact that the village had assured him it would do the board,” Lueck told Wednesday Journal.

Staff Reporter

“His contract was up, and I think the consensus of the board was that he wasn’t the right fit for the moment.”

When he agreed to resign, his case argued that Pope had given Barwin verbal assurance to allow purchase of pension credits. Wednesday Journal has reached out to Pope for comment.

In his email to Wednesday Journal, Barwin wrote that he believed that the private meeting when he tendered his resignation was in violation of multiple statutes, including the Open Meetings Act, village code and the Illinois Public Records Act. Barwin also shared that he believed he was forced to resign to keep from speaking out against a board member’s illicit spending to fund an unnecessary project.

“I believe at least one key elected official who guided the effort was concerned that I would publicly reveal he authorized an expenditure of over $25,000 for a pet project, which was a violation of the village code, and eventually paid after my departure,” Barwin wrote. “He did not want a potential political foe to be aware of this.”

Only five employees, including Barwin’s predecessor, had been permitted by the village of Oak Park to purchase the credits,

according to Rowland’s summary judgment. Barwin contended that this supported his breach of contract claim.

“Despite the fact that the last village manager was authorized to purchase pension credits and Oak Park has apparently never denied such a request before Barwin’s, the Court cannot find that this is ‘customary’ or ‘usual’ enough to constitute a ‘practice,’” Rowland wrote in the summary judgment.

It had been 11 years since an employee had asked for authorization to purchase pension credits at the time of Barwin’s request.

Barwin went on to serve as city manager in Sarasota, Florida, after leaving Oak Park. The Sarasota Herald-Tribune reported that he was slated to retire from the role on Dec. 31 of last year.

He told Wednesday Journal that he hoped an appeal would bring “justice” to his case.

“Of all the places I have or could have served, with its history of defending and advancing fairness and equity, Oak Park was the last place I thought a board would act in such an unethical and, as we have learned, an illegal and certainly unfair manner.”

With waste contract expiring, OP trustees offer new ideas Village seeking proposals for new collection contract

By STACEY SHERIDAN Staff Reporter

One man’s trash is another man’s $2-million-dollar hauling opportunity. Oak Park’s village board Monday voted to have staff to issue a request for proposal (RFP) for municipal solid waste collection for issuance in June. And several trustees offered up new ideas for leaf collection and other items they want to see in the RFP. “This is a very lucrative contract that we have, so we expect some significant interest,” Public Works Director John Wielebnicki told the board during its May 24 meeting.

Oak Park’s current five-year waste collection contract expires April 1, 2022 but Wielebnicki brought it to the board now in advance of the upcoming budget cycle.

“We’ve been working on our proposal for several months now,” said Wielebnicki.

Waste collection is financed by taxpayers through the village’s environmental services fund. The village receives primary hauling services under the contract:

refuse, recycling, yard waste, food scraps or composting, fall leaf collection and hazardous waste.

The contract is only responsible for collecting waste in single-family homes up to five-unit buildings. Anything larger, commercial or residential, is not included in the contract, either under village ordinance or state statute, according to Wielebnicki.

“Those other entities typically do their due diligence searching out other haulers,” said Wielebnicki.

Staff recommended seeking base pricing built on its current program, keeping the size of receptacles, the opt-in composting program, leaf collection and hazardous waste pick-up the same, while looking at possible alternatives for a universal composting program with a smaller cart and changes to leaf collection.

Due to the lengthy proposal, waste hauling companies have a month to respond to the RFP. Wielebnicki expects reviewing submitted applications to take “some time.”

The village is in the process of drafting the RFP. The presentation shown to the board was previously reviewed by the village’s Environment and Energy Commission. Wielebnicki told the village board

“I think people should just keep their leaves on their lawn because it’s better [for the environment].”

ARTI WALKERPEDDAKOTLA Oak Park village trustee

he wanted to return to the commission to show pricing and receive their concurrence.

Wielebnicki hoped to receive final approval of a hauling contractor by January

for education and implementation, so that the village is ready to transition to the new contractor by March.

Trustee Susan Buchanan asked that the RFP include a commitment from haulers to not sell and ship out to other countries plastics that could not be recycled in the United States. Those items often end up in landfills.

She told the board she wanted to see the leaf collection program switched to a bagging program, where residents would pay to have their leaves picked up by buying stickers to place on bags of waste. Currently fall leaves are raked into the street and collected by waste haulers.

Trustee Jim Taglia wanted the village to get public input from residents before removing traditional leaf pick up, while Trustee Arti Walker-Peddakotla was glad to have the village board consider removing leaf pick up from the waste management collection program.

“I haven’t agreed with that expense,” she said. “I think people should just keep their leaves on their lawn because it’s better [for the environment].”

The village board unanimously approved the resolution to allow staff to issue an RFP ahead of the expiration of its current waste hauling contract.

OAKPARK.COM | RIVERFOREST.COM

Colin Fane, Agent

Getting the lead out in River Forest

212 S Marion Street Fl G Oak Park, IL 60302 Bus: 708-383-3163 www.colinfane.com Monday & Friday 9am-5pm own the water service lines from the Buffalo Service line replacement boxes to their buildings.

Tues/Wed/Thurs 9am-7pm To be eligible, property owners are reprogram approved by village Saturday quired9am-12pm to use plumbing contractors who are licensed and bonded in the village and must submit a reimbursement request. Anderson Contributing Reporter said the village has budgeted $250,000 for the River Forest property owners who still program this year. Assuming all requests have lead service lines gained an incentive for reimbursement would be for the full to replace them when officials unanimously amount, that would allow 33 property ownapproved the creation of a lead service line ers to take advantage. Anderson said if the replacement program at the May 24 village number of reimbursement requests exceed the amount budgeted, he would expect offiboard meeting.

As is common in municipalities through- cials to re-evaluate “at that time.” However, out Illinois, water service lines leading to he added, “This is a program we plan to conbuildings in the village constructed before tinue.”

According to Anderson, Illinois officials 1986 are likely to feature lead. Because no safe blood level has been identified for are considering legislation that would reyoung children, all sources of lead expo- quire municipalities to have a plan in place sure for children should be controlled or for replacement of all lead service lines by eliminated, according to the U.S. Centers April 15, 2027, with 14 years to complete. He for Disease Control. The U.S. Environmen- added that grant money to support such protal Agency has set the maximum contami- grams could be available through the state.

In response to a question from Trustee Ernant level goal for lead in drinking water at State Farmika Bachner regarding the number of lead zero because lead can be harmful to human Bloomington, IL service lines in the village, Anderson also health even at low exposure levels.

2001290 To encourage residents to eliminate lead said the village’s planned automatic meterservice lines, the program offers property ing infrastructure project will allow staff owners partial reimbursement for costs members to update the inventory of water related to replacing them. John Anderson, service pipe for all buildings throughout the public works director, said there are approx- village. The $1.32 million project will entail imately 3,200 water customers in the village. upgrading water meters throughout the vilUnder the program, the village will pro- lage with state-of-art equipment that will allow the village to obtain meter readings vide reimbursement for the full amount of replacing the village-owned portion of the without requiring public works staff memwater service line up to $5,000 and 50 percent bers to perform a “drive-by” read, which is of the cost to replace the property owner’s the current practice.

Lisa Scheiner, acting village administraportion up to $2,500. The village owns the water service lines from the water mains tor, said staff members will begin promotto the Buffalo boxes, and property owners ing the program this week.

By ROBERT J. LIFKA

Wednesday Journal, May 26, 2021

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Property tax appeals now open The Cook County Assessor’s office has announced that it will be accepting appeals of the assessed valuations of Oak Park properties between May 17 and June 16, 2021. According to Oak Park Township Assessor Ali ElSaffar, individuals looking for assistance in filing appeals should feel free to contact his office at (708) 383-8005 to set up appointments during the appeal period.

“All Oak Park properties were reassessed in 2020, and most of the values set in 2020 will remain unchanged until Oak Park’s next reassessment in 2023,” ElSaffar said.

“Because the 2020 reassessment was such an important part of the tax process, many people believe that assessed values can only be appealed during a reassessment year. But since property values can change

from year to year, assessed values can be appealed in any year, including 2021.”

Although ElSaffar expects to see fewer appeals in 2021 compared to 2020, there are some circumstances where taxpayers may want to appeal this year. One such situation arises when the county assessor sends notices of reassessment for properties that have had significant changes in the last year, such as the construction of a new building or an addition to an existing building. The 2021 appeal period also allows taxpayers to bring attention to changes in the value of their properties over the last year.

Finally, taxpayers who missed the deadline for appealing their 2020 assessed values can contest their values for the 2021 tax year.

Call Jill at (708) 524-8300 or visit OakPark.com/subscribe

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Like many parents during the early days of the pandemic, Kristen Sposeep struggled to find a fun-but-worthwhile project to occupy her 5-year-old son Griffin last summer.

“Griffin really wanted to work on a garden, so we got a big box in the backyard to start growing things,” Sposeep told Wednesday Journal.

String beans were his favorite thing to grow last year, but vegetables weren’t the only things budding in the backyard of the Sposeeps’ Oak Park Avenue home. Shortly after setting up their garden, the green thumbed-Spooseeps noticed that the adult children of their next-door neighbors had also started planting a garden across the fence separating the yards.

“One just graduated from college and the other is normally at med school, but they came home because of the pandemic,” said Sposeep of the neighbors.

Despite the difference in age, Griffin quickly bonded over a shared interest in gardening with medical student Emma Dunne and her brother Will, the recent graduate.

“They started sharing information and seeds and talking,” Sposeep recalled.

The gardeners kept safely separated by physical distance due to COVID-19, but Griffin’s attachment to Dunne grew, which did not go unnoticed by his mother.

“He would be like, ‘I love her. I want to marry her. She’s amazing,’” Sposeep said.

Dunne grew quite fond of Griffin as well, calling their friendship “organic.”

“It was a blast getting to know Griffin and having an outdoor study break to look forward to,” said Dunne.

Along with string beans, the Sposeeps planted lettuce, kale, carrots, corn — even watermelon.

As the plants began to produce, the two began exchanging tiny tokens of their friendship, according to Sposeep. Griffin would wake up from his nap to find Dunne had left him little presents of cherry tomatoes.

“We brought them potato seeds, starters and things,” said Sposeep.

Dunne also received homemade challah.

Griffin would help make the bread at preschool, but the family continued baking challah while in lockdown. She even got a bouquet of flowers from Griffin.

Now that Dunne is back at school, her little neighbor hasn’t forgotten about her.

Dunne remains a star in Griffin’s eyes.

They’ve even struck up a pen pal correspondence.

“Do you stare longingly out the window, hoping she comes into the back yard every

Photo provided by Kristen Sposeep

GROWING FRIENDS: Griffin Sposeep and Emma Dunne, next door neighbors, have bonded over their gardens. day?” Sposeep asked her son, who replied with a sheepish, “Yeah.”

Dunne told Wednesday Journal that the experience last summer reminded her of her own childhood with older neighbors.

“My brother and I grew up crafting and cooking with our neighbors to the south,” Dunne said. “Gardening with Griffin is one more of those fun activities made possible by neighbors in Oak Park.”

Griffin has already started working on his garden this summer and his little sister is starting to get involved.

While Dunne won’t be around as much, her brother Will has stepped up in her absence. Will Dunne has been making the trek from his Chicago apartment to help Griffin with his vegetable patch.

“That meant everything to Griffin,” said Sposeep, tearing up.

Griffin has shown greater interest in eating vegetables since starting the garden, and the neighborly friendship has brought joy during an otherwise difficult and lonely period.

The friendship has certainly meant a lot to Griffin, but he doesn’t quite grasp how much the kindness of the two young adults has impacted his parents.

“Will and Emma are just wonderful people,” Sposeep said. “I can only hope that my kids would treat someone the way they’re treating mine.”

Wednesday Journal, May 26, 2021

OAKPARK.COM | RIVERFOREST.COM

9

Woman on hunger strike for reparations awareness

By MICHAEL ROMAIN Equity Editor

A 72-year-old woman is currently on a hunger strike in order to raise awareness and support for H.R. 40, a federal bill that if passed into law would establish a commission to study and develop proposals for reparations for Blacks.

Rachelle Zola said as a white woman, she did not have much awareness of the country’s long racial history, adding that she grew up in Long Island, New York and lived in Colorado, Virginia and Arizona, before moving to Chicago in 2019.

“I didn’t have a clue as to the depth of the harm done not only to the African American community but also to our nation by 245 years of systemic racist policies and actions,” she said.

Zola said that she is pursuing the hunger strike in solidarity with the “countless people who have worked tirelessly for decades and who continue to do so today to pass H.R. 40.”

Zola started her strike on Sunday. On May 16, Dominican University, 7900 Division St. in River Forest, organized an event on its outdoor quad commemorating the launch of Zola’s hunger strike. The event featured speakers, poets, artists and musicians.

Cosmopolitan United Church, 1112 N. 9th Ave. in Melrose Park, is hosting Zola during the day for the duration of her hunger strike. The church’s pastor, Juan Pablo Her-

rera, has invited community members to visit with Zola every day and to pray for her during the hunger strike.

“She’s committed to the hunger strike for as long as her body can sustain it,” said Amy Omi, the university minister for Liturgy and the Arts at Dominican, during an interview last week.

During an interview in February, Sheila Radford-Hill, Dominican’s recently retired chief diversity officer, said the River Forest university is one of about three dozen campuses across the country that the Association of American Colleges and Universities (AACU) have designated Truth, Racial Healing and Transformation Centers (TRHT).

Omi, Dominican’s TRHT coordinator, said that supporting Zola’s hunger strike fits squarely within the university’s mission.

“I was immediately struck and I thought, ‘This is something that Dominican University should get behind and sponsor,’” Omi said, referencing Zola’s efforts to raise awareness about the Congressional reparations bill.

“There’s this language around narrative change, which is related to reparations work and the narrative change piece is being able to center voices that have traditionally been erased and marginalized within the mission or heritage story of a college or university or, frankly, the church.”

Colette Davion, an adjunct instructor at Dominican, said that Zola “wants to be in sol-

SHANEL ROMAIN/Contributor

Rachelle Zola went on a hunger strike to raise awareness for a federal reparations bill. idarity with everyone, she doesn’t want this to be about her. One of the concerns she had is that people will say, ‘What’s in it for this white woman.’ Her end goal is basically to get this bill passed and to use her white voice and her white body to raise awareness.”

According to a New York Times report, the House Judiciary Committee voted 25 to 17 along partisan lines last month to ad-

vance the legislation establishing the commission, but the bill still faces steep odds.

“With opposition from some Democrats and unified Republicans, who argue that Black Americans do not need a government handout for long-ago crimes, neither chamber of Congress has committed to a floor vote,” the Times explained.

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Wednesday Journal, May 26, 2021

OAKPARK.COM | RIVERFOREST.COM

School expulsions seen as the opposite of inclusion

Collaboration’s Equity Summit tells personal stories

can’t even blame the program. It’s a matter of resources.”

Barriga, a member of the bilingual parent advisory committee at Oak Park Elementary School District 97, was one of a few guests who spoke at a panel during the Collaboration for Early Childhood’s inaugural equity summit. The free event — which included a panel and breakout discussions — aimed to bring people from Oak Park together and talk about what equity means and what it looks like inside the classroom and around the community.

As Barriga shared her story, she thought about the struggle to find the right doctor to evaluate her son and to find a new preschool program. Barriga recalled reaching out to developmental specialists and scrambling to make sure those providers were covered by her insurance while juggling her day job.

Barriga said she considered herself lucky because she had the financial resources and often leaned on her group of mom friends for emotional support and advice.

“I can’t give up on my child,” she said. “If he has a sensory disorder, he needs to get the help that he needs because he’s 4 now. What

By F. AMANDA TUGADE Staff Reporter

When Marta Barriga was told by school administrators that her toddler son was being expelled, she was stunned. Barriga said that was the first time she even learned about her 3-year-old’s “aggressive” behavior toward teachers and other students. His behavior supposedly changed, after he returned from winter break and his favorite teaching assistant was no longer there.

“There’s a lot of guilt and shame and sadness,” Barriga said, as she opened up during a Zoom meeting May 22 to a virtual room packed with parents, educators, researchers and community residents. Her voice wavering, Barriga said she wasn’t sure why her son was acting this way and felt helpless when the school turned her family away.

“We need to speak up,” Barriga said, her eyes tearing. “We need to help. I don’t know how, but we need to share these stories. “I

happens when he’s in first grade and [he’s] not able to read or write or stay put?”

During the panel, Sarai Coba-Rodriguez, an assistant professor of educational psychology at the University of Illinois at Chiago, reminded Barriga that she was not alone and spoke in-depth about her research project, which centered on school expulsion.

Thousands of preschoolers between 3 and 4 years old are being expelled from school across the nation for what can be seen as normal developmental behavior, including biting, throwing toys or excessive crying, Coba-Rodriguez said. She shared furtherathat students of color are also more likely to face expulsion than their white counterparts.

Being expelled is “detrimental” for parents and caregivers, as well as students, Coba-Rodriguez said. The entire family loses access to a network of support systems.

Keynote speaker withdraws, unhappy with police participation Chief Reynolds also chose to step back from event The initial plan for the Collaboration for Early Childhood’s first Equity Summit was for it to run for roughly four hours, but a disagreement among speakers cut the event in half. John Borrero, the collaboration’s executive director, said the dissonance that transpired days ahead of the May 22 event served as a tough reminder for all participants that the conversation around equity can be hard.

One of the original panels sought to explore the importance of equity in early childhood settings and invited community leaders such as Oak Park Police Chief LaDon Reynolds to be part of the discussion.

Borrero said his organization had learned about the department’s initiatives on equity, especially for young children, and one of the goals for the summit was to bring different people to the table.

The presence of a police department representative, however, did not sit well with keynote speaker, Akiea “Ki” Gross, founder of Woke Kindergarten. Gross, whose organization hosts anti-racism read alouds and educates youth and families on liberation, felt unsafe with Oak Park police as part of the program and pulled out of the event, Borrero said. Other panelists, including the police department, decided to take a step back from the event, as well, Borrero added.

ally care about what hap“There was nothing for pens to children in our us to do except honor that communities. I think it’s request,” Borrero said. “We natural that there would be want everyone in this space an emotional connection to feel safe, and that was our to that topic, and when you goal: to create a place where have people in the room everyone can speak.” who are emotionally atIn a brief Twitter thread, tached to a topic, I think it Gross told their followers lends itself to these kinds why they decided to back out of deep conversations.” of the summit.

AKIEA KI GROSS Borrero also believed “I cannot align myself w/ the event, overall, was still [sic] any entity, person or otherwise that thinks p*lice [sic] should be a success and said he does not consider the in convo [sic] about early childhood equity “dissonance” between some of the panelfor Black & [sic] brown children,” Gross ists as a negative. Borrero said it did not said May 22, the day of the event. “I’m still detract from the vision of the summit, as processing the harm, & [sic] am not in a the event continued to move the conversaplace to divulge further, but I wanted to tion of equity forward. share my absence for those who might’ve “Everyone who walks into that has a difbeen attending today. ferent take and different experience that “p*lice [sic] are not community helpers. informs their understanding of equity, they [sic] have no place in our communi- and those are what I think are the areas ties, schools or otherwise. abolition or where sometimes people’s differences nothing,” they continued. come out,” he said.

Borrero shared that for some “We’re really proud that we’re part of people, talking about equity this community and proud of the role and and access to education, re- the commitment that we’ve seen from the sources and opportunities can community,” Borrero said, adding that often be personal and passion- one of the main messages here is the orate. ganization will strive to create a safe space “When people talk about for people to talk, learn and build. young children, they get emoGross and Reynolds could not be immetional. They think about their diately reached for comment. children,” he said. “People re-

CHIEF LADON REYNOLDS

Coba-Rodriguez also noted several factors come into play here when school officials do decide to suspend or expel a student. One example is that educators may have implicit bias. Teachers may not be equipped with the right skills to help handle their students’ behavior. Schools may also not have enough funding to support mental health and social-emotional resources, she said.

Coba-Rodriguez shared that most of the research on expulsion is written from the perspective of teachers, directors or state policies, but her investigation is founded on families’ experiences. Coba-Rodriguez and her research partner, Kate Zinsser, are taking a look at what happens to families after their children are thrown out of school and their journey to find new academic opportunities. This is about “access, affordability and quality,” Coba-Rodriguez said.

Other panelists such as Beronica Puhr of the Oak Park Public Library shared what equity looks like among her staff and the children they serve. Puhr, who manages the library’s middle school services, said she and her colleagues have worked to help families facilitate issues of racism and biases.

Some staff members are also trained to hold peace circles, a model used in discussions that often address conflicts, needs and healing for participants.

“What the young adults are seeing, even as young as 7 years old, 6 years old, the [biases] that started out early [have] seeped into them from their families or even within their school system,” Puhr said. “They are aware of it, and they want to say something about it.”

As the two-and-a-half-hour event came to a close, keynote speaker Gina Harris offered some of her thoughts. Harris, who is on the Oak Park and River Forest High School board and works at Percy Julian Middle School as a climate and culture coach, shared her screen with the audience and pointed to a slide that depicted many messages and sayings on equity.

“Anti-racism is a process of unlearning, co-learning, engaging and enacting,” said Harris, as she read one of the messages aloud.

The only way to end the conversation was to stop talking about action and taking that step – whatever it may be – to further the mission.

“We are the system. We are it,” she said.

“We make it up, and every single thing we do needs to be addressing it. What on an individual basis are you going to do? Whatever board, community, group you ascribe to, [what] are you going to do? How do we support the collaboration and do what we all say we are about?”

Wednesday Journal, May 26, 2021

OAKPARK.COM | RIVERFOREST.COM

Is Oak Park ready for a sustainability incubator?

Exciting News in 2021!

Trustee Ravi Parakkat thinks so

MAJOR RENOVATION!

on the 3.29-acre plot of land that formerly housed concrete manufacturer J. Mohr & Sons Co. The property was previously under contract but went back on the market almost a year ago when the buyer backed out due to

By STACEY SHERIDAN the uncertainty of the COVID-19 pandemic.

Staff Reporter Parakkat ran his trustee campaign based What if teenagers not on the college track in part on a platform of increasing the vilhad the opportunity to gain work experi- lage’s sustainability efforts, having served ence in fields that promote environmental on the Environment and Energy Commissustainability, while simultaneously at- sion, as well as the ad hoc Climate Action tracting the investment of green-minded Planning Team.

“Sustainability has to be a foorganizations in the village of cus for humanity in general,” he Oak Park? It may sound ambisaid. tious, but Trustee Ravi ParakThe incubator is a chance to kat believes Oak Park has the make good on campaign promwherewithal to turn the idea of a ises. And the village doesn’t sustainability incubator into an have to foot the entire bill. Partapproaching reality. nerships with businesses, non“Investing in our future is how profits, universities and neighI look at sustainability,” Parakboring communities could help kat said. fund its creation, said Parakkat, In an interview with Wedneswho does not have an estimated day Journal, the recently elected cost for the incubator but said Parakkat elaborated on his vision for a sustainability incubait hinges on the village board’s tor, an idea he first presented commitment. during the village board’s May “It’ll depend on the scope as 17 goal setting discussion but we define it, so if we are looking one that has been bouncing at acquiring the land, and havaround his brain for months. ing developers come in, there is “It’s been a long time coming,” a long process, and the scope of he said. activities will decide the kind of RAVI PARAKKAT At the May 17 meeting, Parakpartnerships and the cost associVillage Trustee kat asked the board to consider ated with that,” said Parakkat. conducting a feasibility study to Parakkat envisions a future identify the cost and timeframe, where Oak Park is a hub of susas well as the overall possibility, tainability with the incubator of carrying out such a venture. serving as its environmentally Parakkat’s incubator idea was conscious epicenter. He sees the met with modest interest from the board, incubator also as an outlet for wider engagewhose members were advised to keep goals ment with surrounding villages to reverse reasonable. But Parakkat doesn’t believe the climate change, while bolstering camaradeconcept is entirely exorbitant either. The in- rie among neighbors. cubator could start humbly, then grow over “I really believe that it’s got the opportutime. nity to bring other communities together.”

“It could be as simple as a training facility that provides our youth, not just from Oak Park but from all neighboring communities, to come in and get skilled in terms of being able to participate in a clean energy economy of the future,” said Parakkat. “It could then build from there in terms of attracting investments.”

A feasibility study, Parakkat said, could help the village determine a jumping off point, as well as identify areas for future development. The board could then compile You can get local news delivered the study’s findings into a list of short-term and long-term objectives based on cost, urright to your email in-box. gency and time.

Sign up for FREE at OakPark.com “That would be the most prudent approach because of the complex nature of something like this,” Parakkat said.

As for potential locations, he has his eye

“Sustainability has to be a focus for humanity in general.”

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Wednesday Journal, May 26, 2021

OAKPARK.COM | RIVERFOREST.COM

May Is Mental Health Month You are not alone Did you know that nearly one in five U.S. adults live with a mental illness, according to the National Institute of Mental Health?

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Wednesday Journal, May 26, 2021

OAKPARK.COM | RIVERFOREST.COM

13

Smooth start to the Farmers Market

By MELISSA ELSMO Oak Park Eats Editor

The Oak Park Farmers Market began its 46th season on Saturday May 22. The laid-back atmosphere and return to the Pilgrim Church parking lot brought a sense of normalcy back to the Oak Park community.

“We started the day at 4:30 a.m. with a smooth set-up, followed by vendor placement at 6 a.m. that worked like a dream,” said Cameron Davis, the village’s assistant director of development customer services and staff liaison to the farmers market commission.

With vendors in place in the parking lot at Lake and Elmwood, the market opened promptly at 7 a.m. and welcomed 3,239 customers over the six hours the market was open. This represents an 85% increase in attendance over the first market last year. The opening market of 2020, held a week later during the height of the pandemic, was the smallest of the season with 1,750 attendees.

Vendors were well organized with plentiful amounts of asparagus, cheeses, local honey, garden plants and artisan breads available for sale. By closing time Breadman bread sold out and fresh rhubarb had become scarce.

While customers are required to travel one-way in a counterclockwise loop, they are free to loop around multiple times while shopping bringing back a more leisurely feel to the 2021 market.

The unmistakable scent of frying donuts lingered in the air. The popular sweet treats were available for purchase inside the market and were also accessible from the alley outside the market. After being sidelined last year, the farmers market band returned to the market. Musicians were positioned on the lawn in front of Pilgrim Church to entertain market goers.

The Oak Park Farmers Market is open every Saturday, rain or shine, in the Pilgrim Church parking lot from 7 a.m. to 1 p.m. through Oct. 30. Masks are required.

SHANEL ROMAIN/Contributor

HOME GROWN: A good sized crowd turned out Saturday for the opening of the Oak Park Farmers Market.

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Wednesday Journal, May 26, 2021

OAKPARK.COM | RIVERFOREST.COM

Flat-fee dining delivery service enters Oak Park market Competing with Grubhub, Delivery First partners with restaurants

By MELISSA ELSMO Oak Park Eats Editor

While restaurants are opening-up and dine in business is on the rise, the pandemic has made ordering dinner a habit for many people and delivery demand remains high in the food industry.

And that change in customer behavior is likely to keep restaurants searching for affordable delivery options in the face of DoorDash and Grubhub’s high percentage takes.

The pandemic pitted many restaurants against third party delivery services, but now Delivery First, a restaurant focused food delivery startup, has entered the Oak Park market and aims to disrupt the gig economy and do away with percentage-based fees.

Delivery First was started by restaurant owners who were trying win the delivery battle, but they could not make the math work. Anthony Gambino, CEO of Delivery First, tried to find a reliable third-party delivery service for his restaurants well before the pandemic hit.

“All the services compromised our cashflow.

Even though we were doing more deliveries our profits were down overall,” said Gambino. “It was clear we needed to get out of the delivery business or get way more in.”

Gambino is a partner in the Victory Restaurant Group which recently opened Victory Italian on Marion Street. He also owns Armand’s franchises from the family-owned businesses on North Avenue in Elmwood Park.

Disillusioned with the expensive, order-generating, mark-up machines delivery services had become, Gambino chose to dive into the business.

Delivery First is structured more like a courier service than food delivery services like Grubhub or DoorDash in charging a flat fee per order. The newcomer aims to lower costs to restaurant owners who have paid more than 30% of every delivery order to Grubhub and DoorDash.

Restaurants are often forced to raise prices to account for the fees associated with third party delivery services. The same dish that may cost $12 when ordered in a restaurant may cost more than $20 when listed on a third-party delivery site. Restaurants raise prices to cover high fees.

Delivery First aims to offer clarity to both restaurant owners and customers. With a flat fee of $7 per order restaurants can leave their menu prices alone and simply charge customers a delivery fee they feel is appropriate.

Unlike the independent contractors affiliated with some services, Delivery First is employee based. Drivers are paid an hourly wage plus tips with a guaranteed threshold. Drivers can contribute to a 401K and are eligible for workman’s compensation should they be injured on the job.

Because drivers are on-demand employees they are paid for the entirety of their shift and their vehicles are insured through Delivery First minimizing liability risk exposure for restaurant owners. Standardized uniforms are provided for all delivery drivers as well.

Additionally, Delivery First will deliver for a restaurant no matter how the order is generated.

“When customers call a restaurant looking for delivery they are often told to hang up and order through an app,” said Gambino. “Sales can be lost this way, but with Delivery First, restaurant employees themselves can request a delivery though our service no matter what method a customer uses to place an order.”

Though Delivery First is transport focused, they responded to customer demand and now offer an online ordering app and website. Participating restaurants do not have to utilize the service to access delivery drivers, but the fees are very affordable — just $1.50 for each order placed directly through the Delivery First website and $1 if the order is placed through the Delivery First on a restaurant’s website. Ordering fees for Grubhub or DoorDash can climb to 20% of an order.

Gambino and his team began building the Delivery First app in 2017 and took on their first client in Elmhurst in 2019. Though small, the company is now in a growth phase and actively expanding into what Gambino refers to as the “parks region. The area includes Oak Park, Forest Park and River Forest. Several Elmwood Park restaurants are using the service already and both Victory Italian and Poke Burrito in Oak Park have joined.

Sean Hennessy, president of Delivery First is an Oak Park resident and can see the benefits of the Delivery First service for restaurants in the community.

“I grew up in Elmhurst and Oak Park was our downtown,” said Hennessy. “Lake Street was our destination for shopping. I have been an Oak Park consumer since I could walk.”

When it came time to set down roots Hennessy naturally gravitated to Oak Park. Now the husband and father is excited to bring Delivery First to his hometown.

The Oak Park area is an emerging hub with a current team of 10 “on demand” drivers. As more restaurants join the program Delivery First is committed to hiring drivers from inside the community. The company currently employs 120 drivers, and the position has proven to be appealing to retirees and college students alike.

“Our goal is to be a local delivery partner,” said Hennessy. “We are not a nameless or faceless organization. We are looking to form meaningful local partnerships.”

MELISSA ELSMO/Editor

Jacques Shalo stands outside Kribi Coffee. The shop was named among the 10 best Chicago coffee shops by Chicago Social. Kribi Coffee serves a superior cup of coffee, at 7324 Madison St. in Forest Park.

Kribi Coffee named among 10 best by Chicago Social Forest Park shop blends beans, social justice

By MELISSA ELSMO Oak Park Eats Editor

Jacques Shalo, owner of Kribi Coffee, 7324 Madison St., was surprised and delighted to learn his Forest Park Air Roastery had been named one of the 10 best coffee shops in Chicago by food and drink editors at Chicago Social.

In an article posted on May 5 Chicago Social editors announced, “Cameroon native Jacques Shalo has given a welcome jolt of caffeine and a vibrant sense of social awareness to west suburban Forest Park,” before bringing attention to Kribi’s unique air roasting technology and dedication to partnering with organizations aiming to end systemic racism.

“This was a real honor,” said Shalo. “I was pleasantly surprised by the quick recognition. It really has been something to watch this happen over such a brief period of time.”

Kribi Coffee is just 2 years old and joins notable Chicago coffee shops including Intelligentsia, Dark Matter, and Metropolis on the tight list of 10.

Since opening in January 2019, Shalo has been working to carve out a unique identity for his independent roastery in the congested and competitive coffee shop business. Shalo credits Kribi’s “four tenants,” freshness, method, sourcing, and giving back, for catching the attention of Chicago Social.

“Fresh coffee doesn’t start with brewing,” said Shalo who sources green coffee beans and air roasts them in small batches on site.

Kribi coffee sources historically significant coffees with a growing focus on beans grown in Cameroon. In addition to sourcing with regional specificity in mind, Kribi is dedicated to putting more money into the pockets of coffee farmers and donating to local social justice causes. A portion of every bag of Kribi’s Black Lives Matter blend is donated to Tutoring Chicago.

Wednesday Journal, May 26, 2021

OAKPARK.COM | RIVERFOREST.COM

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Silent to the end, winning library trustee won’t serve Lofton attempted to withdraw, failed in the attempt, still not talking

By STACEY SHERIDAN Staff Reporter

The Oak Park Public Library swore in its new board of trustees May 25 (after the Journal’s print deadline), but Saria Lofton will not be among those taking the oath of office.

“Although I was elected to the library board trustee position, I will not be able to serve,” Lofton wrote in an email sent to library board president Matt Fruth and thenvillage clerk Vicki Scaman, now village president.

By not taking the oath of office, Lofton will effectively be resigning from the post necessitating that the board appoint someone else to fill the open seat.

While Wednesday Journal obtained the email May 20, Lofton sent it two days after the April 6 municipal election, in which she won the fourth open trustee seat with 17.75 percent of votes. The Journal has reached out to Lofton for comment.

Despite Lofton’s refusal to publicly state in the weeks after the election whether she intended to assume the office, the date of the email sent to Fruth and Scaman clears up any residual puzzlement over her plans.

The May 25 library board meeting will include discussion of how to proceed on an appointment, Fruth told Wednesday Journal.

The board will begin discussions regarding an appointment system following after being sworn in, he said.

“On our agenda is an action item for declaring a vacancy and then hopefully coming to a decision on a process for filling that vacancy,” Fruth said.

The Oak Park Public Library (OPPL) board will also vote on its next round of officers during the Tuesday meeting, which will occur after Wednesday Journal’s print deadline. The vote will determine whether Fruth will enter a new term as president.

Fruth contacted the elected trustees a few weeks back to find out what aspects they would like to have included in the appointment process.

“Just to start thinking about it so that we can be in a good spot when we start that discussion,” Fruth said.

Lofton’s win caused much confusion in

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Oak Park as Lofton had attempted to remove herself from consideration prior to election night but after the deadline had passed to remove a candidate’s name from the ballot.

Many wondered whether the seat would go automatically to Peter Prokopowicz, the candidate who came in fifth place. However, Lofton’s withdrawal was deemed unofficial under the Illinois Board of Elections regulations as she failed to notarize her statement of withdrawal, rendering it invalid and her win lawful.

Lofton never shared why she could not

serve on the library board in any of her communication with Wednesday Journal.

Neither did offer she a reason in her May 8 email to Fruth and Scaman.

The library board is subject to the Open Meetings Act. When the time comes to formally appoint a new trustee, the vote will take place in a public meeting.

Prokopowicz announced that he will not submit himself for consideration of the appointment in a written statement sent May 2 to Wednesday Journal. The statement also serves as an apology for previous offensive

jokes Prokopowicz made on social media at the expense of Asian Americans. Prokopowicz was widely criticized in the Oak Park community for his social media posts.

“Following the public discussions of my comments online, it is clear that not all members of the community have that confidence in me,” Prokopowicz’s statement reads. “I apologize to the Asian American community for the harm I caused, and I ask that the OPPL board not consider me as a replacement for Trustee-Elect Lofton if she resigns.”

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Wednesday Journal, May 26, 2021

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ART BEAT

Mural’s great, but her life’s the masterpiece Tia Etu turns walls into community canvases in Oak Park and Forest Park

By JOHN RICE

T

Contributing Reporter

ia Etu is an artist from Oak Park, who works in many different media, including painted murals. She received her first Forest Park commission when the owner of 810 Beloit asked her to paint a mural on the alley side of his building. She is currently creating a striking 11-by-22-foot work titled “Imagine.”

The owner requested something colorful , and fun, with movement. “Imagine” captures that vision. It depicts goldfish swimming through clouds. The joy in Tia’s work is in direct contrast to her troubled childhood.

She grew up in the South Side neighborhood of Chatham. It was a comfortable close-knit neighborhood, but her mother’s mental illness made Tia’s home life unstable. She attended the local Chicago Public School. She was an indifferent student, but teachers could see her potential.

They encouraged her to take art classes, join the yearbook staff and play in the band.

Tia, however, continued to get into trouble.

In seventh grade, she found herself in the principal’s office. She was asked to draw a picture of Mickey Mouse. When she displayed it on the bulletin board, her drawing drew great praise. “I’ve been creating art and staying out of trouble ever since,” she said.

Etu’s teachers not only mentored her, one of them secured a scholarship for her to attend the School of the Art Institute of Chicago (SAIC). She was there for three years before taking time off to see the masterpieces she had been studying. She spent six months in Europe visiting Paris and London.

After returning from Europe, she gave birth to her son, Skylar. She then landed a job as a loader at UPS. It was not only hard work, but dangerous. Tia lost a finger on her right hand but, thankfully, it did not hamper her artwork.

She completed her degree at SAIC and switched from loading trucks to teaching art classes and selling artwork. Etu was among the first artists to occupy a live-work place in the Oak Park Arts District on Harrison St. She has operated galleries in the district for 32 years. Her business is called Whatever Comes to Mind Studio, 27 Harrison Street.

Her studio displays paintings, drawings and jewelry. She also paints indoor and outdoor murals, including seven in Oak Park.

Many of her murals “strive to capture social

inequities in powerful and unique ways,” she said.

Etu has also participated in the Oak Park Sculpture Walk and worked with teens on art projects through the summer teen program at the Oak Park Public Library.

Those completed projects can be seen on the wall of the teen study room at the Main Library, 834 Lake St., and outside the Dole branch – a large peace sign mosaic sculpture stands outside the side entrance at 255 Augusta St. Etu has retained her adventurous spirit, traveling around the country and tooling through the city on her motorcycle. Her adventures over the years include teaching art in some of Chicago’s most impoverished neighborhoods. Many of the students are lost, like she was. She has a heart for her students and knows how to motivate them.

She recruited Skylar’s best friend, Ed Palasz, of Melrose Park, to help on “Imagine.” Ed is a house painter by trade, so he is handy with a brush. Tia hopes the work might lead to more commissions. She also hopes to own a warehouse, where she can install workstations for every kind of art she practices.

ALEX ROGALS/Staff Photographer

FLIGHT OF FANCY: The owner of 810 Beloit Ave. in Forest Park commissioned Oak Park artist Tia Etu to paint a mural, titled “Imagine,” on the side of his building. Etu has done the same on several buildings in Oak Park.

Wednesday Journal, May 26, 2021

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OPRF students seek grade relief in face of COVID-19 School board to discuss issue

By F. AMANDA TUGADE Staff Reporter

Members of the student-led organization Revolutionary Oak Park Youth Action League gathered outside Oak Park and River Forest High School May 19 and continued to demand District 200 officials reconsider its A through F grading policy as a way to help the Black and Brown students who are at risk of failing their second semester classes.

During a press conference, four members of ROYAL spoke up about how students of color have fallen behind throughout the school year, as they watched their communities confront issues of racial injustice and police brutality on top of the COVID-19 pandemic. The conference came off the heels of a May 18 meeting where ROYAL’s Black and Brown youth leaders met with district officials and urged them to not give failing grades during this semester.

“It’s not fair that we have to ask the school for empathy and equity during this time of death, gun violence and police violence,” said Chloe Leach, of ROYAL and a graduating senior, at the press conference.

OPRF sent a letter to school families and the community May 19 referencing the meeting between ROYAL and school officials. Included in that meeting were Supt.

Joylynn-Pruitt Adams, Associate Supt. (and incoming superintendent) Greg Johnson, Laurie Fiorenza, director of student learning, Sara Dixon Spivy, board president, and Gina Harris, board member.

At this point, D200 board members are set to meet May 25. If changes are made to the grading policy, they must be approved by the board, said Karin Sullivan, the high school’s communications director.

Sullivan added school administrators are already holding conversations on what other services and resources they can provide for students. “We recognize we’re coming back to school next year after a pandemic.

Kids are still going to be struggling and recovering from this worldwide trauma that they’ve experienced. So, those things are

Photo provided by Paul Goyette

MAKING DEMANDS: OPRF senior Chloe Leach spoke at a press conference May 19 about how Black and Brown students cannot focus on their schoolwork because they have watched their communities suffer from racial and police violence on top of the COVID-19 pandemic. under discussion now.”

Leach said she was hospitalized twice this past year and found it hard to just “step back into the swing of things” after her health recovered. While Leach was able to keep her grades up, she said she was lucky enough to have the “willpower” to study and to have support from her parents.

“I know that a lot of students don’t have two parents at home and the resources that I have, and it’s not fair that the school is expecting students to continue to get things done,” she said.

Among ROYAL’s list of demands, youth leaders are calling on the district to give students credit for their current classes and an option to opt out of grade-based assessments. They also want the district to prioritize their students’ mental health, especially as this year comes to a close, and to continue those efforts when school resumes in the fall.

In its statement, District 200 officials

shared the number of ways they have tried to help their students, especially those of color, throughout the pandemic. The district has already eliminated finals for the second semester and replaced it with Bridge Week, where students can work with teachers individually. Among many things, teachers have held office hours after school and the school has offered on-site and online tutoring.

“We care deeply about the success of all our students,” the district said in the statement. “We too are concerned about the inequitable ways that the pandemic and racial violence have affected our Black and Brown students.”

District officials said they have “deliberately enhanced our academic and socialemotional supports” so all students, “particularly those who struggled, have had equitable access to learning.”

For ROYAL organizer and OPRF parent Cynthia Brito, those efforts are just not enough. Brito believed that the school failed

to recognize racial and police violence as part of an ongoing pandemic toward communities of color.

“This is traumatic for students of color, but we still want them to get up and be on Zoom for hours and make up all semester work in one week – Bridge Week?” she said.

“You want to boast about Bridge Week?”

Brito said several Black and Brown students, including those in ROYAL and her own daughter, are failing classes. She went on to say the school should have revised its A through F grading policy sooner and not waited until the end of the second semester.

The final day for seniors like Leach was May 20, while the last day for underclassmen is May 27.

ROYAL has also called on the D200 school board to host an emergency meeting and discuss the policy.

Brito’s daughter, Marlene Menaz, and nephew Jacob Diaz, also spoke at the press conference about their shared frustrations.

“We’ve had family members pass away and have been severely affected by COVID-19,” said Diaz, a sophomore at OPRF. “Many of our parents are essential workers who have put their lives on the line so that society can continue to function. Many of us have been sick ourselves.”

Menaz, a freshman, added the fight to upend the grading policy isn’t about teens being “lazy,” “bad” or being on their “phones too much.” This was about their mental health.

“I don’t understand how the school doesn’t understand what we’re going through when there’s just so much, especially for youth,” said Menaz, adding she, herself, is failing her first year at OPRF. “There’s so much going on. There’s so much stress. There’s so much anger within us. It’s just so much.”

Menaz said her grades started slipping after she was diagnosed with COVID-19 last November, and she was not the only person in her family who suffered from the novel virus. Even though she recovered, Menaz, who was a straight A student, said she couldn’t keep up with the schoolwork and this is the first time she has received failing marks.

“Adults aren’t doing nothing for us,” she said. “The school’s not doing nothing for us.

It’s not a safe place for us.”

Growing Community.

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Wednesday Journal, May 26, 2021

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WEST

Once campaign season picked back up in 2018, he moved back to D.C. and started doing freelance photography for the presidential campaigns of New Jersey Sen. Cory Booker and Massachusetts Sen. Elizabeth from page 1 Warren.

“All of the candidates I’ve worked with are He applied for the position of photo editor, not thinking he’d get it, considering he had great,” West said. “I haven’t met anybody who is a jerk or anything, but [Booker] is one no connections to the campaign. of the most personable and most engaging “I assumed I’d never hear anything,” he people.

When we launched the campaign, I said. “I was planning to move from New met him at 6 a.m. and hung York to Washington D.C., to out in his kitchen for most see what I could find down of the day. He was doing here and as I was packing media calls. One moment, up, I got a call from the camhe gets off the phone after paign asking me to come in.” talking to his senior advisWest worked as one of ers and I’m kind of huddled roughly five staff photograin the corner of the room phers on Clinton’s campaign trying to not to make noise until it ended. What did he and he turns to me and says, think of his principal sub‘Hey Chandler, how do you ject? think I did on that call?’ He “I met Hillary Clinton a goes out of his way to make couple of times, but I spent sure everybody feels part of more time with other princiCHANDLER WEST the process and engaged.” pals, since she had her own White House Photographer West connected with the chief photographer,” West Joe Biden campaign just as said. “So I wasn’t superthe former vice president close to her personally, but was gaining unstoppable momentum after any time I interacted with her, she was super-close and warm. She’s a very caring per- his surprising landslide win in the South son. When people would get off the plane, Carolina primary. West had cultivated a relationship with Biden photographer Adam she’d get off and check on things, asking if everyone had their bags and if they needed Schultz while working on the Clinton campaign (Schultz is now Biden’s chief White anything.”

After the Clinton campaign, West moved House photographer).

“By the time I joined his campaign, Biden to California and worked roughly two years as a multimedia specialist with the Chan was basically the presumptive nominee and Zuckerberg Initiative, the philanthropy es- the campaign was kicking into high gear tablished by Facebook founder Mark Zuck- and hiring more staff,” West said. “That’s erberg and his wife. when I got a call from Adam asking to help

White House photographer

“When you walk up to the building, it glows from the sunlight kind of bouncing off the white and it’s definitely something you never get used to.”

AIRBNB

Shooting on Lombard from page 1 Radzinski and his family continued to observe the situation, sneaking glances out of the windows they were hiding beneath.

Radzinksi later posted his footage from the night on Facebook.

Police received three calls reporting the shooting and arrived at the location shortly after.

“We were pretty much on scene almost immediately,” said Rygh. Oak Park’s police station is one block north of the incident.

Fear did not set in for Radzinski until the day after the shooting.

“The adrenaline wore off,” he said. “Then I just broke down.”

Radzinski believes three firearms were discharged during the incident, as he overheard police say there were three different types of shell casings on the street.

“In the morning, they said that they have people in custody, and they recovered two

guns,” Radzinski said.

He told Wednesday Journal he saw police tag 22 shell casings up and down the neighborhood.

As the incident is still under investigation, the police department would not state whether either the victim or the three people in custody were the renters of the Airbnb. No charges have been filed yet.

Rygh told Wednesday Journal this shooting is unrelated to the one that occurred on the Austin Boulevard ramp off the Eisenhower Expressway at 12:07 a.m., May 22, which is being handled by the Illinois State Police.

The proximity of the police station to the Airbnb led Radzinski to believe that the people involved in the incident were not local.

He said people on social media are already pinning the blame on teenagers from the neighboring community of Austin, which he believes unfair.

“People need to know that the local people in Austin are good people,” Radzinksi said.

“They’re working their [expletive] off to get this stuff out of their neighborhood.”

Photo provided by The White House

INSIDE VIEW: Chandler West, once Wednesday Journal’s staff photographer, now works in the White House. him keep up with everything.”

West said that’s been his job ever since.

The days are long: “12 hours is probably a good day; sometimes they’re more like 15- or 16-hour days,” and the work is not always glamorous.

West helps manage a small staff of about six photographers who are charged with myriad tasks, not the least of which is ensuring that the White House “jumbos” (the large-scale prints hanging up throughout the house) are rotated with regularity.

Despite the tedium, he said it’s hard to be jaded in the new gig. On the morning of this interview, he had been taking photographs in the Rose Garden.

“A lot of the halls in the West Wing look just like any other office hallway,” he said.

“Not all of it is super-grand. A lot of it is doing normal office things. But then you get snapped out of normalcy when you hear the helicopters flying on the lawn, or the other day I was getting a COVID test down the hall in the medical unit and I realized John Kerry was in line ahead of me. So it’s this weird jumping back and forth out of those moments.”

And then there’s the daily commute.

“When you walk up to the building, it glows from the sunlight kind of bouncing off the white and it’s definitely something you never get used to,” West said. “I’ve worked with pastry chefs and security and other staffers who have been here for 20 years or more and they say the same thing.

It never gets old.”

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Wednesday Journal, May 26, 2021

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C R I M E

Garage break-in leads to lawn tool loss

A leaf blower, a lawn mower, a power washer, an air compressor and a wagon made of red cloth were all taken from a garage that was left with an open service door in the 600 block of Lombard Avenue between 7:30 p.m., May 20 and 3 p.m., May 21. The estimated loss is $975.

Burglary ■ Someone broke into an unlocked 2018 Nissan Kicks and removed a laptop computer and miscellaneous gift cards between 5 p.m., May 16 and 4:30 p.m., May 17 in the 1100 block of South Boulevard. The estimated loss is $1,545.

■ Someone removed a bicycle from a garage with an open service door between 2:40 p.m. and 2:44 p.m., May 21 in the 800 block of South Taylor Avenue. The estimated loss is $700.

Motor vehicle theft A 2013 Toyota Corolla was removed from the 400 block of South Kenilworth Avenue between 9 p.m., May 21 and 9:30 a.m., May 23. The estimated loss is $5,200.

Theft ■ Someone cut the catalytic converter from a 2008 Toyota Prius between 5 p.m., May 12 and 9:30 a.m., May 14 in the 400 block

Oak Park bank robbery suspect in custody The Oak Park Police Department say they have arrested someone who attempted to rob the Chase Bank branch at 1048 Lake St. on the afternoon of May 20 at around 12:30 p.m.

Police would not confirm any details about the suspect, because that person has not been charged, nor whether the alleged offender was armed.

“We have the offender at the station,”

said Commander William Rygh.

Rygh stated that the bank incurred no loss or damage as a result of the attempted robbery. No one was hurt.

The FBI has been notified of the incident and will lead the investigation, according to Rygh. Bank robbery is prosecuted at the federal level.

This is a developing story.

Stacey Sheridan

of Home Avenue.

■ Stakes, rope and a glass sculpture were taken out of a residential yard in the 1100 block of South Euclid Avenue between 9:30 p.m., May 18 and 10 a.m., May 19. The estimated loss is $130.

■ Someone cut the catalytic converter from a 2006 Toyota Prius while parked in a rear carport in the 300 block of Home Avenue between 5:30 p.m., May 12 and 7:45 a.m., May 13.

■ Someone broke the lock to a storage unit and removed a bicycle from inside between noon, Jan. 25 and 6:45 p.m., May 20 in the 200 block of Washington Boulevard. The estimated loss is $280.

■ A package was removed from the vestibule of a residence in the 100 block of Washington Boulevard between 9:46 a.m. and 11 a.m., May 15. The estimated loss is $200.

These items, obtained from the Oak Park Police Department, came from reports May 18 – 24 and represent a portion of the incidents to which police responded. Anyone named in these reports has only been charged with a crime and cases have not yet been adjudicated.

Compiled by Stacey Sheridan

Man killed in shooting on Ike ramp at Austin Saturday The Illinois State Police are investigating the fatal shooting of a 27-yearold man who was driving on the Interstate 290 westbound ramp to Austin Boulevard around 12:07 a.m., May 22.

The Medical Examiner’s Office identified the victim as Jerry Thornton of Chicago. Thornton was pronounced dead at 7:17 a.m. that morning.

The shots were fired from an unknown vehicle also traveling at the location, according to the police. A 29-year-old male passenger traveling with the victim sustained minor injuries. A third passenger, a 19-year-old male, was unharmed in the shooting.

Both passengers were from Chicago.

Austin Boulevard was subsequently closed but reopened around at 3:13 a.m., police said.

Stacey Sheridan

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Wednesday Journal, May 26, 2021

OAKPARK.COM | RIVERFOREST.COM

Are you a property owner/manager with tenants in need of rental assistance?

The Illinois Rental Payment Program can provide up to $25,000 in emergency rental assistance!

Tenants and housing providers must both complete their portion of the application to be considered for this grant. The grant will be paid directly to the housing provider.

Grant amounts will vary, and the maximum grant amount is $25,000 per tenant. Assistance will cover up to 15 months of emergency rental assistance, paying up to 12 months of missed rent payments and up to three months of future rent payments. The coverage period is June 2020 through August 2021.

Wednesday Journal, May 26, 2021

OAKPARK.COM | RIVERFOREST.COM

Housing providers/landlords may initiate a joint application starting Monday, May 17 through Monday, June 7. Tenants will have until Monday, June 14 to complete their portion of a landlord-initiated application.

Tenants may initiate their own application starting Wednesday, June 9 through Monday, June 28. Landlords will have until Tuesday, July 6 to complete their portion of the tenantinitiated application.

Tenants may be eligible to receive ILRPP assistance if: The household is behind on their rent for at least 30 days.

The household lives in Illinois and rents their home as their primary residence.

The household’s income in 2020 was below 80% of the area median income, adjusted for household size.

The household experienced a financial hardship, including a loss of income or increased expenses, due to the COVID-19 pandemic.

The residents are at risk of homelessness or housing instability

Housing providers and tenants can submit a joint application at ILRPP.IHDA.org.

For application assistance, call the Oak Park Regional Housing Center at 773-887-5187 or 708-771-5801

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Wednesday Journal, May 26, 2021

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Wednesday Journal, May 26, 2021

23

Homes

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Life beyond PADS Housing Forward addresses homelessness with interim opportunities

By LACEY SIKORA

I

Contributing Reporter

n 2015, West Suburban PADS changed its name to Housing Forward to better reflect the agency’s comprehensive approach to finding solutions to homelessness in the western suburbs. In 2020, the pandemic upended Housing Forward’s traditional shelter model, in which clients reported to churches or gyms for a meal and an overnight sleep on a portable pad.

Overnight, the communal living model had to be restructured.

The agency pivoted, and sought shelter in hotels for many clients.

Today Erik Johnson, the nonprofit’s chief development officer, says clients have largely been moved out of hotels, and the board has decided to move away from the former PADS shelter model to focus more on more transitional housing opportunities.

Even before the pandemic, Housing Forward’s transitional housing programs aimed to get clients out of overnight shelters and into more stable housing that would enable them to more easily transition to permanent housing. Several interim housing programs are going strong today.

Bridge for Youth Jontasia (whose last name is being withheld for privacy) is a high school student who credits Housing Forward’s Bridge for Youth program with giving her the home base and support she needed to finish high school.

“My mom put me out of her home when I was 17,” she said. “At 17, I really couldn’t do anything by myself. I was homeless and had to figure everything out.”

An internet search led her to Housing Forward, and within a few days of turning 18, she was able to find housing through Bridge for Youth.

Patricia Stokes, Housing Forward’s program director for Bridge for Youth, says the HUD-funded program works specifically with those between the ages of 18 and 24 in partnership with other agencies.

“We provide housing navigation services and work with other agencies to help the youth get connected to education and employment services,” Stokes said.

The period of homelessness was difficult for Jontasia has a high school student.

“I was moving around and being in different homes,” she said. “I started floundering because I didn’t have internet or a computer for remote school.”

Once Housing Forward placed her in an apartment with an internet connection and helped her find a computer, she says things improved.

She expects to graduate from Oak Park and River Forest High School with a 3.0 grade-point average. She is also working part time and says Housing Forward support staff helped make this possible.

“I don’t know what I’d be doing without them,” Jontasia said. “Even with a full-time job, I couldn’t pay market rent, never mind pay for food. Just having the stability has been really good.”

Stokes says the Bridge for Youth program, which was launched in October 2020, serves a growing need in the community and serves a diverse population, from high school students to young parents.

“As we move along, we are figuring out how we can best serve these young people,” Stokes said. “They come to us with a variety of needs and concerns. At this time in their lives, they are navigating so many

Photo provided by Housing Forward

HELP FOR VETS: Alfred Warren, a Vietnam War-era veteran, obtained a place to live via Housing Forward’s Victory Path program through Hines Hospital. He says, “It’s working out very well.

Kits to help move from shelter to home At one point during the pandemic, said Erik Johnson, Housing Forward’s chief development officer, the nonprofit had 119 clients living in hotel rooms.

As the agency worked to move those clients into homes, Housing Forward was overwhelmed with a need for the kits traditionally provided by volunteers to help clients move into a home.

Volunteer Coordinator Amanda Young stepped in to spearhead the effort to get over 100 kits, valued at over $1,300 each, ready in a short time period.

“As people transitioned from hotel shelter to home, they need everything -- bathroom basics, kitchen supplies, cleaners, lights,” Young said.

“Everything to set up a home.” different things.”

Victory Path for military veterans Stokes also directs Housing Forward’s transitional housing program for military veterans in partnership with Edward Hines Jr. V.A. Hospital. The pro-

She credits a huge volunteer effort with getting the kits ready in record time.

“Gigi was our shopper and interior designer. Renee hauled things, Joe and Anne were good with culling used items,” Young said. “Seeing good people come together and works so well. I’m really proud of it.”

With the COVID relocation surge behind them, Housing Forward continues to need support for its efforts to build “House to Home” kits. Individual donations of funds or a community organization’s efforts to build a kit are welcome. More information is available by contacting Volunteer and Community Outreach Manager Enid Johnson at ejohnson@housingforward.org

gram serves 15 households, which can either be a single veteran or a veteran family.

Housing Forward provides rent assistance for one year and works with the veterans on savings program See HOUSING FORWARD on page 24

24

Wednesday Journal, May 26, 2021

HOUSING FORWARD Shifting models from page 23 and transitioning to independent housing. Case managers have daily contact with the veterans and weekly home visits. Stokes calls the program a “very active kind of process.”

“We are making sure they get the medication or mental health services they need to stabilize,” Stokes added.

One veteran currently enrolled in the program is Alfred Warren, a Vietnam War-era veteran who is disabled and found himself going through a rough time. He was in recovery and homeless when he was referred to Victory Path through Hines.

“I got connected right before Christmas,” Warren said. “It was a blessing.”

Warren struggles with depression but says that his Housing Forward counselors are helping him make progress. His one-bedroom apartment is providing a safe space to work on becoming stable.

“It’s working out very well,” he said.

OAKPARK.COM | RIVERFOREST.COM

Interim housing In October 2020, Housing Forward began leasing 65 rooms at the Write Inn, a hotel at 211 N. Oak Park Ave. in Oak Park as part of its interim housing program. Janet Hotch, director of interim housing, says it was the first time Housing Forward had tried this model. What began as a response to the pandemic has become a new way of approaching homelessness.

“Prior to the pandemic, we’d talked about the challenges that the church or PADS model presented for our clients, but the capacity to set up a different model was a big hurdle,” Hotch said.

When the pandemic forced their hand, Housing Forward initially set clients up in hotel rooms. By mid-September they were was moving clients into the interim housing.

Hotch says the interim housing model has proved a game changer for their clientele. “Their health is much improved,” she said. “People living in homelessness experience a lot of health issues when living on the street. From issues with their feet from walking all day, to wounds and

HELP FOR THE HOMELESS: (Left) Aneesha Moore, program assistant for Housing Forward’s supportive services, works on May 21 at The Wright Inn on Oak Park Avenue in Oak Park. (Below) Hotel to Home volunteers (from left) Renee Sichlau, Amanda Young, Joe Montroy, Gigi Rowe and Ann Wardell Tanner assisted Housing Forward in getting clients more permanent shelter last summer during the height of the pandemic.

New board members for Housing Forward At the annual meeting of the Board of Directors on Thursday, May 20, Housing Forward appointed six new members to its Board of Directors and announced the five members who have completed their terms.

The new 2021-2024 Board members are: ■ Barbara Best, CAP STRAT ■ Paul Betlinski, Desmond & Ahern ■ Tim Granholm, The Boeing Company ■ Vena Nelson, Illinois Department of Public Health ■ Bob Tucker, Chicago Community Loan Fund ■ Steve McMahon Zeller, Dykema Gossett PLLC

ALEX ROGALS/Staff Photographer

Also joining the Board of Directors is Emanuel Johnson, Robert R. McCormick Foundation, who was elected to the board in January, 2021.

The members who have completed their Board terms are: ■ Kathleen Clark, retired attorney ■ Sarah Dolan, Quad City Bank & Trust ■ Jim Heininger, Dixon | James Communications ■ Aaron Lebovitz, Adaptation Capital, LLC ■ Tim Wrzesinski, West Monroe Partners The following slate of officers was elected for the 2021-2022 Board term: ■ Heidi Vance, President, Team Blonde ■ Steven Glass, First Vice President, JenCare ■ Camile Lindsay Kumi, Second Vice President, Illinois Department of Corrections ■ Christopher Parker, Treasurer, Wintrust ■ Marc Kieselstein, Secretary, Kirkland & Ellis, LLP (retired) The members who will continue their terms on the Board of Directors are John Ciancanelli, Rebecca Daisley, Pamela Conley Euring, Henry Fulkerson, Bob Hahn, Patrick Herron, Peggy Johnson, LeTisa L. Jones, Delilah P. Strickland, John Tulley, MD and Destiny Woods.

issues arising from stress.”

She notes that the traditional PADS model provided food and nightly shelter, but it wasn’t ideal.

“People would be exhausted,” Hotch said. “They would sleep and eat at the church and then have to be out by 7 a.m.

It was very hard for them to get case management or get to our support center so that we could help them be workready and prepare them to be housed.”

With interim housing, these issues are solved. People have a place to leave their belongings during the day, a home-base for meals and a place to meet with case workers.

“All these things are taken care of so they can start getting their feet back under them,” Hotch said.

On top of the Write Inn space, Housing Forward also operates medical respite interim housing and a family interim space in Oak Park’s Sojourner House.

Housing Forward’s Johnson says that the agency will focus on the interim housing model going forward rather than returning to PADS shelters in local churches post-pandemic.

Photo provided

Wednesday Journal, May 26, 2021

OAKPARK.COM | RIVERFOREST.COM

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Lots of updates including: lawn irrigation system and exterior LED lighting (‘15), deck (‘14), new sewer connection and walkway (‘13), main roof (‘13), 2nd floor new Marvin thermopane windows (‘07).

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Join Us in Celebrating 35 Years!

Upcoming Programs and Events

June 3: Urban Foraging Free Virtual Lecture Support the Friends of the Oak Park Conservatory.

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Visit us: 615 Garfield, Oak Park Tues - Sun 10 am - 4 pm OakParkConservatory.org

Learn more at fopcon.org

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Wednesday Journal, May 26, 2021

OAKPARK.COM | RIVERFOREST.COM

SPORTS

Welin runs like the wind

Photo courtesy of Paul Nickoley

OPRF’s top distance runner eyes state track titles

By BILL STONE Contributing Reporter

When the COVID-19 pandemic ended the IHSA girls track and field season in midMarch 2020, Oak Park and River Forest High School junior Josephine Welin conducted a personal state championship.

On May 23, the day Welin would have raced in the Class 3A state finals at Eastern Illi-

nois University she instead ran a 1,600-meter time trial at Chicago’s Amundsen Park with family watching and OPRF girls cross country and assistant track coach Ashley Raymond on FaceTime.

Welin ran a lifetime-best 4 minutes, 56 seconds that would have earned top-four finishes the previous three state meets.

“Being able to break 5 minutes, [racing] by myself, for the first time showed me I can push myself really hard, and when I get the chance to race again I can do something big,” Welin said.

This track season, Welin often runs alone, because few can keep pace with the fastest

girls distance runner in OPRF history. It’s already led to national exposure, such as top-seven finishes in one and two-mile races at the Adidas Indoor Nationals Feb. 26-28 in Virginia Beach, Virginia.

At the one-day IHSA Class 3A State Finals on June 12, Welin seeks top-nine, all-state honors for the 3,200 and 1,600. Her 10:20.40 is the state’s fastest outdoor 3,200 this season by 19 seconds. Her last 1,600 of 4:52.20 on Feb. 19 indoors would rank No. 1 by .61.

There was no IHSA-sanctioned cross country state meet in November, but other results validated Welin as the top Illinois girls runner and OPRF’s greatest team ever.

No IHSA state championship medal? No worries.

“Sometimes I feel a little bit upset not getting all of the attention for being the real state champion or something like that. I have to tell myself it’s just a title. It’s just a medal,” said Welin, who swept all but one regular-season race.

“Even though you don’t have the medal doesn’t mean you haven’t been working hard,” Welin said. “It’s definitely good to know that just training is something that can fulfill me.”

See WELIN on page 27

OPRF girls reach water polo sectional finals

By MELVIN TATE Contributing Reporter

The Oak Park and River Forest High School girls water polo team went into last week’s IHSA York Sectional tournament a modest No. 4 seed out of nine teams, but the Huskies arguably were the surprise of the tourney, downing top-seeded Maine West 10-6 to reach the sectional finals, where their run came to an end against No. 2 York in a 14-2 defeat.

“We were clearly outmatched. York has a strong offense, and we couldn’t get the ball down the pool and made turnovers,” OPRF coach Elizabeth Perez said. “We played hard but weren’t quite up to their level. And [York] doesn’t make many mistakes.”

OPRF opened the sectional tournament by defeating Von Steuben 24-9 in the quarterfinal round on May 19. Addie Kosterman led the Huskies with 11 goals, and Regan Mary and Rory Cronin each added four goals.

On May 21, OPRF upset top-seeded Maine

West 10-6 in the semifinals as Rory Cronin tallied six goals. In the sectional title game on May 22, the host Dukes went on a 12-0 run that spanned all four quarters as the Huskies fell 14-2.

Regan Mary Cronin and Zoe Regenstein scored the only two goals against York for the Huskies, who finished 9-9 for the year.

Perez felt her team gradually improved as the season progressed and is excited about future success now that her returning players will be able to spend more time together

in the offseason.

She also thanked her seniors for providing a good example for their teammates to follow.

“They leave a legacy of hard work,” Perez said. “I couldn’t ask for a better senior class. They push each other, love the sport and showed true leadership this year and last when we had the pandemic. You don’t expect high school kids to handle this well, but they did.”

See WATER POLO on page 27

Wednesday Journal, May 26, 2021

@ @OakPark

27

Fenwick bats can’t match Nazareth in loss

By MELVIN TATE Contributing Reporter

The Fenwick High School baseball team faced one of Chicagoland’s top programs May 20 at the Dominican Priory in River Forest, dropping a 4-1 contest to the Roadrunners.

Afterwards, coach Dave Hogan paid tribute to Nazareth coach Lee Milano, a Fenwick alumnus from 1981 and one of Hogan’s former players, who recorded his 500th career victory three days earlier.

“His whole family is a baseball one,” he said. “Lee deserves his success. He works hard and has an excellent program year in and year out. He does a great job and I’m proud of him.”

Luis Gonzalez pitched six solid innings for Fenwick, allowing two runs, seven hits,

WATER POLO

Huskies boys step up D from page 26

For OPRF boys three’s the charm The Fenwick High School boys water polo team had defeated crosstown opponent Oak Park and River Forest High School twice in the regular season. But the third time was the charm for the Huskies as they rallied from a 7-5 halftime deficit to knock off the host Friars 10-9 May 21 in the York Sectional semifinals.

“Fenwick is a great team, and they got a couple of bounces early on,” said OPRF coach John Rapp. “We turned it up on defense in the second half and that’s what won us the game.”

Senior Finn McMullen led OPRF with four goals against Fenwick, including the go-ahead goal with 39 seconds remaining in regulation.

“I didn’t have any goals in the first half and I was getting scared,” said McMullen.

“But this team really stepped up. After our first game, we made defense our main emphasis. If we play good defense, the offense will come.”

The Huskies (10-9) also received two goals apiece from George Bourgikos, E.J. Robinson and Connor Sorg as well as 10 saves from goalie Ambrose Krozel.

Fenwick (18-12) was victorious over OPRF twice - 14-10 on April 30 and 10-7 on May 7 and led 8-5 early in the third quarter Friday night. However, the Friars managed only one more goal the remainder of the contest. “[OPRF’s] defense was phenomenal tonight,” said Fenwick coach Kyle Perry.

“We weren’t clicking on offense, but OPRF played great and we couldn’t quite put the ball in the back of the net as much as we would’ve liked to.”

Wil Gurski led Fenwick with four goals and two assists. Peter Buinauskas added

and a walk with four strikeouts.

“We were hoping for three innings and he gave us six strong,” Hogan said of the sophomore, who was an emergency fill-in as Fenwick’s No. 2 and No. 3 starting pitchers are out with injuries.

However, it was a struggle offensively as the Friars (5-11) managed only six hits. Fenwick’s lone run came in the bottom of the fourth on a groundout by Luke Coffey that plated Will Mazzocchi, who had tripled to lead off the inning.

The Friars managed to load the bases with one out in the bottom of the seventh, aided by a pair of Nazareth errors. But the Roadrunners’ freshman pitcher, Nick Drtina, escaped the jam by striking out Pearse Gorman and Coffey.

Hogan lamented Fenwick’s difficulties in

a goal and three assists, and goalie Brian Moore recorded six saves. Buinauskas, Gurski, and Moore are among nine players that Fenwick will lose due to graduation.

OPRF advanced to the York Sectional title game against the host Dukes on May 22 and led 4-2 early in the second quarter, but York scored the game’s next 13 goals en route to an 18-7 victory.

“Their goalie was just too good and they counterattacked off of that,” Rapp said. “We came out at the start with a lot of confidence, but I think our boys showed they were tired in the third; the floodgates opened and that was pretty much the end of the game.”

Despite the loss, Rapp believed the Huskies had a good season.

“From where we started to where we finished, I couldn’t be happier,” he said. “One of our main goals was to beat Fenwick, and we accomplished that.

York too much for Fenwick girls Fenwick defeated Maine South 14-9 in its York Sectional opener on May 19 with Annie McCarthy leading the Friars with four goals, while Demi Ovalle added three goals, five assists and four steals.

However, the season came to an end May 21 as Fenwick went down to defeat in the semifinal round against No. 2-seeded York 15-9. Against the Dukes, Ovalle led the Friars (11-13) with five goals, four steals and two assists. C.C. Trejo added two goals, two assists and two steals, while McCarthy had a goal and four steals. Goalie Julie Soto had 18 saves.

“We hung in there for a while,” said Fenwick coach Elizabeth Timmons. “But we just couldn’t finish out all four quarters. I could not be more proud of this season. The players should be proud of themselves, and I’m excited about what’s ahead because we have so much room to grow, learn, and develop over the next few years.”

Fenwick returns five of its seven starters next year -- and only one will be a senior -- so the future does appear bright.

getting clutch hits, which in his view is the story of this season.

“That’s been our bugaboo all year,” he said. “We get an opportunity, but we just can’t open the door.”

On May 22, the Friars notched an extra-inning 3-2 victory at St. Ignatius. Robert Pauly

Luiz Gonzales

WELIN

Steady improvement from page 26 When IHSA cross country ended with sectionals – and Welin winning in record time -- the ShaZam Championships on Nov. 8 in Chillicothe became the unofficial state finals.

Welin’s girls course record 17:25.64 for 5,000 kilometers (3.1 miles) won Division III by nearly 35 seconds over six of seven returnees, who beat her all-state 16th in 2019 (17:07.86 for 3.0 miles). The team of OPRF runners finished fourth.

“I am so proud of the way she raced [at ShaZam and sectionals],” Raymond said.

“She didn’t want to just win. She wanted to run with guts and test her limits. You have to respect the courage and confidence she showed.”

The Huskies consistently excelled even with junior Nora Wollen, a 2019 all-state 15th, injured until sectionals. Seniors Maggie Rose Baron and Parker Hulen, junior Samantha Duwe, sophomore Avery Minnis and freshman Lenny Sterritt also competed at sectionals and ShaZam. “Next to racing, my favorite thing is watching my teammates,” Welin said.

In 2018, Raymond’s first season, the 10thplace Huskies equaled their highest state finish. Welin was 80th.

Welin then finished 25th at 2019 state track finals in the 1,600 (5:17.14). When the pandemic halted 2020 track competition, an improving Welin initially was devastated.

Nearby trails then became softer training surfaces to sustain her regimen with less impact. Welin added only five miles

earned the win with two scoreless innings, and Mazzocchi, who doubled to lead off the eighth, scored the go-ahead run with two outs on a dropped third strike.

With six games to go in the regular season, Fenwick hopes its bats will heat up in time for the playoffs.

ALEX ROGALS/Staff Photographer

weekly and slightly more during the summer.

“Josephine understands the little things, like sleep, nutrition and recovery matter just as much as training,” Raymond said.

“She is the last to finish any strength session. She is a machine. Her balanced focus allows her to increase her training load, stay injury free and run fast.”

At the IHSA cross country sectionals on Oct. 31, 2020 at Chicago’s Lincoln Park, Welin won by 40 seconds (course-record 16:33.31 for 3.0 miles) and the Huskies were a program-best second.

When Welin became OPRF’s second runner to win the West Suburban Conference Silver Meet on Oct. 17 (16:49.35 for 2.88 miles), she overcame rain, 35-mile-per-hour winds and pre-race doubts to win by 21 seconds. OPRF finished second to York, whose runners won ShaZam. “I was really proud of just being able to endure the conditions and prove to myself I still was as good as I thought I could be and my goals were still in reach,” Welin said.

Because of WSC restrictions, OPRF did not race non-WSC schools until the postseason. By ShaZam, strategy was simple. “[Raymond] told me, ‘You are in a position to win and take it out.’ I wanted to show I can be competitive and push myself no matter what,” Welin said. “We were waiting all season for [additional] competition. I didn’t need it. I still ran fast.”

Welin also enjoys drawing, painting and photography. At OPRF, she is completing a 3D display of pandemic-themed photos that she printed and sewed into face masks.

To achieve her picture-perfect state finishes, Welin now realizes she possesses the physical and mental tools.

“I have everything I need to push myself right in me,” Welin said. “I don’t need everyone cheering. I don’t need a fast person [for pace]. I have that power. I’ve definitely learned I can be confident in my abilities.”

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Wednesday Journal, May 26, 2021

Growing Community Media & A Tribe Called Aging Present

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Words Matter. Attitudes Matter.

The

R-Word

THOROUGH PRODUCTIONS Presents “THE R-WORD” Written and Directed by AMANDA LUKOFF Produced by AMANDA LUKOFF and DANIEL EGAN Edited by DANIEL EGAN Cinematography by ZACHARYHALBERD Music by AUDIO NETWORK Illustration by MATT DARNALL Animation by JOHN LONG

www.therwordfilm.com NR

NOT RATED The content of this film has not been evaluated

Appreciating the beauty of impermanence, a quarterly Film Series encouraging everyone to embrace and respect our aging population and the transformation of our society.

The

R-Word

Friday, May 28 • 10am

THE R-WORD is an intimate look at the history of the word ‘retard(ed),’ cultural representation, and the challenges and triumphs of people living with intellectual and developmental disabilities.

Filmmaker Amanda Lukoff grew up advocating for her sister Gabrielle, especially whenever she heard the word ‘retard(ed),’ which was far too often. The disparaging word is everywhere – in TV, movies, music, social media, and throughout our public and private communities -- perpetuating negative stereotypes and cultural bias.

THE R-WORD is a humanizing, purposeful, and deeply respectful look into the longreaching history and lasting implications of derogatory language used to describe people with intellectual and developmental disabilities. Through captivating animation sequences, the personal narrative of four sibling stories, and the first-person accounts of self-advocates, we get an intimate and nuanced perspective of the challenges and triumphs of people living with an intellectual disability.

The Director of the film, Amanda Lukoff, will be with us following the screening for a Q+A discussion, with Mike Carmody from Opportunity Knocks.

Sponsors

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DEADLINE FOR SUBMISSIONS IS FRIDAY 5 P.M. Call Viewpoints editor Ken Trainor at 613-3310 ktrainor@wjinc.com

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Wednesday Journal, May 26, 2021

VIEWPOINTS

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Say it ain’t so, Joe p. 32

Inviting mystery into your yard

s an eighth-grade teacher, I’ve been teaching remotely all year, but on Earth Day, some students were in-person.

I took them outside to write environmental messages on the sidewalk in chalk. At the end of a lovely hour in beautiful weather, one of the girls said to me, “This is the most I’ve been outside in a month and a half !” When I asked why, her reply was, “There’s nothing to do outside.”

During my walk home, I thought about this conversation as I passed yards that are a monoculture of grass surrounded by plants from Asia or Europe — typically some yew shrubs near the house, maybe some boxwoods, with ivy and hostas on the edges. The plants don’t really change with the seasons and there certainly isn’t much wildlife attracted to them since the plants evolved to live with creatures on other continents.

A few robins hop around here and there, a couple of squirrels run up some trees when they see me coming. Some yards have the little white flags that warn us away because of pesticide application.

Any dead leaves or stems have been removed. Honestly, I agree with my student that there aren’t many interesting things to see or do outside.

We’ve done a good job creating activities for kids to do in our houses. We give them big comfy couches, Netflix and video games, books, toys, etc. Teens want to explore and keep secrets from adults, and we give them an endless source of mystery: the internet and social media.

In our quest to make the outside as comfortable as the inside, we’ve taken all the mystery and wilderness out of our patches of nature, our lawns. It’s not surprising that kids aren’t interested in exploring outside.

Recently, I took my class out to our pesticide-free school garden. A few students made dandelion chains while others watched the fuzzy butts of bumble bees go in and out of the purple creeping charlie flowers and searched for four leaf clovers. In our native garden, we looked in some of the stems for evidence of nesting native bees and moved leaves around, hoping to find butterfly chrysalises. There were shrieks of fear and delight when a spider was spotted. A tiny bit of wilderness. A bit of mystery. Something to do.

May is Monarch Month here in Illinois. The population of this iconic species has dropped dramatically due to habitat loss, climate change and increased use of pesticides. But we can change this.

When you create a pollinator patch in your yard by planting milkweed and other native nectar flowers, you do more than just create a place for this butterfly. All of our native bees and insects thrive on these plants and when they thrive, so do the birds that live here.

When you embrace the dandelions and clover, you provide food for the first butterflies and bees of the spring and keep the fireflies alive.

When you let that patch of native plants drop its leaves and leave the stems, then rake the leaves of your trees under some shrubs instead of into bags, the insects have a place to go over winter. But best of all, you create a little patch of wilderness. You invite mystery into your yard. You give yourself and your family something to explore through all the seasons.

Oak Park declared 2021 “The Year of the Butterfly” and there are many events scheduled to help you learn more about how to create a patch for pollinators of all sorts in your yard. The Oak Park Conservatory has a website devoted to this at fopcon.org/year-ofthe-butterfly.

Laura Stamp is a District 97 elementary school teacher.

LAURA STAMP

One View

ALEX ROGALS/Staff Photographer

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Take a stand on human rights

week ago Monday, over 130 people from Oak Park/River Forest/Forest Park, Chicago and other west suburban towns came together in Scoville Park to demonstrate their solidarity with Palestinians, their condemnation of the Israeli government for the bombings of Gaza and killing of over 225 people, for Israel’s denial of Palestinian rights and freedoms, for the matrix of discrimination and control that Israel imposes on every facet of Palestinian life, and the ongoing inhumane blockade of Gaza.

We were Jews, Christians, Muslims, secularists, young, old, students, homemakers, faith leaders, elected officials and veteran activists as well as individuals and families who had never spoken out about the Israeli atrocities occurring in Palestine.

We demanded that the U.S. government stop its support of the violence and the killing. The U.S. provides Israel with $3.8 billion annually in unconditional military support, and President Biden recently proposed to sell Israel an additional $735 million in precision-guided weapons, which will certainly be used on Palestinians in Gaza, whether now or in the future.

Over the past few weeks, Palestinians have experienced an increase in aggressive Israeli actions in East Jerusalem (especially in and around Al-Aqsa Mosque and the Old City during Ramadan), provocative and violent policing tactics and support of violent marches

by Jewish Israeli extremists, and planned forced removal of families from their homes in the Sheikh Jarrah neighborhood (an Israeli-annexed Palestinian area of East Jerusalem).

None of these human and civil rights violations by Israel are new. Palestinians have been imprisoned without charges for years and indiscriminately maimed and killed; their homes have been demolished, their

land stolen, their fields of olive trees destroyed, and their access to water and electricity reduced to inhumane levels. Palestinian lives have been made intolerable for decades.

The Israeli settler movement has mobilized an armed insurgency across Palestinian towns, and has reached newfound heights of political power. This has led to Jewish extremists shooting Palestinians on the street, several public lynchings, and throwing Molotov cocktails into Palestinian homes. In Sheikh Jarrah, two settlerorganizations were the drivers behind the expulsion of Palestinian families: Nahalat Shimon and Ateret Cohanim. Both of these organizations are receiving charitable donations from the U.S., under the legal status of 501(c)(3) tax exemption.

As was the case during last year’s spring uprisings in the U.S., we are again witnessing an awakening on the part of people around the world, and specifically here in our communities, to the Israeli violence and oppression that have been destroying Palestinian lives and communities. People are finding their courage and their voice to join in the calls for the U.S. to stop supporting Israel’s violations of U.S. and international law. People are pushing back on the threat of being called anti-Semitic for speaking out for human rights for all human beings. Standing up for human rights is anything but anti-Semitic. Indeed, we are seeing a growing movement of faith-based human rights, feminist, immigrant, and racial justice organizations coming together to say, “We Stand Together against apartheid, against ethnic cleansing, and for true democracy and human rights for all.”

If you want to join with us, please contact us at http:// www.cjpip.org. Add your voice to this movement for justice.

COMMITTEE FOR A JUST PEACE IN ISRAEL & PALESTINE One View

Committee for a Just Peace in Israel and Palestine (CJPIP)

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Wednesday Journal, May 26, 2021

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What’s rotten at Loretto

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or decades, Loretto Hospital in neighboring Austin has been classified as a safety-net hospital. Rough translation: This institution serves a community of color, inequitably covered by private health insurance and facing chronic health issues long under-addressed.

Our view, as publisher of the Austin Weekly News, has been that Loretto is perpetually on the precipice financially, relying to a great and not surprising degree on funding through state and federal programs. And when payment on those programs was delayed for whatever reasons, we were told the hospital would skirt close to missing payrolls.

That made its habit of courting relationships with local elected state representatives and senators seem wise, if a bit sketchy.

We’re going back to days when Austin native and Oak Park icon Phil Rock was state senate president, and he would allegedly make calls to agencies in Springfield to pry loose funds overdue to Loretto.

Now, thanks to the powerful reporting coming from Block Club Chicago and the Better Government Association over recent months, we have seen repeated and appalling actions by this safety-net hospital in the ways it has diverted precious COVID vaccines off the West Side and into the arms of Trump Tower residents, upscale restaurant and jewelry retailers, and even congregants at the far suburban church of its president. These vaccine recipients were people whiter and far more privileged than Loretto’s immediate neighbors.

Just last week, these two independent, nonprofit newsrooms unraveled a story right before our eyes, and it involves multiple elected officials who represent both Austin and also parts of Oak Park, River Forest and Forest Park. State Sen. and Majority Leader Kimberly Lightford and, until recently, State Rep. LaShawn Ford have served on the Loretto board. And State Rep. Camille Lilly has worked at Loretto in marketing since long before she was elected to office.

Ford had the good sense to leave the board in early spring after it failed to effectively discipline leadership for its abuse of the COVID vaccines.

The roles of the elected officials have not been a secret. The hospital’s ER was somewhat updated a decade ago and Loretto named it for Lightford. You can see her name over the door as you drive down the Ike. Board membership has had its perks, including Caribbean travel and campaign contributions. The travel is reportedly related to an insurance firm owned by the hospital. The campaign cash to Lightford has come from a major contractor at Loretto and is pushing $40K, according to Block Club and the BGA. Perhaps Loretto is on less of a precipice and is more akin to an insider slush fund. We have regard for these elected officials. We have seen good work on the ground in Austin from Loretto Hospital. But a massive broom is necessary for both the executive suite and the board room.

This safety-net hospital has to be fully reoriented to its mission.

New goals for Oak Park

When Oak Park’s remade village board met last week to settle on its primary goals for the term ahead, it crystallized the change in direction voters have chosen. Topping its list of priorities are environmental sustainability, equity, community safety, affordability and infrastructure.

These are worthy goals and important to set early, as there will inevitably be many distractions ahead in the normal course of governing.

We appreciate the caution offered by Village President Vicki Scaman that goals have to be specific, affordable and attainable. But there also needs to be some reach and some ambition if progress on issues so large and complex as equity, policing, and sustainability are to be accomplished.

Israel needs a good Old Testament prophet

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support Israel’s right to exist as an independent, sovereign nation. Israel has a right to defend itself.

I support Palestine’s right to exist as an independent, sovereign nation. Palestine has a right to defend itself.

Can Israelis and Israel’s supporters agree with both of these statements? Can Palestinians and Palestinian supporters agree with both statements?

Maybe that’s the heart of the problem.

I support both statements, but I do not support all the ways Israel and Palestine choose to defend themselves. And I do not support their respective current leadership. Gaza, the West Bank and Israel are all poorly led.

But I am not equally unsupportive because this is not a fair fight. The Israelis have the upper hand — wealth, power and military might (subsidized by the U.S.). Because they have the upper hand, they have a greater responsibility to seek a solution to this mess.

But they effectively gave up on solutions a generation ago, preferring a policy of “containment,” while allowing encroachment by extremist groups who built settlements on land that should be part of Palestine.

Israel, meanwhile, built isolating walls and created security checkpoints for Palestinians. I’ve seen them — long lines of cars waiting to get through as we breezed past in our tour bus, even though our tour was led by a Palestinian. That was in 2006. I’m guessing not much has changed. It has probably gotten worse.

When Palestinians get fed up, the “unrest” revives this most vicious of vicious cycles.

Hamas fires rockets, mostly shot down by Israel’s Iron Dome missile defense system, though a few have gotten through and killed civilians. Israel bombs suspected Hamas strongholds and underground tunnels in Gaza, resulting in far more civilian casualties, which the Israelis blame on Hamas being imbedded in the civilian population. The Israeli government, meanwhile, is poised to seize land and property in Arab-dominated East Jerusalem.

As Neil Steinberg wrote in his Sun-Times column last week, “I’ve picked over the Torah, looking for the part that says it’s OK to oppress people who live on land you want, and haven’t found it yet.”

I’m no expert, but I’m not sure there are any experts on this catastrophic mess of a Middle East feud. I only hear unwarranted, unearned and toxic certainty on both sides.

At least that’s how it looks from a distance.

But how it looks is important. If enough of us speak out, maybe our government will put pressure on the governments of both sides to act responsibly — and maybe the Israelis and Palestinians will elect more responsible leaders. Maybe.

In the meantime, here’s how it looks to me and, I suspect, many other Americans: Palestinians are treated like second-class citizens and Palestinian lives do not matter, at least to the Israeli government. In this country we know from our ongoing reckoning with race that where there is inequality, there is racism. Israel’s government seems to believe that because some Palestinians are terrorists who put Israeli lives in jeopardy, Israel is justified in treating all Palestinians as potential terrorists and therefore as second-class citizens.

But no excuse for inequity is valid.

And there is no justification for a longoppressed people to adopt the methods of the oppressor in order to “guarantee” their own safety and security — which doesn’t work anyway. In fact, the Israeli approach to the “Palestinian situation” has badly damaged their moral credibility. Israel has had an authoritarian leader for most of the last three decades, resulting in a fractured, divided society that is currently living a coalitional nightmare — at the mercy of right-wing religious groups, which ultimately decide who holds power.

Ignoring the peace process has undermined the high opinion many of us once had of Israel. Defenders of the status quo tell the growing number of American critics to keep quiet because we can’t know what it’s like unless we live there — and there is some truth in that — but the problem persists and the perception that there’s something rotten in Israel is only growing stronger.

I support Israel’s right to exist and I support Palestine’s right to exist. I do not support Israel and Palestine’s right to defend themselves in any way they see fit, and I do not support their right to defend themselves in the way they have currently chosen.

The authoritarian approach is only making matters worse. Not solving this problem is harming Israel, just as not solving racism harms our country.

Jewish religion and culture have endured by staying true to the bedrock principle of doing what is right.

And when they don’t do what’s right, there is a long, biblical tradition of prophets arising to speak truth to power, chastising their leaders when they become corrupted by arrogance. Where are Israel’s prophets?

They’re needed now more than ever to bring this troubled nation back to its senses and to its moral underpinnings.

Both sides are being poorly served by their leaders, but only one side has the power, and that side is showing clear signs of being compromised by it.

Israel cannot afford to be the oppressor.

Their security ultimately depends on finding — with the Palestinians — a win-win solution to this awful, never-ending conflict.

KEN

TRAINOR

V I E W P O I N T S

Wednesday Journal, May 26, 2021

W E D N E S D A Y

JOURNAL of Oak Park and River Forest

ALEX ROGALS/Staff Photographer

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Citizens of Nowhere …

amas may stop firing indiscriminate rockets on Israel cities, and Israel may stop their air raids, bombing and home demolition of the Palestinians, but the harsh occupation and the injustice keeps going.

Today, a 14-year-old Israeli teen has witnessed four major wars, had to say goodbye to a parent who was deployed to war, who may or may not return home, has been subjected to numerous Hamas rocket attacks, listened to the sound of sirens instructing her to take cover in a bomb shelter and, like me, probably has a lot of nightmares, hers about rockets and suicide-bombers, while mine are about the Israeli soldiers and their cruelty.

Today, a 14-year-old teen in Gaza has also lived through those four major wars and air strikes and has seen her relatives, classmates and neighbors torn apart by Israeli missiles and bombs. In the middle of night, she has been forced to flee her demolished home to take shelter in a camp set up by Hamas who would recruit her later to resist the occupation.

None of these children gets to choose what side of the conflict to be born on or which God they will be taught to worship. These children are our children.

Many of us hurt equally for the loss of life and destruction on each side.

Both sides are engaged in perpetual war. Wars not just aimed to defeat, but with the goal of eliminating the other side. Both have engaged in indiscriminate attacks against civilians. And both are committing war crimes against humanity.

At the end of each war, Hamas claims victory for indiscriminately firing 4,000 rockets on Israeli cities, terrifying civilians and causing death and destruction in the name of independence and resistance. While Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu, with modern precision weapons, hits targets, demolishing numerous homes and centers, destroying roads, bridges, water tanks, power lines, tunnels, and whatever infrastructure was restored from the previous war, killing many civilians and crushing an already devastated Palestinian economy, all in the name of self-defense and security.

The cruel conditions the Palestinians endure daily are impossible to imagine.

And expecting the Palestinians to give up their resistance, submit to continued Israeli occupation and economic strangulation, and give up their rights for statehood, is like expecting we Americans to give up our independence and submit to being a forever-impoverished colony of a foreign government.

What would you do if your home were demolished, regardless of how many minutes you were given to evacuate your family in the middle of night? Regardless of whether you had anything or nothing to do with Hamas?

What would you do if you were made homeless on top of being stateless? What would you do if your land were confiscated?

What would you do if you were denied your basic needs, including medicine? If your electricity and cooking gas were constantly cut off ? If your water wasn’t safe to drink? If your movement were restricted and villages barricaded? If travel were denied and your territory isolated from the world? If you lived under a state with double standards and policies that impose different laws for people depending on their religion and race? If you were denied citizenship in your birth land while foreigners are granted full rights?

What would you do if you could not protect your own children? What would you do if you were denied seeing your dying father or mother?

Would you dispute the occupation? Would you dispute the injustice? Would you resist?

Palestinians were dancing in the streets celebrating President Biden’s election, full of hope that he would bring some fairness and balance to help lift their siege and end the occupation. Resolving this 70-year conflict requires holding both sides accountable for their crimes against humanity. Our unconditional support for the occupier, while labeling the occupied as terrorists is a policy that has led to more wars, less stability, and No Peace.

Anan Abu-Taleb, the former mayor of Oak Park, grew up in Gaza through his teenage years.

ANAN ABUTALEB One View

Editor and Publisher Dan Haley Senior Editor Bob Uphues Equity Editor/Ombudsman Michael Romain Staff Reporters Stacey Sheridan, Maria Maxham, F. Amanda Tugade Staff Photographer Alex Rogals Viewpoints Editor Ken Trainor Real Estate Editor Lacey Sikora Food Editor Melissa Elsmo Arts Editor Michelle Dybal Digital Strategist James Kay Columnists Marc Blesoff, Jack Crowe, Doug Deuchler, Mary Kay O’Grady, Kwame Salter, John Stanger, Stan West Design/Production Manager Andrew Mead Designers Mark Moroney, Javier Govea Business Manager Joyce Minich Marketing Representatives Marc Stopeck, Lourdes Nicholls Sales & Development Mary Ellen Nelligan Circulation Manager Jill Wagner E-MAIL jill@oakpark.com Chairman Emeritus Robert K. Downs

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About Viewpoints Our mission is to lead educated conversation about the people, government, schools, businesses and culture of Oak Park and River Forest. As we share the consensus of Wednesday Journal’s editorial board on local matters, we hope our voice will help focus your thinking and, when need be, fire you to action.

In a healthy conversation about community concerns, your voice is also vital. We welcome your views, on any topic of community interest, as essays and as letters to the editor. Noted here are our stipulations for filing.

Please understand our verification process and circumstances that would lead us not to print a letter or essay. We will call to check that what we received with your signature is something you sent. If we can’t make that verification, we will not print what was sent. When, in addition to opinion, a letter or essay includes information presented as fact, we will check the reference. If we cannot confirm a detail, we may not print the letter or essay.

If you have questions, email Viewpoints editor Ken Trainor at ktrainor@ wjinc.com.

LETTER TO THE EDITOR

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Wednesday Journal, May 26, 2021

2021 tax appeal period is open for Oak Park

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tion to an existing building. he Cook County AssesThe 2021 appeal period also sor’s Office has anallows taxpayers to bring nounced that it will be attention to changes in the accepting appeals of the value of their properties assessed valuations of over the last year. Finally, Oak Park properties between taxpayers who missed the May 17 and June 16, 2021. Indideadline for appealing their viduals looking for assistance in 2020 assessed values can filing appeals should feel free to contest their values for the contact my office at 708-383-8005 2021 tax year. to set up appointments during In most cases, those who the appeal period. are filing 2021 appeals beAll Oak Park properties were cause they missed the deadreassessed in 2020, and most lines from prior years will of the values set in 2020 will Oak Park be able to do anything remain unchanged until Oak Township Assessor not about their assessments Park’s next reassessment in from prior years. Indeed, 2023. Because the 2020 reassesssince Cook County tax bills always arrive ment was such an important part of the one year late, property owners should be tax process, many people believe that aware that the money-saving effects of assessed values can only be appealed successful 2021 appeals will not appear during a reassessment year. But since on tax bills until the summer of calendar property values can change from year to year 2022. year, assessed values can be appealed in The biggest point of contact between any year, including 2021. most citizens and their government Although we expect to see fewer aparises through the payment of taxes. Oak peals in 2021 compared to 2020, there Park residents with concerns about the are some circumstances where taxpayfairness of this important point of coners may want to appeal this year. One tact should know that Oak Park Townsuch situation arises when the county ship is available to help residents redress assessor sends notices of reassessment tax inequities. for properties that have had significant Ali ElSaffar is the Oak Park Township changes in the last year, such as the conAssessor. struction of a new building or an addi-

ALI ELSAFFAR

A Memorial Day story Memorial Day: A tribute to those who gave everything in the line of duty. One such soldier was James W. Robinson Jr., born in 1940 in Hinsdale. He enlisted in the Marines in 1958, and gave his life in battle on April 11, 1966 in Vietnam.

I came about Sgt. Robinson’s story when I encountered a framed photo of him at the Hines VA hospital. It spelled out a detailed description of his valor in the face of a fierce firefight with a Viet Cong battalion.

Sgt. Robinson moved among the men of his fire team, instructing and inspiring them. Enemy snipers, located in trees, were inflicting heavy casualties. Robinson used a grenade launcher to eliminate the threat. When the medic in his team was himself hit while administering aid, Robinson charged through a withering hail of fire and dragged his comrades to safety, where he rendered aid and saved their lives. With the firefight still raging, he collected weapons and ammunition from the wounded to distribute to those still able-bodied.

He continued to defy the enemy’s fire

and was himself wounded in the shoulder and leg. Despite his wounds, he rescued another of his wounded fighters. While patching his own wounds, he spotted an enemy machine gun nest that had inflicted many casualties on the American force. His rifle ammo expended, he seized two grenades. He was hit in the leg again, with a tracer round that set his uniform on fire. He staggered indomitably toward enemy fire. Shot twice in the chest, but marshalling his last bit of physical strength, he hurled the grenades, destroying the enemy position.

Robinson was awarded the Medal of Honor posthumously.

Who among those who serve in any war would be so self-sacrificial? Sgt. Robinson died, first and foremost, for the men in his unit. No doubt every skin color was represented in the members of his team.

Sgt. Robinson was white. War may be inherently insane, but somehow, in its most dire moments of battle, it reveals a bonding. We all bleed the same color blood.

Joe Harrington Oak Park

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Remote learning should use more social media

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his past year has been tough for students, including myself. COVID-19 changed the way life works but it especially changed the way high school students function. During the school year, we have been learning virtually through Zoom and some part of the school year physically. Learning remotely throughout the school year has been frustrating because the learning experiences haven’t gone well. Most students were home just staring at a screen 4-7 hours a day in order to succeed. That is unhealthy for your mental and physical well-being.

But a solution to these problems can possibly be social media.

Students have been learning from home, but there are plenty of distractions with so many electronic devices. Phones have been the most distracting thing for students.

Students can get caught up in their phone which leads to a lot of missing work. Then they try to play catch up with the work and feel a lot of overload which leads to stress and depression. So since we are on our phones, we should incorporate some type of learning through social media to help students with distraction problems and make it a more enjoyable learning experience.

Most kids are distracted by their phones because social media grabs their attention and cures boredom. They are actively on social media apps such as Snapchat, Instagram, Tiktok, etc, which draws their attention away from their top priorities, such as school. But their purpose for being on social media is to learn information from others, enjoy other people’s creativity, and

share their own creativity and information. There are plenty of creators who make videos on social media who combine their unique creativity with useful information that can be helpful for students during their learning process. Creators on social media are more capable of making an emotional connection than a teacher who is just teaching through Zoom.

Social media can be a better learning tool. Despite its negative effects, social media can positively influence students’ self-esteem in certain subjects like math or English according to Thrive. It can also positively influence students’ emotions as well. When learning from a direct teacher virtually, students’ motivation to learn goes down drastically and interest in doing school goes down drastically. Social media can cheer students up, watching someone with an enjoyable personality or someone who gives you tips and tricks to figure out a solution. A Tiktoker by the name “your. bummy.math.tutor” makes informative videos that help students solve equations and he also makes enjoyable content to make it enjoyable to learn.

COVID-19 is a pandemic that has affected a lot of students’ lives around the world.

We are learning every day how we can get through these tough times easier. Social media is a good solution to some problems that we are dealing with while learning virtually. I hope teachers and parents can be open-minded and incorporate some creative tactics such as social media to teach students.

Khalil Nichols is a student at OPRF High School.

KHALIL NICHOLS One View

Sorry to hear about Joe

I am very sorry about the passing of Joe Citari. I missed seeing Joe play for the Huskies. I did keep score for Jack Kaiser at Oak Park. I was on the team that won the “old” Suburban League conference! I enjoyed my time with him.

I first got to know him in Summer Driver’s Ed. He helped me refine my scoring.

A comment to all OPRF alumni and parents: Get your COVID vaccine — for your family, so you can enjoy the summer without getting sick.

Go Huskies!

Bill Weedman Jr.

North Liberty, Iowa

Joe Citari

PROVIDED

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Our time of rebirth

pring is known as a time of rebirth.

This seems especially apropos this year. The last 14 months completely changed how we do life. Coronavirus disease 2019 or COVID-19, a highly contagious disease caused by severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARSCoV-2), caused a global pandemic that brought us to our knees. The first known case was identified in December of 2019.

The disease has since spread worldwide. As of the time of this writing, there have been 32,753,426 total reported cases and 582,769 total deaths in the United States.* In that time, COVID did more than just cause deaths. It stopped the world. Office workers had to work from home. Schools closed down. Bars and theaters closed down. Grocery stores and restaurants had to quickly figure out how to continue business. The weirdest thing for me was that suddenly toilet paper became the hottest of commodities. I say all of this to illustrate how hard the last 14 months have been.

Not everything stopped though. Institutional racism for instance. We saw white supremacists spurred by ignorance and fear vilify AAPI peoples, and we saw the continued murdering of black lives by the very people who were sworn to protect them. We even saw a sitting president incite a mob to

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Wednesday Journal, May 26, 2021

attack the Capitol in an act of insurrection to try to overturn a free and fair election. It has been a really hard year.

The hard year forced us to come together to see ourselves through the dark. People came together to support each other in such beautiful ways. Our youth reignited the spark of the Civil Rights Movement.

Communities came together to lift up and support frontline workers. Labor rights activists rallied communities to demand that places like Instacart and Amazon better compensate essential workers. People who set aside money to order from small businesses every week to help them weather the storm.

Those stories gave me life.

All of these tensions, terrors, and inequalities, as well as being home for over a year, have forced us to take a brutally honest look at The System. How do we do life?

How much does our society demand of our waking life? Should our schools function as the largest daycare institution in the world?

I heard from some people how nice it was to work from home and be with their families.

Others felt the pressure from companies that wanted them back in the office, which

caused friction between families and schools.

It is people who rely on the system to re-establish itself.

The system requires people to be brought into it so that it can maintain itself. We no longer maintain crops or retain any of the skills we used to have. We offloaded those things to The System to maintain. Then, we work within the system to get money, the vouchers we need to get the things we need to live our lives comfortably. When we are so beholden to the system to provide for us, it’s no wonder that, even though we’re living through a global pandemic, a new civil rights movement, and a dying planet, we still try to uphold the systems we have always relied on and believed in, to shepherd us through.

All of which keeps bringing me back to the question: Can we go back to life before the pandemic? Should we go back?

I can’t help but think that this is not how we were meant to live. Think about 2020. How special that time was when we could spend so much of it with the ones we love. We got through this difficult time; we’ve gotten through maybe every dif-

MAUI JONES

ficult time with our beloved community.

What if we rebuilt our systems with that community at the heart of all things? I very much doubt that it will happen on the national level but maybe we can start here. In Forest Park. In all of our small towns and communities. Maybe we can reimagine schools. Maybe we can reimagine policing.

Maybe we can reimagine what community means or how we are inclusive.

In the greatest moments of discomfort, we find the opportunities for the greatest moments of change. This. Right now. My hope, my dream is that we can start the change here, in our communities.

Perhaps, if enough of our local communities can change, our national ones can too. I think we are seeing the seeds of change. Organizations like The Firehouse Dream and the Justice Troopers in Maywood. Like ROYAL in Oak Park, and Forest Park Against Racism in Forest Park. There are community activists and equity leaders running for office. I can see the change happening and it is inspiring to see!

So here’s to the spring and here is to our time of rebirth. * Numbers cited were from CDC website as of 5/17.

Maui Jones is a Forest Park resident. He founded Echo Theater Collective in Oak Park.

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The Individual & Family Connection team: Natalia DeSouza, MA, LPC, therapist; Joe Edwards, MS, LPC, therapist; Erin Fisher, MSW, LCSW, therapist; Sherry Fleydervish, MA, LCPC, therapist; Andrea Good, MSW, LCSW, therapist; Layton Kirk, MA, LPC, therapist; Ritamaria Laird, MA, LCPC, NCC, clinical director and therapist; Julianne Neely, MSW, LCSW, executive director and therapist; Kellie Seccombe, MSW, LSW, therapist. Also celebrating: Sam Yousif, Fuller Health Group; Tamekia Swint, Styles 4 Kidz; Todd Bannor, Bannor For&your ribbon us onPhotos: oprfchamber.org & Bannor; Liz Holt Mark own Walden, OPRFcutting Chambercontact of Commerce.

Cassie Anna Photography.

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The downside of ‘Cancel Culture’

ancel culture is used to bring down powerful people and just ruin people’s reputations. I have witnessed more than four people and many others who are celebrities getting “canceled” for something they didn’t do. It got to the point where they weren’t even being canceled, just cyberbullied into a depressional state. They are targeted by people who don’t use real facts. They have power and choose not to fact-check.

I want to stop cancel culture because it ruins people for selfish reasons. Sometimes the wrong person is accused when making these accusations. I want people to understand that no matter what your opinion is about someone, you can’t just try to bring them down for something far into their past, mistakes that they learned from and changed and then you use it against them today. This makes their supporters turn on them and they lose everything.

A 10th-grader named Thomas Ullman described how in his class they were reading about Joseph Conrad who was an unbounded explorer and captivating writer. Instead of learning more about him and asking questions, the class just argued about why they shouldn’t be learning about him, that he doesn’t deserve to be noticed because of his insensitive racial comments. While it was wrong, it was normalized back in the 19th century. He explained that people who “cancel” old figures aren’t learning the lesson.

As students, we need to learn from their mistakes or else history will continue to repeat itself. Even people from the past who are insensitive, we can still learn from instead of just canceling them for something that was normalized (“Cancel Culture Is Undermining Learning and Harming Students like Me”).

Although canceling culture can be helpful for allegations of serious misconduct, it also reveals that sometimes the reports are false or very old offenses, used just to bring down a person and ruin them, which is considered cyberbullying.

The article mentions that cancel culture is nothing new, but it didn’t have as powerful an effect as it does now. This suggests that people need to be honest about their facts and not dig far back into the past just to ruin someone, especially

when that person has shown growth since that time (“Cancel Culture”).

Shouting about someone’s since-buried past on Twitter while attempting to fire them from a new role isn’t accomplishing anything (“Why we should cancel the phrase ‘cancel culture’”).

Rather than canceling the people who acted poorly, perhaps we should talk about the hatred spewing through society. Maybe it would be more effective to seek ways to help people grow instead of tearing them down. There’s only one way to stop cancel culture and it’s going to take all of us. The next time someone is being canceled for something they’ve done, look not at the person but at the problem in society that drove them to act in such a way or just the fact the person is uneducated. Then find a way in your own life to address that issue and counteract it. No matter how small the change is, if everyone does their part, there won’t be a need for social media cancellations (“The problem with ‘cancel’ culture and why it needs to stop”).

Today’s generation is so into cancel culture that they are now trying to cancel dead people. Some wonder if anyone understands what it means to cancel someone instead of just using that word to have people dig far back into the person’s past (“If curtailing racist imagery in Dr. Seuss is ‘cancel culture,’ what, exactly, is your culture?”).

Unfortunately, canceling often turns into bullying. Like bullying, if you’ve been canceled, it can make you feel ostracized, socially isolated, and lonely. Research shows that loneliness is associated with higher anxiety, depression, and suicide rates. It can feel as if everyone is giving up on you before you’ve even had the chance to apologize. Instead of creating a dialogue to help you understand how your actions hurt them, the cancelers shut off all communication with you, robbing you of the opportunity to learn and grow from your mistakes or insensitivities (“The Mental Health Effects of Cancel Culture”).

Some aspects of cancel culture can be useful in holding people and organizations accountable for bad behavior. On the flip side, it can take bullying to a new level, damaging the mental well-being of everyone involved. People need to

ESMIE ALWAELI One View

learn that to truly grow and become a better person, you need to realize a mistake was made, fix that mistake, and take the proper steps to ensure you don’t make the same mistake again.

Without these steps you’re going to have the entire world watching you like a hawk to try and destroy your reputation and life. I think people should try to think before they act on a piece of information that they find. For example, if the information is outdated and it seems irrelevant to mention it about that person now, don’t say it; just keep it to yourself.

But if it’s something more serious like any form of sexual assault or being uneducatedly racist toward others and the person never faced their consequences, then bring it to the public’s attention but be wise on how you tell people.

Esmie Alwaeli is a freshman at OPRF High School.

Send letters to the Editor Emailed every Friday morning!

g n a H e r e h in t k r a P k a O

Ken Trainor, Wednesday Journal 141 S. Oak Park Ave., Oak Park, IL 60302 E-mail: ktrainor@wjinc.com

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Wednesday Journal, May 26, 2021

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35

O B I T U A R I E S

Paul Weldon, 64 Catholic business leader

His heart was forever on his sleeve.

And his priorities were always clear: family, work, faith, community. Paul J. Weldon, third-generation owner of Van Bergen & Greener Inc., a Weldon Corporation, died peacefully in his home from complications of multiple myeloma on May 24, 2021. He was surrounded by immediate family members.

The owner of the only U.S. manufacturer of starter drives and starter drives components, Weldon led the 102-year-old company with innovation, compassion, ambition and empathy. Known and respected in Catholic business leadership communities, he had been an active member of Lumen Institute’s Chicago group.

Born on Nov. 30, 1956, a native of River Forest, he was the fifth of six children of the late Bill and the late Patricia Weldon. He began working with his father at Van Bergen & Greener, a few years after earning his bachelor’s degree in business from Loyola University Chicago in 1978. He later earned his master’s in business administration at Roosevelt University.

Weldon attended St. Luke School in River Forest, then Roosevelt Junior High. He is a 1974 graduate of Fenwick High School in Oak Park, where he was remembered for his sense of humor. He attended Georgetown University for his freshman year, then transferred to Loyola in Chicago.

“Paul was the ultimate team player starting with the Weldon Sibling Baseball League in our backyard on Clinton Place in the 1960s,” said Madeleine Weldon-Linne, his sister, who also lives in River Forest. “He was a trusted confidante to his siblings and also to our parents, who were honored he continued on with the family business.”

Married in 1985 to Bernadette (Treacy), they raised their three children, Matthew, Treacy (Dan) O’Keefe, and Marirose in River Forest before moving to Oak Brook. His wife died in 2004 as a result of an undiagnosed brain tumor.

He was remarried to Diane (Schikora Tentler) Weldon in 2015.

“One of the first things anyone would notice about my husband was his warm smile and generous heart,” said Diane Weldon.

“Paul was always optimistic, giving sage advice. He was my best friend, a wonderful husband, father and man of deep religious faith.”

A generous supporter of Catholic charities and funds locally, nationally and internationally, Weldon was a modest and private man.

“Paul believed in the power of prayer and was a witness to hope for his family

and friends,” said his friend, Father Jason Brooks. “He was inspired by Mother Teresa, Padre Pio, John Paul II and St. Faustina and lived life to the fullest by always taking the high road.”

A well-known and popular resident of Oak Brook for more than 25 years, Weldon also had homes in New Buffalo, Michigan and Palm Harbor, Florida, where he spent weekends and vacations with his extended family.

Known for his generosity to family and his candid sense of humor, he liked to pull pranks and surprise people with his jokes.

He was recognized in his neighborhood for his 2000 red Corvette with the license plate, “Ooh Yah.” “I am so grateful God made him my dad,” said Treacy Weldon O’Keefe. “He was reliable, dependable and fun. He dedicated his whole life to us and set an incredibly high standard of what it means to be a good person.”

Matt Weldon said, “He was a go-getter and always pushing to do whatever needs to get done, but he made sure it didn’t cost anything to anyone to do it.”

“His actions always matched up to what he was saying,” said Marirose Weldon.

“He definitely lived by the morals of being truthful, humble and grateful. I have always worked to embody those as he did.”

Running the manufacturing company as sole proprietor following his father’s death in 1988 and working alongside his mother who was chief financial officer at the company until her death in 2002, he maintained a fervent commitment to his customers, suppliers and employees in the Maywood plant his father purchased in the 1980s.

In 2009, he told a reporter for APRA.org, the newsletter for the Automotive Parts Rebuilders Association in 2009, “People pass, but ethics live on.”

In addition to his wife and three children, Paul Weldon is survived by his wife’s three children, Robert, David and Julie Tentler.

He was the brother of five siblings, Mary Pat (Ken) Woitas, Maureen Weldon, Bill (the late Madonna) Weldon, Madeleine (Mike) Weldon-Linne, and Michele Weldon; and in-laws, William (Deborah) Treacy, Barbara Treacy, Rosemary Treacy, Mary Pat (Jeff) Sutter and Sharon Carroll.

He was the uncle of 27 nieces and nephews: Megan (Alex) Rodriguez; Jaime (Joe) Doss; Kevin (Sherry ) Woitas; Laura (Rob) Clark; Molly (Joe) Barber; Katie Fegan; Maggie Fegan: Bill Weldon; Erin (Bill) Wilton; Elizabeth (Brian) Freer, Conor (Caroline) Weldon; Caelan (Eric)Lampe; Aleksandra Weldon-Line (Evan) Shapiro; Mariel Reeves; Alyssa (Dustin) Jesberger; Weldon, Brendan and Colin Rogers; Patrick, Caitlin and Sean Treacy; Andrew and Scott Sutter; and Nora Carroll.

The wake will be held on Wednesday, May 26, 3-8 p.m., at Sullivan Funeral Home, 60 S. Grant St., in Hinsdale. Services will be held for family only on Thursday, May 27, 10 a.m. at St. Vincent Ferrer in River Forest, followed by internment at Queen of Heaven

Cemetery.

In lieu of flowers, please send donations to: Missionaries of Charity https://www. motherteresa.org/missionaries-of-charity. html or Legionnaries of Christ.

Olive Mobed, 96 International midwife

Olive Mobed, 96, of Oak Park and River Forest, died peacefully on May 17, 2021 surrounded by her three children. Born with her twin brother on Dec. 24, 1924 in Coventry, England, to Ralph and Lily Walton, she was the youngest of six siblings.

During World War II she was evacuated to the countryside for two years where she lived with an aunt and uncle. After the war, she graduated from nursing school and went on to attain specialties in both eye care and midwifery. She worked as a midwife in Birmingham, England before joining the World Health Organization, which took her to Iran to teach midwifery.

In Iran she met and married Jehangir (John) Mobed and started a family. In 1963 they moved to the U.S. where John completed additional graduate work while Olive worked in obstetrics departments at

hospitals in Boston, Washington D.C., and Jacksonville, Florida. She, John, and their now three children, moved to River Forest in 1969. Once the children were older, she returned to work in the obstetrics department of West Suburban Hospital until her retirement in 1986, and then continued to serve as a volunteer at the hospital for another 20 years.

An adventurous traveler, she toured much of Europe as well as more exotic locales, including Egypt and Nepal. She was an enthusiastic reader, tennis player, pianist, and — as part of a local charity group that supported the British Home — a “Daughter of the British Empire.” She was a member of the Berean Bible Students Church in Lombard and later a member of First Presbyterian Church of River Forest.

A devoted mother and grandmother, Olive Mobed is survived by her three children, Parvine MacDonald and her husband Mark, Sue Arends and her husband Dan, and Jim Mobed and his wife Henrike; and her eight grandchildren and one great grandson. She was predeceased by her husband Jehangir (John) Mobed in 2018.

A celebration of a life well lived was held on May 23, 2021 at First Presbyterian Church of River Forest.

In lieu of flowers, please consider a contribution to Caledonia Senior Living and Memory Care (https://www.caledoniaseniorliving.org/fundraising/donate/) or the American Cancer Society (https://www. cancer.org/) in Olive’s honor.

Arrangements were handled by Drechsler, Brown & Williams Funeral Home.

W E D N E S D A Y

JOURNAL of Oak Park and River Forest

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Charles Williams, Owner/Funeral Director 203 S. Marion St. Oak Park 60302 708/383-3191

36

Wednesday Journal, May 26, 2021

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Let the sun shine in...

Public Notice: Your right to know In print • Online • Available to you 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, every day of the year OakPark.com | RiverForest.com | PublicNoticeIllinois.com

Deadline is Monday at 5:00 p.m.

HOURS: 9:00 A.M.– 5:00 P.M. MON–FRI

BY PHONE: (708) 613-3333 | BY FAX: (708) 467-9066 | BY E-MAIL: CLASSIFIEDS@OAKPARK.COM | CLASSIFIEDS@RIVERFOREST.COM

LEGAL NOTICE The Village of Oak Park will receive sealed bids from qualified contractors at the Public Works Center, 201 South Boulevard, Oak Park, Illinois 60302 Monday through Friday, 7:30 a.m. to 4:00 p.m. local time until 3:00 p.m. on Wednesday, June 9, 2021 for the following: Village of Oak Park Valve Actuator ReplacementREBID Project Number: 21-130 Bid documents may be obtained from the Village’s website at http://www.oak-park.us/bid. For questions, please call Public Works at (708) 358-5700 during the above hours.

Published in Wednesday Journal May 26, 2021

PUBLIC NOTICE The River Forest Park District has placed its 2021-2022 Combined Budget and Appropriation Ordinance on file for public inspection.

Said Ordinance may be examined on the River Forest Park District website. A public hearing on said Ordinance will be held at 6:00pm on Monday, June 14, 2021, at the Depot, 401 Thatcher Avenue, River Forest, Illinois.

Michael J. Sletten, Secretary River Forest Park District Published in Wednesday Journal May 26, 2021

PUBLIC NOTICES

PUBLIC NOTICES

NOTICE TO BIDDERS Sealed separate bids will be received by the Oak Park Public Library (“Library”) for the following project:

The Bidding Documents for the project (which include the bidding instructions for the project and other related documents) will be available Monday May 24th, 2021 and are available for viewing/download online without cost or purchase on the Bulley & Andrews, LLC One Drive, located at the following link. No username or password is required.

OAK PARK PUBLIC LIBRARY SECURITY RENOVATIONS MAIN AND MAZE BRANCH LOCATIONS OAK PARK, IL 60301 BID GROUP 1 – ELECTRICAL and ACCESS CONTROLS Bids will be received until 2:00 p.m.

CST on Friday June 11th, 2021 at the Main Branch Oak Park Public Library, 834 Lake Street, Oak Park, IL 60301, and will be publicly opened and read at 2:00 p.m. CST on that date. Bids shall be submitted in an opaque sealed envelope clearly marked: Oak Park Public Library Security Renovations 834 Lake Street Oak Park, IL 60301 Attention: Bulley & Andrews Project: MAIN AND MAZE BRANCH SECURITY WORK Scope of work for Bid Group 1 generally includes, but is not limited to: electrical, power, distribution, low voltage cabling, and access control.

All bids must be submitted in accordance with the bidding instructions contained in the Bidding Documents for the project. Bid security in the form of a bid bond in an amount equal to ten percent (10%) of the base bid amount shall be submitted with the bid. Should a bid bond be submitted, the bond shall be payable to the Oak Park Public Library, 834 Lake Street, Oak Park, IL 60301. All documents and information required by the bidding instructions contained in the Bidding Documents for the project shall be submitted with the bid. Incomplete, late or non-conforming bids may not be accepted.

No bids shall be withdrawn, cancelled or modified after the time for opening of bids without the Library’s consent for a period of ninety (90) days after the scheduled time of bid opening.

h t t p s : / / b u l l e y a n d r e w s - m y. sharepoint.com/:f:/g/personal/ btruty_bulley_com/Ep4N77OJkwtJt67lPDVsuggBHBgpHS8IJ0T1ffDzQA1PWg?e=DxkMYA A site visit/walk through is scheduled for 8 AM on Wednesday June 2nd.

It will take place first at the Main Branch Library then move to the Maze Branch at 9 AM. The Library reserves the right to reject any or all bids or parts thereof, or waive any irregularities or informalities, and to make an award that in the Board’s sole opinion is in the best interest of the District.

PUBLIC NOTICES

PUBLIC NOTICES

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INJURED? If you’ve been hurt in an accident in Illinois, call for a FREE CASE CONSULTATION. Calls Answered 24/7 by Staver Accident Injury Lawyers: 1-888-310-8322

The site will be available for visits by appointment to be coordinated with Bulley & Andrews, LLC. Interested parties may inspect the existing conditions. Schedule an appointment with Bill Truty of Bulley & Andrews in advance if you wish to visit the sites.

All bidders must comply with applicable Illinois Law requiring the payment of prevailing wages by all Contractors working on public works. If during the time period of work, the prevailing wage rates change, the contractor shall be responsible for additional costs without any change to the contract amount. All bidders must comply with the Illinois Statutory requirements regarding labor, including Equal Employment Opportunity Laws.

For additional information on the project, contact Bill Truty of Bulley & Andrews, LLC at btruty@bulley.com or 773-645-2086.

Dated: 5/20/2021 Bill Truty Bulley & Andrews, LLC Published in Wednesday Journal May 26, June 2, June 9, 2021

EQUAL HOUSING OPPORTUNITY All real estate advertising in this newspaper is subject to the Fair Housing Act, which makes it illegal to advertise any preference, limitation or discrimination based on age, race, color, religion, sex, handicap, familial status or national origin, or intention to make any such preferences, limitations or discrimination.

The Illinois Human Rights Act prohibits discrimination in the sale, rental or advertising of real estate based on factors in addition to those protected under federal law.

This newspaper will not knowingly accept any advertising for real estate which is in violation of the law. All persons are hereby informed that all dwellings advertised are available on an equal-opportunity basis.

To complain of discrimination, call HUD toll free at: 1-800-669-9777.

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Hire Local.

Place an ad on Wednesday Classified’s Local Online Job Board.

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38

Wednesday Journal, May 26, 2021

CLASSIFIED

(708) 613-3333 • FAX: (708) 467-9066 • E-MAIL: CLASSIFIEDS@OAKPARK.COM | CLASSIFIEDS@RIVERFOREST.COM HELP WANTED HELP WANTED

HELP WANTED PHYSICAL EDUCATION TEACHER River Forest Public Schools District 90 is seeking a Part-time (FTE 0.77) Elementary School Physical Education Teacher.

Qualifications: Valid Illinois Professional Educator License with Grade-Appropriate Physical Education Endorsement; successful teaching experience in physical education preferred; Master’s Degree is preferred.

Job Duties: The part-time PE Teacher will work in partnership with the full-time PE teacher to instruct students in Pre-K through 4th grade on how to develop habits of mind and actions that support good health, fitness and enjoyment of sport and play. The PE teacher will facilitate a learning environment that engages students in learning skills for sport and fitness, as well as SEL skills by growing confidence, sportsmanship and team spirit.

Application Procedure: Interested candidates should complete the online application available at district90.org. Please do not send hard copies of supporting documentation, i.e.cover letters, resumes, licensure, etc. to River Forest Schools District 90; instead, upload these materials onto the online job application system for proper processing.

ELECTRICIAN’S HELPER Must have own transportation.

For more information CALL 708-738-3848 ALL POSITIONS AVAILABLE

• Previous experience in account-ing, finance, or other related fields • High level of accuracy in data entry skills • Ability to prioritize and multitask • Strong organizational skills

• Deadline and detail-oriented • Proficient in Microsoft Excel • Proficient in QuickBooks

Benefits: Medical, Vision, Dental, Life Insurance, Short-term and Long-term disability and retirement plans, transportation subsidy provided.

SEASONAL FARMERS’ MARKET ASSISTANT The Village of Oak Park is seeking qualified candidates for the position of Seasonal Farmers’ Market Assistant in the Development Customer Services Department. This position will provide administrative support to the Farmers’ Market Manager to allow growers and producers of food to sell directly to the public within established guidelines. This position requires work in inclement weather conditions; some heavy lifting of up to 50 pounds; walking or standing for sustained periods of time. Applicants are encouraged to visit the Village of Oak Park’s website at http://www.oak-park.us/jobs. Interested and qualified applicants must complete a Village of Oak Park application. Open until filled.

We are hiring Relationship Bankers in Oak Park, IL. Visit the link below to check out this opportunity to join a great team! https://wintrust.taleo.net/careersection/2/ jobdetail.ftl?job=2100424&lang=en You can also learn about other career opportunities nearby.

MARKETPLACE ITEMS FOR SALE DECK FURNITURE 48” white wicker table with glass top, 4 chairs with matching umbrella, smaller table and umbrella cover. Best offer.

708-528-0896 HENREDON SOFA Black-gray Henredon sofa. Excel-lent condition. 84 in w x 34 in d. $249.

708-488-8755 QUARTZ HEATER Patton tower quartz heater. Sun like radiant heat. 4ft tall x 6 in wide. Excellent condition. $59.00.

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Apply in person after 3pm.

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SUBURBAN RENTALS Best Selection & Service

PRAYER TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN (NEVER KNOWN TO FAIL) Oh, most beautiful flower of Mt. Carmel, fruitful vine, splendor of heaven, Blessed Mother of the Son of God, Immaculate Virgin, assist me in my necessity. Oh, Star of the Sea, help me and show me, herein you are my mother.

Oh, Holy Mary, Mother of God, Queen of Heaven and Earth. I humbly beseech you from the bottom of my heart to suc cor in my necessity (make request). There are none that can withstand your power. Oh, show me herein you are my mother. Oh, Mary, conceived without sin, pray for us who have recourse to thee (3 times). Holy Mary, I place this prayer in your hands (3 times). Say this prayer for three consecutive days and publish; your request will be granted. CAC

Qualifications:

Office located in Chicago. Candidates will be tested on all skill sets.

Qualified Candidates should send their resumes and salary requirements to humanresources@icl-na.com

NOVENA

HELP WANTED

ACCOUNTING CLERK

Responsibilities: • Accounting duties • Process invoices accurately and timely • Check the accuracy of business transactions • Perform data entry and administrative duties • Preparation of payable checks • Posting of checks and ACH payments • Create, edit and update spreadsheets in excel • Daily, weekly and monthly reporting

Bartenders • Bussers Line Cooks • Servers

STUDIOS, 1, 2 & 3 BR

ANNOUNCEMENTS

OAK PARK & FOREST PARK

708-386-7355

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Apartment listings updated daily at:

Find your new apartment this Saturday from 10 am – 4pm at 35 Chicago Avenue.

Or call us toll free at 1-833-440-0665 for an appointment.

OFFICE /RETAIL FOR RENT 1040 NORTH BLVD OFFICE Sub-lease, Move right in. Private furnished window office 10×15 @1040 North Boulevard, walk to CTA green line and Metra train. Asking $600m + 1m SD. Includes all utilities and internet. Note: this is a 2nd-story walkup space. Conference room available.

Call Michael @ 708 383-7900 LOCATION LOCATION LOCATION FOREST PARK HIGHLY VISIBLE OFFICE/STORE AVAILABLE FOR LEASE 1350 SF w/ AC & HIGHLY VISIBLE MADISON STREET EXPOSURE. 7607 Madison Street. Village parking lot next door. Bright, clean office. Great Madison Street exposure! Call Francis 708-383-8574.

THERAPY OFFICES: OAK PARK Free wifi; flexible leasing, and offices nicely furnished right down to the Kleenex. Secure building & friendly colleagues, often giving referrals to other office mates.

Shared Waiting room, Conference room & option to join Peer Supervision Group. Ideal for new practice or 2nd location.

708-383-0729

RIVER FOREST–7777 Lake St. * 1116 sq. ft. * 1400 sq. ft. Dental Office RIVER FOREST–7756 Madison St. * 960 sq. ft.

OAK PARK–6142-44 Roosevelt Rd. * 3 & 5 room office suites FOREST PARK–7736 Madison St. *2500 sq. ft. unit Strand & & Browne Strand Browne 708-488-0011 708-488-0011

SPINET PIANO AND BENCH Baldwin spinet piano and bench. Light brown wood finish. $300 obo.

708-386-0087 SOLID OAK TABLE Ranch oak, pedestal base. Table top 1” thick and 44” diam. $50.

708-488-8755 Ranch oak,. $50.

LAMP TABLE 708-488-8755

FLOOR LAMP WITH BUILT-IN TABLE Ranch oak,. $50.

708-488-8755 BLACK LEATHER COAT Beautiful black leather coat purchased at Saks 5th Avenue. Excellent condition. Size 6. $40.

708-488-8755

ESTATE SALE Riverside

ESTATE SALE 272 BLACKHAWK ROAD THU 5/27 & FRI 5/28 9AM TO 3PM

Dishes, glassware, tables, lamps, exercise bike, outdoor furniture, cameras, printers, stereos etc.

WANTED TO BUY WANTED MILITARY ITEMS: Helmets, medals, patches, uniforms, weapons, flags, photos, paperwork, Also toy soldiers – lead, plastic – other misc. toys.

Call Uncle Gary 708-522-3400 Lost & Found, Items for Sale, and To Be Given Away ads run free in Wednesday Classified. To place your ad, call 708-613-334

ROOMS FOR RENT Large Sunny Room with fridge, microwave. Near Green line, bus, Oak Park, 24 hour desk, parking lot. $125.00. New Mgmt.

312-212-1212

BY PHONE: (708) 613-3333 BY FAX: (708) 467-9066 BY E-MAIL: EMAIL@GROWINGCOMMUNIT YMEDIA.ORG

Wednesday Journal, May 26, 2021

OAKPARK.COM | RIVERFOREST.COM

Graduation is almost here!

Be part of something fun, something positive and celebrate!

Being a student during COVID-19 has been especially

Place a personalized ad honoring your graduating

challenging. During the first two weeks of June, Growing

high school, middle school or elementary student. The

Community Media will publish graduation coverage

suggested cost is $60 per ad, but no ad will be turned

across all of our four newspapers.

away for inability to pay. If you would like to make an additional donation to defray the cost of another

Give the Grads in your life a much deserved shout out!

student’s ad, you can do that too!

Ads will run on June 2 and June 9.

To place an ad visit: www.oakpark.com/product/gcm-grads/

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Wednesday Journal, May 26, 2021

OAKPARK.COM | RIVERFOREST.COM

REMEMBERING OUR HEROES ON MEMORIAL DAY