Tell us what you really think of the Journal! Take our Reader Survey at oakpark.com/survey and you can win a prize
JOURNAL W E D N E S D A Y
July 26, 2017 Vol. 35, No. 49 ONE DOLLAR
@oakpark @wednesdayjournal
Follow us Online!
of Oak Park and River Forest
D97 will use extra taxes to pay down debt Will result in tax abatement on later bills By MICHAEL ROMAIN Editor
Nineteen thousand Oak Park property taxpayers who collectively paid an extra and unexpected $2.6 million in taxes to Oak Park District 97’s will have to wait a little longer to get that money back. Instead of issuing refund checks that would show up in taxpayers’ mailboxes within months, which was the school board’s initial preference, board members voted 6-0 during a July 18 regular meeting to use the extra funds to more quickly pay down the remaining $4.45 million in bonds the district issued to help fund the construction of its two middle school buildings in 2002. Board member Jim O’Connor was not at the July 18 meeting. Prepaying that debt will result in lower tax bills in future years. District 97 board President Holly Spurlock said that, after consulting with their lawyers, a range of experts and community members, district officials realized that they See D97 TAXES on page 12
File 2016
A PATTERN OF MISUSE: Jeffrey Hunter Cuoto, co-owner of Fiberista Club, 1107 Westgate St., is embroiled in a scandal in the knitting community, with dozens of designers across the globe accusing him of selling their designs without payment. One former member of his monthly yarn club says the problems at Fiberista Club go deeper.
A tangled mess
Oak Park yarn store in firestorm for allegedly selling patterns without paying designers By TIMOTHY INKLEBARGER Staff Reporter
A small-business idea that started as an online knitting club and quickly grew into a brick-and-mortar storefront in downtown Oak Park almost seemed too good to
be true for its owner in early 2016. “We thought it would slowly grow over time, but it sort of exploded, which was great; I’m still pinching myself because we are very blessed,” Jeffrey Hunter Cuoto, co-owner of Fiberista Club, 1107 Westgate St., told Wednesday Journal in
February of 2016, a few months after the storefront opened. But earlier this year, Cuoto’s story began to unravel as knitting designers from as far away as Germany, Ireland, France and See FIBERISTA CLUB on page 15
Enter your patio photo to win $50! Use #MayaPatio to enter on Instagram, Twitter or Facebook. 144 S Oak Park Ave
708.358.9800
mayadelsol.com