Tag Archives: Illinois

Battle over outdoor lighting in Barrington Hills really about the character of the community

Posted on by

On one hand, it seems like a silly fight: people in Barrington Hills, Illinois, a wealthy community known for its large lots and wealthy residents, are battling over a proposed ordinance that would limit outdoor lighting. On the other hand, this debate appears to be about much more than just outdoor lights: it is a discussion about whether Barrington Hills can retain its character or whether it will slowly just become another suburb.

A little background about the community:

Barrington Hills has kept a worried eye on the encroaching masses from the time of its incorporation in 1957. A local history says the village was conceived of in the locker room of the Barrington Hills Country Club by men who vowed to prevent their estates and gentlemen’s farms from being sliced into tract housing.

The village set its zoning code so that properties must be a minimum of 5 acres, a trait it has kept despite booming development in the surrounding communities of Algonquin, Barrington and Carpentersville. Even South Barrington, a town with traditionally large lot sizes, had to allow a subdivision in order to settle a lawsuit.

But Barrington Hills got a glimpse of an unhappy future a decade ago when a developer sought permission to build hundreds of homes in the village’s northwest corner. Turned down by the trustees, he sued and won the right to de-annex the land (to date, though, nothing has been built).

The defeat has lingered in the minds of some village leaders, and some say it plays a role in the lighting feud.

Two years ago, Barrington Hills updated its comprehensive plan — a blueprint meant to guide a town’s future development — and among its recommendations was the adoption of “light control standards to preserve dark skies and rural atmosphere.”

That had been a longstanding concern in the community, Knoop said, and the Village Board approved the plan without controversy. The trouble started when some trustees tried turning light control into law.

So this debate places two values in opposition: the ability of suburban homeowners to light their home as they wish versus the ability of the community to control its own destiny. Both of these are powerful forces: many people move to suburbs, and particularly exclusive suburbs like Barrington Hills, so that they don’t have people telling them what to do. But at the same time, people move to places like Barrington Hills because it doesn’t have sprawling subdivisions and busy roads.

In my mind, there is little surprise that some small issue could become such a big debate: it is not about the lights but rather about whether Barrington Hills can retain its character against the pressures that threaten to turn it into just another suburb. Such debates are relatively common in many suburbs as both political officials and residents consider how proposed changes to laws, zoning, and development patterns might alter the feel of the community. In this particular community, we could ask: why did this discussion develop around outdoor lights instead of another issue or is this a long-running (yet punctuated) debate that the community has been having for decades?

David Brooks asks: will anyone want to run for political office?

Posted on by

In his latest column, David Brooks profiles Illinois Republican Senatorial candidate Mark Kirk. After going through his strong points and suggesting that it seems like Kirk would make an ideal candidate, he then goes into Kirk’s embellishment of his service record. And how the Illinois campaign has turned into what some people have called “the liar-liar campaign.”

And then Brooks brings up a logical point: if this is what happens in politics, who will want to run in the future?

The reality is, Kirk has led a life that is extremely impressive in most respects. The oddest thing about him is that he’s willing to go through this process. And the larger question is: In the years ahead, how many other talented people will be willing to do it, too?

While the prospect of doing good or being in power will always appeal to some, will the process become so unpleasant that the people who make good and reasonable candidates no longer desire to run? This is something to watch in the coming years.

Schools don’t just teach academic skills; they also teach social and emotional skills

Posted on by

The Chicago Tribune reports on widespread programs in schools to teach social and emotional skills to students. The state of Illinois is leading the way:

In 2004, Illinois became the first state in the nation to require all school districts to teach social and emotional skills as part of their curriculum and daily school life. That means students are expected to meet certain benchmarks, such as recognizing and managing feelings, building empathy and making responsible decisions.

The touchy-feely stuff doesn’t have to come at the expense of intellect. New evidence shows a strong link between interpersonal skills and academics, said Roger Weissberg, a professor of psychology at the University of Illinois, Chicago, who has studied social and emotional learning for more than 25 years.

Weissberg and his colleagues recently completed an analysis of 300 scientific studies and reached two important conclusions: Students enrolled in such programs scored at least 10 percentage points higher on achievement tests than peers who weren’t. At the same time, discipline problems were cut in half.

The article also suggests teaching social and emotional skills is tied to seeing students more as whole persons. This is all part of the broad program of socialization in schools. While academic skills are an important emphasis, so are emotional/social skills as well as other topics such as learning how to be a good citizen or acquiring skills needed for jobs.

Suburban budget cuts lead to volunteer opportunities

Posted on by

Many suburban communities have had budget difficulties in the last few years, leading to staffing cuts and other measures.

Naperville, Illinois, a prosperous Chicago suburb, had some similar issues. Because of some of the staffing cuts, the city is now looking for volunteers to help out at City Hall:

The pilot Municipal Volunteer Program is still accepting applications, said Community Relations Manager Nadja Lalvani, and has already drawn the interest of about a dozen people. Currently, the city is looking to fill a vacant front desk at city hall that used to be occupied by a greeter, but due to budget cuts, the position was eliminated…

The front-desk position at city hall will be the first volunteer opportunity opened to the public, Lalvani said. The greeter will be responsible for directing people to various parts of city hall, and could be trained to operate the phone switchboard in the future.

After the pilot period ends in six months, the city will evaluate the program. If all goes well, there could be more opportunities for volunteers.

Is a program like this only possible in generally well-off and well-run places like Naperville? How many citizens today would be willing to volunteer to help the local city government (as opposed to other volunteer opportunities or not volunteering at all)? Naperville does talk up its volunteer spirit so perhaps this ethos will come through and help the city fill a few positions.

Debating how fast high-speed rail should be

Posted on by

Some legislators in Illinois are questioning whether plans for 110 mph trains actually are high-speed trains. However, as you might expect, working out the details and the funding is complicated with many involved parties:

Officials at Amtrak, which has minimal expertise in operating high-speed rail, don’t see a problem topping out at only 110 mph. An infusion of billions of dollars in federal and state funding will mean better Amtrak service in the Midwest — just don’t mistake it for true high-speed trains.

The genuine article, service at up to 220 mph, is being planned in California and Florida. It already exists to a lesser degree on Amtrak Acela Express trains that get up to 150 mph on small portions of the route between Boston, New York, Philadelphia and Washington.

While 110 mph would be faster than current trains, there are some who argue that the speed must be dramatically increased from current levels to have the trains compete with airline travel and attract customers.


Plainfield: From deadly tornado to suburban growth

Posted on by

Plainfield, Illinois has experienced much suburban growth in the last twenty years: it had 4,500 people in 1990 and it was estimated in 2007 to have more than 37,000 (with projections of 120,000 people in 2030).

But at the beginning of this growth spurt, a deadly F5 tornado ripped through the community on August 28, 1990:

The tornado touched down outside Oswego about 3:15 p.m., and the 200 mph winds inside it etched a scar 16 miles long, stretching to the southwest side of Joliet.

By 3:45, the sky was clear and the horizon lined with battered, leafless trees and ruined homes. In all, 1,500 buildings were damaged or destroyed, 300 people were injured and 29 were dead, victims of the most powerful tornado ever to strike the Chicago area.

As the community prepares to commemorate the 20th anniversary of the tornado, this article provides some insights into the collective memory of the community. The memory of their darkest moment faded away as new people moved in, 1,000 new residents in the first year after the tornado. Today, Plainfield is something different than it was then.

Sociological studies of the effects of disasters or crises tend to focus on big cities. I recently heard a presentation about a new book comparing the 9/11 crisis in New York City and the Hurricane Katrina crisis in New Orleans. I wonder if the insights of that book would be able to speak to the experience of people in places like Plainfield.

Blagojevich wins round 1

Posted on by

While sitting in the Atlanta airport waiting to return to Chicago, I saw the big news of today live on CNN: Rod Blagojevich wins round 1 as he is convicted on only 1 of 24 counts brought against him by the federal government.

Amazing.

The jurors started speaking tonight. According to the foreman:

But in the end, he said, the “lack of a smoking gun” was too much of a hurdle for jurors to reach more than the one unanimous decision.

And the charge of trying to selling the Senate seat might have been held up by one juror:

[A young juror] said a female juror who was the lone holdout on convicting Blagojevich of attempting to sell the Senate seat “wanted clear-cut evidence, and not everything was clear-cut.”

The court proceedings will continue.

And what does this mean for the State of Illinois, politics, and U.S. Attorney Patrick Fitzgerald?

The results of incentives for movie production

Posted on by

Michigan Avenue has been a battleground for several recent weekends as Transformers 3 filmed scenes. According to the Chicago Tribune, the producers were partly drawn by the financial incentives offered by the state of Illinois. Though the film will spend more than $20 million in six weeks in the local economy, the state will offer at least a $6 million tax credit.

Illinois is not the only state playing this game:

Illinois is among 45 jobs-hungry states tripping over each other to financially woo movies and television shows. About half, including Illinois, offer tax credits, which cut producers’ costs by tens of millions of dollars at the expense of state budgets.

The pool of rivals has doubled in the past four years, and the lures, for the most part, are getting fancier, with only a handful of states pulling back, either due to recessionary pressures or local scandals. A just-released study by the Milken Institute indicates that aggressive plays, by states as well as overseas locales, are cutting into California’s historical grip on the business.

The rest of the article contains arguments for and against such aggressive tax credits. Regardless, it seems that the tax credit game may become a race to the bottom where states eventually find there is little economic benefit to having filming in their backyard.

Even if the filming doesn’t bring in many jobs (as opposed to short-term work) or other lasting benefits, filming can certainly draw attention. The filming of Transformers 3 has attracted a lot of local media attention, perhaps raising the profile of Chicago and Michigan Avenue for viewers.

The diverging diamond interchange

Posted on by

American interchanges can take many forms – see this field guide to highway interchanges from The Infrastructurist – including one called “the diverging diamond.” The goal is to provide better traffic flow from a road onto a highway through switching the lanes of traffic through the interchange area. That is, traffic entering on the right side of the road are then driving on the left through the interchange and vice versa.

Illinois Department of Transportation officials are considering this design, primarily being touted by Missouri officials, for an interchange in Naperville. See the design here and the background to the interchange here.

Cutting writing tests to save money

Posted on by

The Chicago Tribune reports on Illinois’ plan to cut down on state writing tests for 2010-2011 to save $3.5 million. From the article:

[L]ate last month, the Illinois State Board of Education decided to eliminate the writing exam given to students in grades three, five, six and eight for the 2010-11 school year.

The 11th grade writing test still will be given because some universities require a writing exam of applicants, said state board spokesman Matt Vanover.

I wonder if this is a cut intended to draw outrage from citizens…who might then be willing to pay more toward education.

Additionally, federal statutes focus on reading and math and do not require a writing test. The article also notes that Illinois’ writing scores are typically poor.