Submitted by the office of Rep. Karen May

HIGHWOOD, IL – In the wake of widespread loss of power throughout the Chicagoland area, state Rep. Karen May (D-Highland Park) and members of the Illinois House’s Public Utilities committee will hold a subject matter hearing on Power Outages in Northeastern Illinois on Tuesday, August 16 at 10 a.m. in the Ballroom of the Highland Park Country Club, located at 1201 Park Ave West.

Recently, three violent storms tore through Illinois leaving more than 1.4 million area residents without power. Following the near record breaking power outages, many Illinois residents struggled without electricity for several days.

Both the Illinois Commerce Commission and representatives from ComEd are expected to provide testimony. All local residents and elected officials are welcome to speak and offer testimony at the hearing. Anyone who wishes to speak before the committee will need to fill out a witness slip at the event. Due to the large volume of interest in the topic, everyone who would like to provide testimony is being encouraged to speak briefly and also to submit their thoughts in writing to Rep. May’s district office or turn them in at the hearing where they will be introduced into the official record.

“We want to make sure that everyone in the community has a chance to have their voices heard regarding the recent power outages,” said May. “Judging by the amount of phone calls and messages we have received, we will have to limit testimonies to no more than a few minutes each to accommodate the high level of interest in this important subject. People deserve to have answers and to be able to speak their minds.”

For more information on the hearing, to submit written testimony, or to RSVP please contact Rep. Karen May’s district office at (847) 433-9100 or by email at karen@repkarenmay.org.

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By Jillian Marie Chapman, Deer Path Art League Gallery Intern

Come Join the Deer Path Art League in downtown Lake Forest Market Square! The Art League will participate in the First Friday Event on August 5th. Lake Forest Bootery is hosting a gathering where Market Square businesses will stay open longer and have their own festivities!

There will be a wine tasting, music, and food to celebrate South Gate’s 30th anniversary! They are also hosting local artists to paint en plein air (in the open a ir) out in the square. The Deer Path Art League will also be featuring artwork throughout Market Square in store front windows! So please come, bring your brushes, canvases and join the fun for a wonderful evening in downtown Lake Forest!

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By Jim Moss, secretary of Lake Bluff Youth Baseball Association

Gazebo vs. the Square (Market)?
Battle on the Bluff?

Perhaps GazeboNews readers can submit a fitting name for this Saturday that finds Lake Bluff and Lake Forest baseball players locked up in two semi-final battles. (Provide your naming ideas for these games by commenting on this story!)

The action kicks off at Troyer at Noon as the Lake Bluff 11As tangle with their counterparts from the big city.

The battle continues 1PM on Saturday at Deerpath Park as the 12As lock horns with their long time rivals from Lake Forest.

At stake in both games is a trip to Glenview on Sunday for the Lake Shore Feeder Baseball League championship. We all know when Lake Bluff and Lake Forest take the field, you can throw the records out the window.

In other action Thursday night, our 10As, 13As and 14As battled hard, but saw their seasons come to an end.

While the 14A loss probably still stings a bit this morning, that group should take great pride in the body of work they put up in the last 6 years. A 13 year old North Shore championship, champions of many tournaments including two this season and a succesful run in Cooperstown in 2009. They were fun to watch and we will miss these boys!!! Best of luck to you next year in high school!!!

LBYBA
lakebluffbaseball@gmail.com
www.lakebluffbaseball.com

P.O. Box 222
Lake Bluff, IL 60044

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Editor’s note: Lake Bluff resident Bob Clifford read the following speech to the District 65 School Board at its monthly meeting on July 26. It is reprinted here with his permission. Please note: GazeboNews editor Adrienne Fawcet lives in the same neighborhood as Bob, and she is a member of the Middle School Noise Abatement Committee. Also please note that if you comment on this story, you must include your full name.

By Bob Clifford of Circle Drive, Lake Bluff
Lake Bluff, July 26, 2011

I am here tonight representing a group of over 73 citizens in the neighborhood surrounding the middle school and east school site whose lives are being negatively impacted every day and night by the noise pollution being emitted by the HVAC compressors at the middle school. We are enduring the third summer of this nuisance that is interrupting our otherwise tranquil and peaceful neighborhood. I stand before you tonight to let you know that our patience is wearing thin. Our goal is to work with the school district to return the noise levels in the neighborhood to what they were before the HVAC compressors were installed, in other words, full noise abatement.

Thus far, your attempts to mitigate the noise levels have resulted in poor results that are completely unsatisfactory to the neighborhood. Three months ago, we were told to wait for the demolition of East School and we were told it would help the situation. We believe the opposite has happened. The removal of East School has actually now broadened the impact to residents along East Sheridan Road and Vincent Court and has increased noise levels for residents of Circle Drive and Witchwood Lane.

On Wednesday last week, many of you were in attendance of the “simulation” of what the sound would be with baffles on top of the compressor unit. None of us in attendance that day felt the baffles would solve the problem. As a group, we are strongly recommending that you do not waste additional taxpayer resources on baffles. It would result in another band-aid on the situation and we would still be subjected to the loud compressor noise.

The contractors the school district has employed thus far have not offered real solutions to this public nuisance. We strongly urge you to look at companies that specialize and have [...]

The following is a press release from the Chicago division of the Federal Bureau of Investigation:

CHICAGO (July 27, 2011)—A north suburban man was indicted on federal charges for allegedly fraudulently obtaining approximately $4 million from more than 50 investors in now-defunct sleep disorder businesses that he operated in Northbrook. The defendant, Kenneth A. Dachman, was charged with 11 counts of wire fraud in an indictment returned by a federal grand jury yesterday, Patrick J. Fitzgerald, United States Attorney for the Northern District of Illinois, and Robert D. Grant, Special Agent in Charge of the Chicago Office of the Federal Bureau of Investigation, announced today. Dachman allegedly misappropriated at least $2 million of co-mingled funds from investors and the companies to benefit himself and his family.

Dachman, 52, of Glencoe and formerly of Lake Forest, will be arraigned at a later date in U.S. District Court. He operated Central Sleep Diagnostics, LLC, which purported to treat sleep apnea and sleep-related illnesses by conducting diagnostic studies in a patient’s own home instead of a hospital or clinic, and Advanced Sleep Devices, LLC, which purported to sell equipment used to treat sleep disorders to patients. He also operated Key Partners, LLC, to handle marketing for both businesses.

Visit the FBI’s website to read the rest of the press release.

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By Paige Wagenknecht

Lake Bluff native Elizabeth Lawrence premiered her first feature length documentary, “Roll Out, Cowboy,” at Facets Multimedia in Chicago. The film, which is running through July 31, features 39-year-old cowboy Chris Sand, the “Sandman,” as he performs his mix of rap and country songs in small clubs and dive bars around the country, which he has done for the past two decades.

Lawrence, with a small film crew including producer Warner Boutin, also from Lake Bluff, toured with Sand sporadically for a year as he performed in cities and towns like St. Louis, Chicago, Cincinnati, Olympia, Washington, Portland, Oregon and Bozeman, Montana. They also filmed in Sand’s small town, Dunn Central, North Dakota; an experience Lawrence called “a breath of fresh air.”

(Click here to see a clip of the documentary and get more info about it. To read a pdf and see more photos, click on the following: rolloutcowboy stills and pics)

“He’s from a town of 120 [people], so that was awesome,” Lawrence said (whose proud family runs Lawrence Interiors in Lake Bluff).

“I took a flight to Minneapolis, and took a night train out to North Dakota and I woke up and saw nothing but cornfields. I was ‘what am I doing.’ I started writing an outline, but I realized with the documentary you have to go with the flow and use your intuition.”

Now living in California, Lawrence majored in film and video at Columbia College, but found her passion for filmmaking while a student in the telecom department at Lake Forest High School. She dedicated “Roll Out, Cowboy,” to mentor and telecom teacher, Tom Wing, who passed away in 2003.

“He was really instrumental in providing an environment that was conducive to total creativity. I think I wouldn’t have really survived LFHS without telecom, and I know a lot of people say that as well.”

She returned to LFHS after Wing’s death to teach telecom during the 2003-04 school year because she wanted to give back to the program and “didn’t like the idea of potentially a substitute being in that department watching movies all day.”

Lawrence said teaching was “one of the most rewarding jobs I have [...]

The rainfall from Wednesday-Thursday morning reached 1.2 inches, bringing the monthly total to date to 4.78 inches (July 1-28). This is just a teensy bit more than the same period last year, which was 4.74″. Lake Forest resident Carl Noble’s data goes back to 2009, when he started volunteering for the Community Collaborative Rain, Hail & Snow Network. The total in 2009 for the July 1-28 period was just 1.13″. The average for July–the entire month–is 3.7″, he said.

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By C. Kent McKenzie, emergency management coordinator for Lake County

The National Weather Service (NWS) has issued a flood watch for Lake and surrounding Illinois counties through Friday morning, July 29th. Parts of Lake County have been impacted by flash flooding caused by intense thunderstorm rainfall over the past several days, leading to localized flooding of roads, streets, yards, and in some cases, the basements or lower levels of homes. Heavy rains have filled many stormwater basins and road ditches, leaving limited capacity for additional rainfall. The Lake County Stormwater Management Commission has instituted a Green Flood Alert, meaning that current and forecast conditions may lead to flooding.

The current weather situation includes a large area of very moist air over northern Illinois, and additional warm humid air feeding into the area. Storms are expected to develop to our west later today, and then move east. The convective nature of thunderstorms often produces very intense rainfall over a relatively localized area, and within a given storm there is often a wide variation in measured rainfall amounts from point to point. Because of the high moisture content of the atmosphere, storms that develop later today will be capable of producing rainfall rates of one to three inches of rain per hour, which could easily lead to localized flash flooding.

Flash flooding is one of the leading causes of weather-related injuries and deaths in the United States, with most deaths caused by people driving into flooded roads. We join the National Weather Service in reminding anyone that drives upon a flooded road or street to “turn around, don’t drown,” since water can hide damage to the underlying road surface and only six inches of flowing water can sweep a car or truck off the road. Additional information about the “turn around, don’t drown” campaign can be found in the NWS brochure available at http://www.weather.gov/os/water/tadd/images/NSC_FinalVersion1-4.pdf. The Lake County Division of Transportation provides the most complete listing of road information through the Lake County Passage traffic management center, available at 1620 on AM radios, or at the website www.LakeCountyPassage.com.

The Stormwater Management Commission encourages community officials and homeowners to make sure that storm drain grates, drainage ditches, culverts, and swales are not blocked by debris from the recent windstorms. Branches, limbs, leaves, and wood chips can wash downstream and lodge against bridges or culverts, causing water to back up very quickly in areas where flooding may [...]

State Senator Susan Garrett (D-Lake Forest) will not seek re-election in 2012, according to the Chicago Sun-Times. Click here to read the press release.

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Deer Path Art League is seeking artists for its Exclusive Faculty/Member Show August 19. Please contact the League for an application. You can also pick up an application for membership and visit the League’s  “Art is…Figurative” Exhibition up through August 12. Application Deadline for submissions is August 1st! First Come, First Sever Basis.

Deer Path Art League
Second Floor, 400 E Illinois Rd
Lake Forest IL 60045
Phone: 847 234 3743
Fax: 847 234 3761
Email: info@deerpathartleague.org
www.deerpathartleague.org

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