Recapping a bizarre year
Pandemic prominent, but a lot of other big news in Southland
While the COVID-19 pandemic dominated headlines around the world and in the Southland in 2020, there were many other noteworthy news stories.
Warehouses began sprouting up throughout the south and southwest suburbs and more were approved for construction. A powerful derecho caused extensive damage in the region and left nearly all of Harvey without electricity for several days.
Cook County prosecutors decided to not bring charges against a police officer in the 2018 shooting death of a security guard outside a Robbins nightclub, and the death of George Floyd May 25 at the hands of Minneapolis police led to demonstrations against racial intolerance in communities including Orland Park, Frankfort and Tinley Park.
Johanna Taylor, a recent graduate of Lincoln-Way Central High School, and her mom, Terra, used social media to organize a June 4 protest that drew more than 800 people to the Village Commons in New Lenox.
Leading up to the demonstration, social media was alive with comments both supportive as well as fearful that the event might devolve into violence that marred other Chicago area demonstrations.
Some urged New Lenox Mayor Tim Baldermann to stop the event. Baldermann, a former police officer and police chief, instead took to social media to ask commenters to stop “fanning the flames of anger and anxiety.”
“If something does happen here, some young woman asking people to join her in a peaceful way won’t be to blame,” the mayor wrote.
On June 8, Gov. J.B. Pritzker marched with an estimated 400 people in Matteson who called for peace and racial harmony in response to Floyd’s death.
Before leading marchers to Matteson’s Unity Bridge over Interstate 57, Pritzker said leaders “have to repair the damage that’s been done to Black communities around the state” through reinvestment.
Pritzker said too many communities of color had “seen nothing or very little over the years” in terms of investment in health care and education.
Pritzker faced criticism for joining marchers, with many Republicans saying his presence endorsed what seemed to have been a violation of the his executive orders banning large gatherings.
In early August, south and southwest suburban police departments braced for possible looting, with River Oaks mall in Calumet City and Chicago Ridge Mall temporarily closing.
Highway exit ramps were closed at locations in the south suburbs on Interstate 80/94 and the Bishop Ford Freeway. Businesses along the busy Halsted Street retail corridor in Homewood were ordered closed, with municipal vehicles and concrete blocks in place to block access to businesses.
In Calumet City, dirt was hastily piled at some entrances to River Oaks, which had sustained extensive damage on May 31, when concerns about demonstrations prompted malls to close for a few days.
Floyd’s death also prompted Southland leaders to address lingering symbols of what many saw as racist.
In late August, the Thornton Fractional Township High School District 215 Board voted to retire the Rebels nickname for Thornton Fractional South High School in Lansing.
The vote came after a survey showed nearly 70% of students said they supported changing the nickname, chosen in 1958 after the district was divided into North and South high schools. The new school adopted the imagery of the Confederacy, including a Confederate battle flag as its banner and a Confederate soldier as its mascot.
In early October, the family of security guard Jemel Roberson, shot and killed during a chaotic 2018 confrontation outside a Robbins nightclub, learned Cook County prosecutors would not bring charges against a Midlothian police officer who shot him.
State’s Attorney Kim Foxx said that her office had concluded “that the totality of the evidence is insufficient to support criminal charges” against officer Ian Covey.
Roberson, 26, had been working security at Manny’s Blue Room Lounge in Robbins Nov. 11, 2018, when a fight broke out between two groups inside the bar. Shots were fired and four people were struck, including a man suspected of being the gunman.
In the chaos, Roberson managed to detain a man witnesses identified as a shooter and was holding him on the ground at gunpoint when Covey arrived armed with an AR-15 rifle. Covey ordered Roberson to drop the gun and fired on him when he didn’t comply, according to state police.
Witnesses said the officer did not give Roberson adequate time to respond to his verbal commands and ignored their warnings that Roberson was a security guard, not a suspect.
Roberson’s mother, Beatrice Roberson, said at a news conference the decision from the state’s attorney’s office “devastated” her and that “Kim Foxx and her office has let my family down.”
Amazon adds fulfillment centers
In what is expected to generate at least 3,000 jobs, Amazon got underway this year with massive fulfillment centers in Markham, Matteson and University Park, although there was criticism about the size of incentives awarded for the projects.
The jobs are promising salaries of at least $15 an hour, and officials see benefits for businesses such as restaurants and gas stations that the workers could patronize.
The Better Government Association and public radio station WBEZ-FM tallied the value of tax breaks granted by Markham, Matteson, University Park and other Chicago area municipalities where the online retailer has recently built or is building facilities.
The incentives were valued at $741 million, the study found, noting big disparities in the size of incentives between communities of color where Amazon is building and predominantly white communities.
Daily Southtown columnist Ted Slowik, in interviewing Southland economic development officials, pointed out that incentives were bigger for communities such as Markham and Matteson because of higher property tax rates in the south suburbs when compared with other suburban Cook County municipalities.
Police chief changes
On Aug. 1, longtime Orland Park police Chief Tim McCarthy, who as a Secret Service agent suffered a gunshot wound protecting then-President Ronald Reagan, retired.
McCarthy had been chief since 1994 and was part of the Secret Service detail protecting Reagan when he left the Washington Hilton Hotel on March 30, 1981, and John Hinckley Jr. opened fire.
Joseph Mitchell, Orland Park’s deputy chief, was appointed interim police chief then later named as McCarthy’s replacement.
In November, neighboring Mokena hired McCarthy as interim chief after Mokena police Chief Steven Vaccaro was placed on paid administrative leave at the end of October.
Vaccaro had been chief since March 2014 and previously spent 24 years with the Tinley Park Police Department, serving as deputy chief before being hired by Mokena. He was suspended after patrol officers and sergeants on Mokena’s police force sent a letter to village officials saying they had no confidence in their chief.
Mokena had hired an outside law firm to investigate the matter, which was in the preliminary stage, then called off once Vaccaro retired as of Dec. 18.
In early September, officials in Orland Hills fired their police chief after being alerted to a post on Thomas Scully’s personal Facebook page that was described by the village’s administrator as being “in incredibly poor taste.”
Mike Blaha, the Orland Hills Police Department’s deputy chief, was named as interim chief. Scully previously was police administrator for the department before being named chief in late September 2007. He previously served as police chief in Crestwood, leaving that post in September 2005.
Storm causes extensive damage
An Aug. 10 derecho caused widespread wind damage and spawned tornadoes, with Harvey and Park Forest, experiencing heavy damage.
Virtually all of Harvey was without electricity following what that city’s mayor described as an “apocalyptic event,” and it was weeks before most areas had power restored.
The National Weather Service reported a tornado that packed winds of 100 mph tore through Oak Forest and Midlothian, then unleashed 90 mph straightline winds in Harvey.
Leadership woes
In mid-May, Governors State University picked a successor to embattled President Elaine Maimon, who retired at the end of June amid the fallout of a $1.5 million payroll scandal.
Cheryl Green began as the sixth president of the University Park school July 1. She worked for more than two decades at Chicago State University.
Faculty and students at GSU had urged the board to oust Maimon following a state investigator’s report, made public in December 2019, that showed 33 people had been terminated from the university but continued to collect their full salaries and benefits. She had served as GSU’s president for 13 years.
In early August, Crestwood’s mayor came under indictment on federal charges that he accepted bribes to expand the use of red-light cameras in his community.
Federal prosecutors said Lou Presta was caught on a March 2018 recording accepting an envelope with $5,000 cash from a representative of the red-light camera firm, and then lied to the FBI and IRS when asked about it that September.
Presta, first elected in 2013 and seeking reelection in April, has pleaded not guilty to charges that include using a facility in interstate commerce in aid of bribery and official misconduct, willfully filing a false income tax return, willfully failing to file an income tax return and making false statements to the FBI and IRS.
In late June, the estate of Dr. Van Koinis, an Evergreen Park pediatrician who had committed suicide, was sued by parents who alleged he faked routine vaccinations and falsified medical records.
The Cook County sheriff’s office launched an investigation into his practices last year after discovering a suicide note in his car that “seemingly confessed to maintaining improper patient charts and falsifying patient immunization records.” Koinis’ body was found in September 2019 in a Palos Township forest preserve.
The sheriff’s office earlier this year notified families of the doctor’s patients that their children may not have received the vaccinations they’d sought.
Homer roads dispute
In early December, Homer Township filed a lawsuit seeking to stop Homer Glen from taking control of the Homer Township Road District’s property and equipment.
The action came as Homer Glen officials approved an agreement with the township road commissioner to transfer the road district’s assets to the village and approved a $1.5 million tax levy to pay for public works services.
The road district, a separate entity from the village and township, collects taxes from all township residents, but only maintains roads in Homer Glen and unincorporated areas. Roads within the municipal boundaries of Lockport, Lemont and New Lenox are maintained by those municipalities’ respective public works departments.
Homer Glen was working with township Road District Commissioner Mike DeVivo on a plan to transfer stewardship of the road district to the village, prompting the township board to put a referendum on the November ballot to abolish the district and turn over control to the township. Voted rejected that plan.
In September, Harvey native Bishop Ronald A. Hicks was appointed as bishop of the Diocese of Joliet, replacing Bishop Daniel Conlon, who resigned in May after four months of medical leave.
The vicar general of the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Chicago, Hicks was born in Harvey, raised in South Holland and served for about four years at Saint Elizabeth Seton Parish in Orland Hills.
Work began in late August to correct issues at a Hometown railroad crossing where Metra trains have at least twice struck vehicles since 2015, resulting in three deaths and seven injuries.
The $2.3 million project repositioned rail crossing gates closer to the tracks, meant to eliminate a hazard in which vehicles become pinned after the gates come down. In the two collisions, a gate came down behind or on top of vehicles as they waited at a stoplight.
In the 3rd Congressional District Democratic primary in March, U.S. Rep. Dan Lipinski, who had held the seat since 2005, lost Marie Newman, acknowledging after his defeat that his anti-abortion stance was a factor.
Newman vastly outspent Lipinski on TV commercials in which she contrasted their views on abortion, and she went on to defeat Republican challenger Mike Fricilone in the November election.
In late October, Illinois
Gaming Board officials said a decision on awarding a casino license in the south suburbs was at least a halfyear away, blaming the pandemic for contributing to a delay in evaluating applications.
The gaming board was supposed to have awarded the license within 12 months of receiving the applications, putting the deadline at Oct. 28. However, the board could, under the gambling expansion law, provide written explanations of a delay to the applicants.
Calumet City has proposed using part of the River Oaks shopping center at Torrence Avenue east of Interstate 94, for a casino and related development; a site at the interchange of Halsted Street and I-80/294 that straddles the border of East Hazel Crest and Homewood is also among the applicants as are sites in Lynwood and Matteson.
Notable Southland deaths
Early on Thanksgiving Day, Frankfort native Zachary Plantz, 27, died after the car he was driving struck the rear of a semi in Naples, Florida. The sole occupant of the vehicle, Plantz was a senior policy adviser to Lipinski and managed his primary campaign against Newman.
Mary Margaret “Maggie” Crotty, most recently Bremen Township supervisor and a former longtime state legislator representing the south suburbs, died Nov. 5 at age 72.
Crotty in September stepped down as supervisor for health reasons. She had served as supervisor since 2005. She previously held elected positions as a state senator, state representative and Democratic Party committeeman for Bremen Township. Crotty lived in Oak Forest.
Following a years-long battle against prostate cancer, Will County Executive Larry Walsh died June 4 at his home at the age of 72.
The Elwood farmer began his political career at 21 when he joined the Elwood school board in 1970. In 1973, he was elected as Jackson Township supervisor, a position he held until December 2004.
Walsh served on the Will County Board in 1974 and again in 1992, and in the Illinois Senate from April 1997 until January 2005, when he took office as Will County executive. He was diagnosed with cancer in 2014.
One of the south suburbs’ longest-serving mayors, Steger’s Lou Sherman, died Aug. 9 at the age of 92.He served as Steger’s mayor for 40 years and did not seek reelection in 2013.
Born on Christmas Day in 1927, Sherman served in the Army during World War II and is a past president of the South Suburban Mayors and Managers Association. He formerly served as a board member of the Illinois Municipal League.