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Chicagoans voice frustrations over unusually high water bills

Published Fri, 07 Feb 2025 10:16:37 GMT

CHICAGO — Residents voiced their frustrations at City Hall on Tuesday over unjustified water bills, some worth tens of thousands of dollars. Frustrated residents told the Finance Committee they were mailed bills for water they did not use. "The usual consumption of the water for this apartment is around 150 gallons a day. Now it went up from 150 gallons to 45,000 gallons per day. So obviously there’s something wrong," said Victor Catarino. Former University of Illinois basketball star sworn-in with new Peoria police recruits To make matters worse, residents say it's next to impossible to fix the bills.  "There’s no way I used 107,000 gallons of water in two months," Lisa Beard, another frustrated resident, said. Last fall, WGN Investigates reported a 200% jump in the number of people who owe the city at least $20,000 in past-due water bills. Now some alderpeople are growing impatient. "I don’t understand why people got to call y’all to say 'Come chang...

'A fantastic piece of property': New life for vacant mental health care site in Tinley Park

Published Fri, 07 Feb 2025 10:16:37 GMT

TINLEY PARK, Ill. — New life is finally coming to the site of the former mental health center in southwest suburban Tinley Park. Closed in 2012 for cost-saving purposes under then-Illinois Governor Pat Quinn, the Tinley Park Mental Health Center, a sprawling ​280-acre site, once housed thousands of patients over decades of use.Its boundaries roughly run from 183rd and Harlem to 175th and 80th Avenue, comprising 280 acres. Once eyed as a potential casino site, Tinley Park residents rejected that plan for one that would incorporate various indoor and outdoor recreational activities and a fair amount of undeveloped green space.Phase one will develop 90 acres, with parts of the property to be devised later as part of a public-private venture. In early August, the state signed over the property for $1 and has set aside $15 million for environmental cleanup. Traffic troubles lead to hundreds of fans missing majority of concert in Tinley Park "Our main focu...

Men who rushed Coors Field, accosted MLB star arrested

Published Fri, 07 Feb 2025 10:16:37 GMT

DENVER (KDVR) — The two men who were seen rushing Coors Field during the Colorado Rockies game against the Atlanta Braves have been arrested for trespassing and disturbing the peace, according to the Denver Police Department.Jefferson Gonzales-Merida, 23, and Carlos Rivelo-Paiz, 21, were identified as the two men who ran onto Coors Field and accosted Braves star Ronald Acuña Jr.During the seventh inning of Monday night's game, Gonzales-Merida and Rivelo-Paiz allegedly got onto the field without permission and approached Acuña. According to The Associated Press, one of them was able to get his arms around Acuña, but DPD did not identify which suspect touched the outfielder. Acuña’s encounter and Guaranteed Rate Field shooting raise questions about safety of players, fans Shortly after entering the field, Coors Field staff grabbed the two suspects and escorted them away where Denver Police took them into custody. Field guards hold back a fan as he exchanges words with Atlanta Brave...

Williamson County Deputies Association says it's understaffed by 400 officers

Published Fri, 07 Feb 2025 10:16:37 GMT

GEORGETOWN, Texas (KXAN) — The Williamson County Deputies Association accused county commissioners of inaction that's led to understaffing in the Williamson County Sheriff's Office. The WCDA also said the WCSO does not have adequate manpower to keep up with the rapidly growing population.Deputy Charles Duvall, president of the WCDA, addressed a small crowd on the steps of the historic county courthouse, flanked by Sheriff Mike Gleason, WCSO detectives and other WCDA affiliates.Duvall said national data from the FBI found county agencies reported an average of 2.8 officers per 1,000 inhabitants. He said Williamson County right now has .78 deputies per 1,000 residents, highlighting a large disparity between WCSO's ranks and the national average."We need an additional 445 new deputies to meet the national average number of deputies. To be clear, there is only one opening on patrol and that opening is about to be filled," Duvall said.Duvall said the WCDA is now considering asking for G...

Austin officials, Nixta Taqueria working on 'path forward' amid permitting issues

Published Fri, 07 Feb 2025 10:16:37 GMT

AUSTIN (KXAN) -- City of Austin officials said they are working on a "path forward" for Nixta Taqueria amid permitting issues identified at the restaurant, according to a city memo released Monday.KXAN reached out to Nixta Taqueria and business owners said they hoped to be able to give more clarity on the process once they know more.City leaders said in the memo there are "life safety and permitting challenges" at the restaurant, located at 2512 E. 12th St. On Aug. 16, an Austin Energy high heat alarm was triggered due to an electric meter overheating at the restaurant, per the memo. The building is divvied up into two suites, using two meters."The AE technician found burned wires on the business owners' side of the meter and determined that the business was using too much amperage," the memo read in part. "This presents a severe risk of fire or explosion and a threat to public safety. Therefore, AE disabled one of the meters and left a Notice of Electrical Hazard with the business ...

How many citations has Austin Water issued since Stage 2 restrictions began?

Published Fri, 07 Feb 2025 10:16:37 GMT

AUSTIN (KXAN) — Since Austin Water upped its watering restrictions two weeks ago, the city's water utility has issued nine water violation citations. The nine citations were given to five commercial customers and four residential customers, Austin Water said Tuesday. PREVIOUS: Austin moving to Stage 2 drought restrictions Austin Water said it has received 1,076 watering violation reports via 311 since the Stage 2 restrictions went into effect Aug. 15. The water utility has also mailed 621 "Report of Violation" postcards to customers and issued 443 warnings. LIST: What are the current water restrictions in your city? Austin Water said enforcement staff members have spent 105 hours patrolling. What are the penalties for violating watering rules? According to Austin Water, violations can be issued for watering on the wrong day, watering at the wrong time, causing runoff greater than 50 feet and for misaligned and broken heads. INVESTIGATION: Austin pipes leaked enough drinking...

Man charged in 2022 Austin murder deemed incompetent to stand trial

Published Fri, 07 Feb 2025 10:16:37 GMT

AUSTIN (KXAN) -- A man arrested last year on a murder charge after being accused of killing his grandmother has been found incompetent to stand trial.Kenneth Charles Owens Jr. was arrested and charged after his grandmother's death at a southeast Austin home. Following his incompetency ruling, Owens has been ordered to be committed to a mental health or residential care facility for observation for up to 120 days. PREVIOUS COVERAGE: Man charged, accused of killing grandmother at southeast Austin home The homicide took place on July 22, 2022 in the 4800 block of Turnstone Drive. Austin Police said Yong Dennerly, 78, was pronounced dead at the scene just before 11 p.m. that evening.

Want to buy a commercial building? Taproot seeks community investors for home of Can Can Wonderland, Hour Car

Published Fri, 07 Feb 2025 10:16:37 GMT

On St. Paul’s Prior Avenue, the Prior Works building spans more than 481,000 square feet of commercial space, and it’s drawn some 46 tenants as diverse as the Can Can Wonderland mini-golf, a video arcade and bar, the car-sharing nonprofit HourCar, the high school mentoring program College Possible, Theater Mu and BlackStack Brewing.What is the former American Can manufacturing building missing? A new owner. And that could include you, at least in part.The “You Gotta Have Heart” mini-golf hole is a nod to the history of the Can Can Wonderland building and its days of tin can production. Designed by Eric Fetrow, fabricated by Matt Carlyle, with the Tin Man fabricated by Dale Lewis. (Photo courtesy of Jennifer Pennington)With Orton, a Santa Barbara, Calif.-based development firm, looking to sell the 1960s-era Prior Works building after a decade of ownership, the Creative Enterprise Zone, a community-based nonprofit in the St. Anthony Park neighborhood, hopes to ...

Paul Krugman: The paranoid style in American plutocrats

Published Fri, 07 Feb 2025 10:16:37 GMT

Recently Dr. Peter Hotez, a leading vaccine scientist and a frequent target of anti-vaxxer harassment, expressed some puzzlement in a post on X, formerly known as Twitter. He noted that many of those taunting him were also “big time into bitcoin or cryptocurrency” and declared that “I can’t quite connect the dots on that one.”OK, I can help with that. Also, welcome to my world.If you regularly follow debates about public policy, especially those involving wealthy tech bros, it’s obvious that there’s a strong correlation among the three Cs: climate denial, COVID-19 vaccine denial and cryptocurrency cultism.I’ve written about some of these things before, in the context of Silicon Valley’s enthusiasm for Robert F. Kennedy Jr. But in the light of Hotez’s puzzlement — and also the rise of Vivek Ramaswamy, another crank, who won’t get the GOP nomination but could conceivably become Donald Trump’s running mate — I want to say more about what these various forms of crankdom have in common a...

Jamelle Bouie: The forgotten radicalism of the March on Washington

Published Fri, 07 Feb 2025 10:16:37 GMT

As remembered and commemorated by most Americans, the 1963 March on Washington — its 60th anniversary fell on Monday — represents the essence of the Civil Rights Movement, defined in our national mythology as a colorblind demand for neutrality and fairness in the face of discrimination, embodied in Martin Luther King Jr.’s dream that his “four little children will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin but by the content of their character.”Less well remembered, in our collective memory at least, is the fact that both the march and King’s speech were organized around much more than opposition to anti-Black discrimination. It was officially known as the March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom, with a far more expansive vision for society than formal equality under the law. The march wasn’t a demand for a more inclusive arrangement under the umbrella of postwar American liberalism, as it might seem today. It was a demand for something more —...