by dap | Apr 6, 2025 | Chicago Tribune
Road improvements, including traffic signal replacement work at two intersections, are scheduled to get underway this year in the south suburbs, according to Cook County.
Rolling out its schedule of work for this year, the county said that the replacement of two bridges in the south suburbs will begin this summer.
New traffic signals are scheduled to be installed at Ridgeland Avenue and 143rd Street in Midlothian and Oak Forest, at Kedzie Avenue and 139th Street in Robbins, and at Kedzie and 175th Street in Hazel Crest, according to the schedule.
Along with new signals, work will include new street lighting, sidewalks and ramps that are compliant with the Americans with Disabilities Act and illuminated street name signs, according to the county.
Work at the three intersections is scheduled to be completed this fall, according to the timetable.
Bridges over Tinley Creek in Bremen Township and over Thorn Creek in South Holland are in line for replacement, with work starting sometime this summer, according to the county.
On 143rd Street, just east of Ridgeland Avenue, the bridge replacement will be done in three stages, including replacing the superstructure, roadway and landscaping. In South Holland, the bridge on 170th Street over Thorn Creek is being replaced, also in stages, and both bridge projects are scheduled to be finished by fall 2026, according to the county.
The county said it will continue work this year on a large road project in Tinley Park.
Work includes rebuilding and widening of 175th Street from Oak Park Avenue to just east of Ridgeland Avenue, and from Ridgeland from just south of 175th to north of Oak Forest Avenue and the intersection of Ridgeland and Oak Forest, including a stretch to the east on Oak Forest Avenue.
Along with the streets, new storm and sanitary sewers are being installed, along with new sidewalks and a multi-use path.
New storm sewers along 175th are meant to eliminate roadside ditches and ponding of water on the street and sidewalks, according to the village.
Work will include installation of new traffic signals at 175th and Oak Park Avenue.
The rebuilding program started last year and is expected to be completed this fall, according to the county.
Of the expected cost of $10.3 million, the county is contributing $7.5 million and the balance is being paid by Tinley Park.
Now maintained by Cook County, Tinley Park will take over jurisdiction of the streets and responsibility for future maintenance once the project is completed.
by dap | Apr 6, 2025 | Chicago Tribune
Associated Press
CIUDAD DEL VATICANO (AP) — El papa Francisco fue llevado en silla de ruedas a la plaza de San Pedro durante una misa jubilar especial para los enfermos, en su primera aparición pública en el Vaticano desde su salida del hospital hace dos semanas.
El pontífice levantó las manos para saludar a la multitud, que se puso de pie y aplaudió, mientras le llevaban al frente del altar en la plaza.
“Buen domingo para todos. Muchas gracias”, dijo Francisco.
La voz del pontífice sonaba más fuerte que cuando se dirigió a los simpatizantes fuera del hospital Gemelli el día de su alta el 23 de marzo, después de luchar contra una neumonía que puso en peligro su vida durante una estancia hospitalaria de cinco semanas.
___
Esta historia fue traducida del inglés por un editor de AP con la ayuda de una herramienta de inteligencia artificial generativa.
by dap | Apr 6, 2025 | Chicago Tribune
Homelessness in Chicago is a crisis. More housing is needed, and fast, which this page has addressed more than once. But there are few easy answers to the problem in the short run.
On the border of Hyde Park and Kenwood, city officials have provided a stark example of what not to do.
With next to no notice to the affected community, city and state officials decided late last year to make a former Best Western hotel, located amid lakefront high-rises, into a permanent shelter housing up to 750 people.
The shuttered hotel previously was used on an emergency basis to house migrants during the surge that occurred as Texas Gov. Greg Abbott was busing Venezuelan and other asylum seekers in large numbers to Chicago. At the time, the idea (or at least the neighborhood assumption) was that once the migrant crisis was past, the use of the hotel for a shelter would end.
Instead, the state of Illinois, which has been operating the Best Western shelter, now plans to transfer it to the city on June 30. Since December, the city and state have worked together to convert this former migrant facility to a homeless shelter.
In February, city officials acknowledged to irate neighbors of the facility that they’d failed to keep the community informed of those plans. It had taken 5th Ward Ald. Desmon Yancy’s entreaties on behalf of constituents to make city officials realize “there was a big, big problem, a big misstep here,” Chicago Chief Homelessness Officer Sendy Soto said back then, according to Block Club Chicago.
Yet another meeting took place March 31, this one attended by more than 200 people, most of them still irate about what they had thought was a temporary shelter apparently becoming permanent.
Yancy promised then to try to close the facility; he suggested community members file a zoning challenge. State Rep. Curtis Tarver, who represents the area and also wants the facility closed, pinned the blame squarely on the mayor, describing the lack of communication and solicitation of community input as “ineptitude on the fifth floor.”
Where have we heard that before? We’re two years into Mayor Brandon Johnson’s term and city officials still make amateur mistakes like thinking a 750-person homeless shelter located without warning in a stable, densely populated neighborhood won’t generate an uproar. As if to reinforce the community’s view that the mayor doesn’t care about them, Soto was invited but didn’t attend the most recent meeting.
These issues are emotional no matter what. They strike at deep-seated and valid concerns like property values, public safety and orderliness and cleanliness. But let’s be real: They also surface prejudices. The people in the Best Western shelter all are families with young children — the most vulnerable homeless population we have.
There’s a real debate to be had about what responsibility better-off neighborhoods like Hyde Park have to help solve humanitarian problems that often are laid at the feet of poorer areas. But once you’ve sown such distrust by appearing to make such a momentous decision a fait accompli, as city officials have done here, engaging in productive dialogue with affected neighbors becomes almost impossible because of lack of trust.
Will this administration ever learn?
Submit a letter, of no more than 400 words, to the editor
or email letters@chicagotribune.com.
by dap | Apr 6, 2025 | Chicago Tribune
The well-timed editorial
(March 26) is something every teacher, principal and school superintendent should read. I’m the founder of a company that has been implementing science of reading programs for nearly two decades, and the recent National Assessment of Educational Progress results were deeply disappointing.
Year after year, millions of children fall behind in reading, and the consequences are profound: reduced lifetime earnings, higher dropout rates, poor workforce readiness and increased economic inequality, reinforcing cycles of poverty and limited opportunity.
The data paints a grim picture. But what makes this crisis even more unacceptable is that these outcomes are both preventable and addressable at scale.
The devastating reality that
are proficient readers has spawned a cottage industry of excuse-making. Prominent among these are baseless critiques of the NAEP itself (lauded as the gold standard of achievement measures) and a lament that the science of reading — recently endorsed by more than 40 states — has failed.
That is simply not the case, as decades of research have proved. We know how to teach reading effectively. The shortcoming is not in the program or the science. The problem instead is that the gap between research and classroom practice remains as wide as ever.
The science of reading is a body of research that explains how children learn to read and how we can best teach them. Although most states have now adopted policies aligned with the science of reading, policy adoption alone does not change instruction. Many schools have been left to interpret these policies on their own.
To move the needle, we must ensure every teacher has the right training, provide diagnostic tools to identify and address gaps, and support our older students with proven approaches. We also need to hold schools and districts accountable for implementation. Schools must be equipped and required to implement best practices with fidelity. Finally, we need to engage parents and communities. Literacy is not just a school issue — it also is a societal imperative.
The NAEP results do not doom America’s students, but they do underscore a crisis of inaction. When we fail to teach students to read, we risk consigning them to a life of unmet potential and fulfillment.
— Scott DeSimone, Bethesda, Maryland
Embracing the basics
Why is it not surprising that after emphasizing phonics and comprehension, Louisiana reading scores have improved? It’s no mystery. Phonics is the key that unlocks the door to the world of words. I always thought it was a cruel trick to expect kids to unlock a universe of words without giving them the key! So, even though I was schooled in whole language, I always taught phonics.
Simply pronouncing words, however, is not reading; it’s merely word-calling. In addition to phonics, the study of root words, prefixes and suffixes is essential. Reading also entails background knowledge, comprehension and vocabulary. (See “The Early Catastrophe: The 30 Million Word Gap by Age 3” by Betty Hart and Todd R. Risley.) A great way to increase all three is to actually read: The more kids read, the better they read, and the more they read, the more they learn.
What’s often missing is motivation. Everyone’s interested in something. The trick to getting reluctant readers to read more is to find that something and to make reading fun. Poetry, read-alouds and connected art projects are great ways to get kids interested. (I highly recommend “The Random House Book of Poetry for Children” by Jack Prelutsky as a great source of poems.) Since it’s usually an adult who’s reading aloud, the book can be far beyond their reading level — or even way below. Nonfiction picture books are a fun way to build background knowledge, even for the teacher!
I worked with a lot of kids with struggles with reading and discipline. I would select a high-interest read-aloud book, dramatically read to a particularly suspenseful point, pause, look at my watch and declare something like: “Oh, my, it’s time for math!” It was great to have a class full of “unmotivated” nonreaders beg me to keep on reading and then argue over who gets the book.
So, phonics is basic and essential, but it’s not everything — not even close. And whole language, which champions many of the excellent strategies still in use today, is not all bad. Knitting the two together looks a lot like the new “science of reading” approach heralded in the editorial.
What’s old is new again.
— Sue Ellen Levins, retired reading specialist, Chicago
AI in health care
and
would create the Artificial Intelligence Systems Use in Health Insurance Act. The identical bills, sponsored by state Rep. Bob Morgan, D-Highwood, and state Sen. Laura Fine, D-Glenview, respectively. aim to regulate artificial intelligence (AI) in health insurance decision-making. While both bills’ goal of fairness and transparency is commendable, the legislation’s current provisions could unintentionally hinder innovation and efficiency in customer service.
AI systems are designed to analyze vast amounts of data quickly and accurately. Restricting the use of AI without clear and consistent guidelines may lead to administrative inefficiencies that reduce consumer experience and increase costs for customers. It is important that we build on existing insurance regulations and consumer protections to avoid conflicting standards by which insurance companies must comply at the state and federal levels.
As president of the Illinois Life & Health Insurance Council, I support guardrails that ensure this evolving technology does not circumvent existing protections designed to ensure human decision-making remains intact when there is an adverse determination related to care. However, HB35 and SB1425 as currently written could restrict the use of AI for other claims-processing functions designed to identify gaps in care and reduce administrative costs for payers. This could potentially make health insurance less accessible and affordable for Illinoisans at a time when health care costs continue to outpace the rate of inflation.
We are committed to collaborating with Morgan and Fine to ensure the legislation benefits Illinois consumers without hindering our health plans’ commitment to the responsible use of AI to improve health outcomes, increase access to care, enhance the consumer experience and lower costs for their customers.
— Laura Minzer, president, Illinois Life & Health Insurance Council, Springfield
Infamous ‘Edgar ramp’
In his column (
March 31), John T. Shaw overlooks the most damning outcome of Jim Edgar’s time as governor: the infamous “Edgar ramp,” which stretched pension payments out 50 years. This kick-the-can-down-the-road approach directly contributed to the current $140 billion shortfall in the public retirement accounts that currently consume about 20% of the Illinois state budget. Think of what $10 billion a year would do for education and rivers, roads and rails.
Since Edgar did not need to make any significant pension payments while in office, he was able to “balance” the budget and increase spending for special projects, much to the delight of the legislators. So much for conservative values and good stewardship.
The result of Edgar’s “focus on the future” is an obscenely underfunded state retirement account.
— Gerry Gosewehr, Warrenville
Protecting Illinoisans
The length and severity of heat waves in the U.S. are increasing significantly, “with potentially devastating consequences for human health and wellbeing, particularly among the most vulnerable populations,” according to
by the U.S. Joint Economic Committee. The report documents the mounting costs of extreme heat in the U.S.
In Illinois,
— 25% of our workforce — are employed in “heat-exposed” industries such as agricultural production and construction.
that rural Illinois residents are hospitalized at higher rates for heat exposure than urban and suburban residents, while lower-income residents without air conditioning are at higher risk. And national heat-related health care costs have been estimated as high as $1 billion annually.
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention has worked with the Illinois Department of Public Health to develop climate and health educational materials for physicians and public health professionals, host webinars for family physicians and pediatricians, and provide graduate courses for public health students. As a result, Illinois has better informed medical and public health professionals who are prepared to protect their patients from the health impacts of climate change and to discuss risks with their patients. The program also hosts a
that Illinois planners can use to study the incidence of high heat days at a county level for planning and management.
U.S. Rep. Lauren Underwood, D-Ill., has introduced
, to continue the federal program with $110 million, a small amount compared to the federal administration’s budget reduction goals.
Our elected officials do care about their constituents. If you’re concerned about the impact of cuts on Illinois residents’ health, take a moment to call or email your elected officials. Your opinion matters to them and to everybody who values these services
— Scott Buckley, Naperville
Submit a letter, of no more than 400 words, to the editor
or email letters@chicagotribune.com.
