INSIDE
SPORTS Maine South rolls; hosts Glenbard N. Page 11
NEWS Charging stations not in Park Ridge’s future
Page 3
Our Village, Our News
www.nilesbugle.com
NOVEMBER 8, 2012
Homegrown relief Chicago-area ComEd, Red Cross offer aid to devastated areas
Niles Police Warn of Green Dot Card Scam By Alex V. Hernandez Staff Reporter
workers/volunteers and mobile feeding trucks from its DeKalb office east in preparation for helping with relief efforts. Shimanski said since Sandy was a dangerous storm that affected communities along the East Coast, the Red Cross was moving fast to open shelters and is moving workers, vehicles and relief supplies into place to help as soon as the storm subsided. Red Cross officials said more than 2,300 disaster workers
Law enforcement officials are warning of a new scam that revolves around a fictional highvalue prize and the purchase of a MoneyPak pre-paid debit card. The Green Dot Card is a type of prepaid debit card offered by MoneyPak, Visa and MasterCard at locations such as Walgreens, CVS, 711 and RadioShack. The card functions like a debit card but, unless the user has a minimum of $1,000 loaded onto the card or uses the card 30 times within the month, users are charged a monthly fee of $5.95 a month for having the card active. Additionally, only specific MoneyPass ATMs allow users to withdraw their funds without a service fee. Authorities say potential victims usually are contacted over the phone and told they have won a prize. The perpetrators of the scam are reported to have said to victims that the prize is a large cash sum, a vehicle or some other high value item. Then, the scam artist instructs the “winner” to head to a local retailer to purchase a Green Dot Card and asks them to pre-load a large sum of money onto the card. It has been reported that in some
See SANDY, page 2
See GREEN DOT, page 3
By Alex V. Hernandez Staff Reporter
Relief workers from the Chicago area have headed to the East Coast to help rebuild after superstorm Sandy’s devastation left thousands of people in need food, shelter and comfort. In anticipation of this storm hitting the coast, local representatives of ComEd and the American Red Cross were gearing up to assist in Hurricane Sandy relief as early as Oct. 27. ComEd spokesman John Schoen said more than 240 ComEd crews from the Chicago area headed to the East Coast as early as Oct. 27 in order to provide assistance to sister companies with power restoration. “We’re glad that we are able to provide assistance,” Schoen said. “The crews will stay there as long as they’re needed.” The relief efforts that began last month still are direly needed as cold weather
Vol. 57 No. 5
Flickr/David Shankbone
New York City’s FDR Drive flooded after Hurricane Sandy on Tuesday Oct. 30.
settling in across the New York metropolitan area is adding to other problems such as widespread gasoline shortages and power outages. As of Nov. 4, temperatures in New York have dropped into the 30s overnight, while an estimated 700,000 homes and businesses in New York City, its northern suburbs and Long Island are still without electricity for more than a week after the storm. As of last week, New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo warned that many homes are becoming uninhabitable and
that tens of thousands of people are going to need other places to stay. “We’re caring for thousands of people across the affected region, and more help is on the way,” said Charley Shimanski, senior vice president of Disaster Services for the Red Cross. Since the storm hit, the Red Cross has provided more than 23,000 overnight shelters, and as of Oct. 30, more than 9,000 people have stayed in 171 Red Cross shelters across 13 states. Additionally the Chicago area Red Cross also sent relief