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Canines a concern at local cemetery Unleashed dogs at DeKalb cemetery upset local resident By FELIX SARVER fsarver@shawmedia.com
Rob Winner – rwinner@shawmedia.com
Steve Silverstein, a driver for DeCab Taxi Service based in DeKalb, waits for a client in need of a ride on the 600 block of Oak Street on Friday in DeKalb.
Local taxis not popular in late-night DeKalb By CHRIS BURROWS cburrows@shawmedia.com DeKALB – At first, Jon Morse didn’t realize the value of a car at Northern Illinois University. “A couple of times people asked me for rides and tried to flag me down on the side of the street,” Morse said “... Sometimes late night it’s difficult to get around.” He began to realize the value a taxi service might have, so around the beginning of 2013, Morse went through the process
detailed in the city of DeKalb’s taxi and livery code. The code devotes 10 pages and 29 sections to rules for business and driver’s licensing, vehicle maintenance, insurance, signage, conduct, fares and more, that together total more than 5,500 words worth of restrictions – a novella, which might lead one to believe that taxis are a booming industry in DeKalb. They’re not. According to the city clerk, two cab companies have licenses on file with the
Voice your opinion Have you ever called for a cab in DeKalb? Go to Daily-Chronicle.com to vote. city, and between them, a total of two cabs provide rides to area residents. DeKalb is a sprawling city with a sizable population, plenty of nearby attractions and several late-night activities, but a combination of costs, unlicensed
cabs and competition from other kinds of services have all but pushed taxis out of the area and under the table. Once he went through the necessary but expensive process of applying for and receiving state and local business and driver’s licenses, having his vehicle inspected by a mechanic and putting a down payment on an insurance policy, Morse didn’t expect what happened next.
See TAXI, page A4
DeKALB – Respect was one thing Carmen Siragusa learned from her late father, and it was a lesson that motivated her to protect his grave. The Sycamore resident said her father, William Rush, was a feisty person who loved country music and playing steel guitar. He died in May 2012 and was buried at the Fairview Park Cemetery at First Street and Fairview Drive in DeKalb. Siragusa still remembers what he taught his children. “He taught us to respect things and follow the rules, which I kind of wish other people would do,” she said. Siragusa has been disturbed by the number of dogs she’s seen unleashed or off the roadways at Fairview Park Cemetery, despite a sign prohibiting it posted at the entrance. She said she’s seen several people treat the cemetery as a dog park, and her family has witnessed almost a dozen instances of dogs roaming around the graves and even urinating on them. “That’s the last physical attachment of my father,” she said, “and the only way we can respect him is by having his gravestone out there. A dog urinating there is a degradation of property.” Siragusa contacted cemetery administrator Lisa Larson to express her concerns.
See CEMETERY, page A4
Obama cancels Putin summit amid Snowden tensions The ASSOCIATED PRESS WASHINGTON – Already faltering, President Barack Obama’s five-year effort to reboot U.S.-Russian relations finally crashed Wednesday, as the White House abruptly canceled his planned face-toface summit with Russia’s Vladimir Putin. The effort to upgrade the relationship has fallen victim to the rapidly shrinking common ground between the former Cold War rivals, including extreme differences over the Syrian civil war, Russia’s domestic crackdown on civil
rights and – the final straw – the asylum granted to NSA leaker Edward Snowden. The U.S. and Russian foreign and defense ministers will sit down in Washington later this week, but Obama canceled his planned September summit in Moscow with Putin because of what the White House called a lack of “recent progress” on a wide array of critical issues. Such steps are not taken lightly, and the decision will almost certainly herald a new frostiness in already chilly ties. “We have informed the
Russian government that we believe it would be more constructive to postpone the summit until we have more results from our shared agenda,” the White House said in a statement, citing deep differences over missile defense, arms control, trade, global security and human rights. “Russia’s disappointing decision to grant Edward Snowden temporary asylum was also a factor that we considered in assessing the current state of our bilateral relationship.” The Kremlin responded quickly, voicing its own dis-
appointment with the canceled summit and blaming it on Washington’s inability to develop relations with Moscow on an “equal basis.” Putin’s foreign affairs adviser, Yuri Ushakov, added that the decision was “clearly linked” to the Snowden case, a situation that he said wasn’t of Russia’s making. While Snowden might have been the immediate catalyst for canceling the summit, the seeds of renewed U.S.-Russia discord were planted more than a year ago when Putin regained the Russian presidency.
AP file photo
President Barack Obama meets with Russian President Vladimir Putin on June 17 in Enniskillen, Northern Ireland. It was reported Wednesday that Obama is canceling plans to meet with Putin in Moscow next month – a rare diplomatic snub.
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