TUESDAY
No ve mbe r 11 , 2014 • $1 .0 0
BIG MATCHUP
NIU’s game against Toledo packed with senior night emotions / B1 HIGH
LOW
45 21 Complete forecast on page A10
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Property tax hike gets initial OK DeKalb aldermen back a nearly 10 percent increase; hearing set for Nov. 24 By requesting slightly less than $7.1 million in property taxes, the city would raise the DeKALB – Amid promises average homeowner’s properthe actual tax increase will be ty tax bill by close to $50 next lower, DeKalb aldermen Mon- year. City staff floated a propday narrowly gave initial ap- erty tax increase as a way proval to increasing property to phase in fully funding its taxes by nearly 10 percent. pension obligations through
By KATIE DAHLSTROM
kdahlstrom@shawmedia.com
property taxes instead of the general fund. The idea didn’t win over all aldermen. On first approval during the DeKalb City Council meeting, 1st Ward Ald. David Jacobson, 6th Ward Ald. Dave Baker and 7th Ward Ald. Monica O’Leary voted against
the increase. Third Ward Ald. Kristen Lash was absent. “It’s got to come from somewhere else than going after the few remaining property owners that are are trying to hold their value,” Baker said. City staff want to move
away from the current practice of using the general fund to pay for pension obligations property tax revenues don’t cover. Finance Director Cathy Haley explained property taxes currently fully
See TAX, page A7
Sixth Ward Ald. Dave Baker voted against increasing property taxes by nearly 10 percent. “It’s got to come from somewhere else than going after the few remaining property owners that are trying to hold their value,” he said.
Some flee homes to escape the wealth gap
‘Somebody’s got to put the uniform on’ DeKalb school resource officer begins deployment on Veterans Day
By TAMMY WEBBER The Associated Press
Photos by Danielle Guerra – dguerra@shawmedia.com
DeKalb District 428 School Resource Officer Jose Jaques (center) – flanked by veterans Tywon Green (left), Army active duty; and Cesar Mata (right), Army 66-67 – walks through the halls Monday of DeKalb High School in a march to honor veterans. Jaques, an active member of the Illinois National Guard for the past five years and in the reserve unit for the past 27 years, received his orders to mobilize today with the Bilateral Embedded Staff Team to Springfield and later to Afghanistan for a six to nine month tour. TOP: Cards litter Jaques’ desk at Clinton Rosette Middle School on his last day at work Oct. 31. By ANDREA AZZO aazzo@shawmedia.com
F
or the first time, Jose Jaques will be spending this Thanksgiving, Christmas and his entire spring break overseas in Afghanistan. Jaques, a 46-year-old DeKalb police school resource officer at DeKalb’s two middle schools, will be leaving his DeKalb home Friday to go to Springfield and then travel to Afghanistan in mid-November along with four others in his Illinois National Guard unit. Jaques is a lieutenant colonel with the National Guard and the commander of his team. “Somebody’s got to put the uniform on and go,” Jaques said. “I’d rather fight the fight over there than have it fought here. I guess my dad instilled in me a sense of
Voice your opinion Do you have any living veterans in your family? Vote online at Daily-Chronicle.com. service.” Even though he won’t be leaving for Springfield until later this week, Jaques, becomes a member of the U.S. Army in the active component today, on Veterans Day. While he doesn’t consider the holiday different from any other day, he is continuing a family tradition of serving in the military. Jaques’ father and uncle both served in the Korean War, and his aunt is a retired lieutenant colonel with the U.S. Air Force. Jaques has been a police officer in DeKalb since 1996, but his military background stretches further. He first joined the military with the Army National Guard in 1987
and spent time at Fort McCoy in Wisconsin in January 2003. Jaques expects to be in Afghanistan for six to nine months and will return to his job as a school resource officer when he is finished with active duty. He said he will be the highest ranking officer in the Illinois National Guard in Afghanistan, leading his unit in providing logistical support – such as supply, maintenance and transportation operations – to a Polish unit in Afghanistan. While he is gone, four DeKalb police officers will rotate shifts at both Huntley Middle School, 1515 S. Fourth St., DeKalb, and Clinton Rosette Middle School, 650 N. First
St., DeKalb. DeKalb Police Detective Aaron Lockhart said patrol officers Jeff Winters, Jared Burke, Keunte Mallett and Mario Nonnenmann all went through a 40-hour school resource officer training class to be certified to work in the schools. If the DeKalb Police Department is successful in hiring an additional school resource officer, then police will have a school resource officer at DeKalb High School and both middle schools full time, rather than having officers split time at the middle schools, Lockhart said. Lockhart, who is the school resource officer at DeKalb High School, said Jaques has a close relationship with the teachers and staff at the middle schools, so he will be missed.
DANVILLE – This Illinois city already was struggling when Tara Holycross and her friends were kids riding their bikes to Custard Cup, swimming at the park district pool and hanging out in the Wendy’s parking lot. Manufacturers that provided thousands of well-paying, middle-class jobs – General Motors, General Electric, Hyster – were closing. Neighborhoods were crumbling. By the time Holycross graduated from high school in 2004, a city best known for its massive downtown grain elevator was scrambling to create new opportunities. Ten years later, this city of 32,500 still is struggling. But Holycross and some of her classmates are doing just fine – because they moved. They’re doctors and athletic trainers, software specialists and financial advisers. They’re living all over the country – from Chicago to Charleston, South Carolina, to Boulder, Colorado – where they found solid jobs that reward the kind of education they have. Holycross and four classmates interviewed said about half of their class of fewer than 50 left town, and those they’re in touch with landed good positions. “I knew there wasn’t an opportunity for me to have my career” in Danville, said Holycross, 28, a third-generation native who now works as an athletic trainer in Beloit, Wisconsin, about 90 miles northwest of Chicago. Their experience is a counterpoint to the desperation gripping so many rural and manufacturing communities in the Midwest hard hit by global economic changes. The flow of educated workers from struggling communities to areas with brighter job opportunities might, to some extent, help shore up the middle class, which has been squeezed by a widening gap between the richest Americans and everyone else. Since roughly 1980, income has grown most for the top earners and dropped for the poorest 20 percent. Incomes for the highest-earning 1 percent of Americans soared 31 percent from 2009 through 2012, after adjusting for inflation, according to data compiled by Emmanuel Saez, a
See DEPLOYMENT, page A7 See GAP, page A7
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Work at Manning Ford could be completed in January / A8
Bull Moose Bar & Grille wins Best Sandwich in Sandwich contest / A3
DeKalb officials debate funding for 3rd school police officer / A3
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