FRIDAY
Apr il 3 , 2015 • $ 1.0 0
SHUTTING THEM DOWN
DAILY CHRONICLE
Jacox, Sycamore rout Rockford Guilford, 12-0, in five innings / B1 HIGH
45 31 Complete forecast on page A6
daily-chronicle.com
SERVING DEKALB COUNTY SINCE 1879
LOW
Where to after graduation?
Facebook.com/dailychronicle
@dailychronicle
7 seek 4 seats on D-428 board Contest includes five write-in candidates Election Central 2015
By DARIA SOKOLOVA dsokolova@shawmedia.com
Photos by Danielle Guerra – dguerra@shawmedia.com
Clint Cargile, author of “Five-Mile Spur Line: A Railroad History of Sycamore, Illinois,” talks Thursday about the new exhibit in the Sycamore History Museum, which goes along with his book. Cargile, originally from Tuscaloosa, Alabama, moved to DeKalb County to attend Northern Illinois University. He graduated in May 2014, lives in the county with his wife, and plans to continue writing books about the history of DeKalb County.
Some NIU alumni stay in DeKalb County, many move to Chicago-area By DARIA SOKOLOVA dsokolova@shawmedia.com DeKALB – Twenty-yearold hospitality management major Alexandria Celestin came from Chicago to study at Northern Illinois University. Celestin hasn’t yet decided whether she will stay in DeKalb County after graduating, but said other places may offer her more opportunities and experiences. Celestin works at the Holmes Student Center Hotel and said she is looking to get more experience under her belt and find out whether her major is a good fit. “With my field, working here on campus I do see potential to stay, but as far as DeKalb as a whole, I would say it’s not somewhere where I would want to stay with my field,” she said. “I want to travel, I want to get more experience outside of DeKalb.” This summer, Celestin will be interning as a front-of-the house employee with Entertainment Cruises in Chicago. “[I’m] so excited about it,” she said. Many NIU graduates live
Looking at a wooden historical reproduction of a train that ran the rails between Sycamore and Cortland, Clint Cargile, comments on artist Bob Meyer’s intricacies in the locomotive displayed Thursday in the Sycamore History Museum. and work in DeKalb County, but more go on to live elsewhere. According to recent data provided by NIU, there were 7,572 NIU alumni living in DeKalb County. The largest concentration of NIU alumni in Northern Illinois are in Cook (40,510), DuPage (25,132) and Lake counties (12,063). Nearly 90 percent of the university’s graduates live and work in Illinois after getting a degree, according to NIU’s website.
Howard Riefs, director of corporate communications at Hoffman Estates-based Sears Holdings Corp., said the retailer continues to actively recruit NIU graduates. Sears representatives attended three career fairs at the university last spring. “We typically recruit graduates with degrees in accounting, economics, industrial and systems engineering, operation management and information systems, and
computer science,” Howard said. “We’ve also recently hired NIU’s best and brightest for internships and fulltime positions in our inventory management, IT audit, internal audit and merchandising teams.” The outlook on jobs varies from major to major. Matt Hotopp, who received his bachelor’s in Spanish Language and Literature in 2002 from NIU, said he left DeKalb to try to find work in his hometown of St. Charles. “I was familiar with the area, and when that didn’t work, I reached out to surrounding areas, including DeKalb, and eventually, I ended up in Rockford,” he said. Hotopp, who has been teaching all levels of Spanish at Jefferson High School in Rockford since August 2003, said there are pluses and minuses to staying in DeKalb after graduating. “When students live in DeKalb, they make close connections with friends. They also save money since they don’t have to commute.
See MOVING, page A4
DeKALB – Change is certain in the county’s largest school district, as seven candidates, five of them write-ins, vie for four open seats on the DeKalb School District 428 Board. With four board members leaving, Tuesday’s election could bring a new majority to power on the board, which oversees the the district’s $77.2 million budget. The budget and the district’s recent technology plan have been key issues. The district’s revenue heavily is dependent on local property taxes, student fees and donations. These local sources accounted for about 65 percent of the overall operating revenue, or about $48 million in the district’s most recent budget. The $21.8 million in general state funding, state grants and transportation reimbursements amounted to about 30 percent of the revenue, with the rest, or about $4.4 million, coming from federal sources. Candidates also weighed in on the district’s one-to-one technology program, which is expected to cost $8.5 million over five years, and its $3.5 million operating deficit. Write-in candidate Ronald Adamson suggested a thorough examination of the district’s expenditures, but said measures are yet to be determined. “We shouldn’t burden our communities any more with higher taxes,” he said. “Investigating and quanti-
Keep up with all of the election coverage at http://www.daily-chronicle. com/election-central/index.xml. fying is the first step,” he said about managing the district’s budget. Adamson also said the recently approved technology program could put the district further in the red than expected with some of the unaccounted variables such as maintenance and repairs cost. “I think it’s a fantastic plan. Our children truly deserve it. ... I don’t believe it’s been quantified fully,” he said. Fred Davis, another writein candidate, said the timing wasn’t right for the program because the district has to deal with its existing deficit. “I think the timing is really bad,” he said. “I’m not against technology, but financially, it’s a bad time.” If elected, Davis said he will seek a balanced budget and to improve weak spots in the education system. “It’s all about prioritizing our want versus our need,” he said. “[We] would like to have a lot of things, but what do we really need?” he said. Howard Solomon, whose name will appear first on Tuesday’s ballot, said he had no problems with trimming the budget and cutting taxes, but was against cutting school
See BOARD, page A4
Lawmaker, ACLU push bill on police license plate readers By NICK SWEDBERG The Associated Press SPRINGFIELD – Law enforcement agencies are using high-tech cameras to scan thousands of license plates an hour in Illinois, gathering data they said can help solve crimes and enforce traffic laws. But some lawmakers and civil liberties advocates worry the technology could lead to illegal tracking of private citizens. Those concerns have brought together an unlikely alliance: conservative Republican Rep. Peter Breen, a constitutional law attorney who helped defend Illinois’ samesex marriage ban in 2012, and
the American Civil Liberties Union, which helped fight Breen’s challenge. With the ACLU’s backing, Breen has introduced legislation that would limit government use of automatic license-plate readers and impose a 30-day limit on data collected. The bill, which has bipartisan support, also would prevent government agencies from selling the data to private companies. “Privacy tends to be the least partisan and least ideological issue on the spectrum today,” ACLU spokesman Ed Yohnka said. Yohnka said police have used license plate readers out-
side gun shows and mosques, suggesting there is opportunity for abuse and “ideological or partisan reasons to capture the data.” Breen noted that such high-speed reading of license plates wasn’t available a few years ago, and that “they are collecting data and they are entirely unregulated.” Police say concerns are overblown about the cameras, which are often mounted on squad cars or stationary objects. They argue that limiting how long data can be kept could hinder investigations into missing persons or other crimes that can take longer to solve. “Sometimes you just don’t
know someone is a suspect until well past 30 days,” said Ed Wojcicki, executive director of the Illinois Association of Police Chiefs. When a camera scans a license plate, it takes a photo and feeds the information into a computer linked to various police databases, including those that have information on missing persons and arrest warrants, police say. The metadata associated with the scan – including location, time and day – can be kept indefinitely. Breen and others worry AP file photo that if there are enough cameras, police potentially could Patrol officer Chris Stout demonstrates a license plate recognition detrack a person’s movement vice that the Springfield Police Department wass trying out during a from place to place. news conference in 2011 in Springfield.
SPORTS
LOCAL NEWS
LOCAL NEWS
WHERE IT’S AT
High potential
Still improving
Searching
Grable showing no signs of slowing down for NIU softball / B1
County unemployment rate reached 5.9 percent in February / A3
Easter egg hunts celebrating the upcoming holiday / A3
Advice ................................ B5 Classified........................B7-9 Comics ............................... B6 Local News.................... A2-4 Lottery................................ A2 Nation&World...................A2
Obituaries .........................A4 Opinion...............................A5 Puzzles ............................... B5 Sports..............................B1-3 State ...................................A4 Weather .............................A6