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Saturday-Sunday, August 23-24, 2014
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DeKalb apartments condemned Residents of 47-unit Edgebrook Manor displaced By JESSI HAISH jhaish@shawmedia.com
and KATIE DAHLSTROM kdahlstrom@shawmedia.com DeKALB – As students moved into Northern Illinois University residence halls Friday, senior Jordan Lanum was trying to figure out where he would live after his apartment building was condemned. City officials condemned the 47-unit building at 912 Edgebrook Drive after discovering what they said were dangerous conditions there. Lanum said he spent $1,100 on
a security deposit and the first month’s rent when he moved into apartment 2K about two weeks ago. “I don’t know how a building gets condemned,” Lanum said. “I hope they do something to make sure we are taken care of.” Officials and the owner of the building, Pat Bragg of DeKalb, both said they were not sure how many tenants were displaced as a result of the condemnation. Bragg, who was taken to the hospital not long after meeting inspectors on Friday, said
the apartments in the building were nice and reasonably priced. However, the stairwell of the apartment building on Friday evening was filled with the sounds of chirping smoke detectors and a foul smell. City Engineer John Laskowski said a plumbing inspector and deputy building official with SAFEbuilt, the outside contractor that handles building inspections for the city, along with the DeKalb Fire Department’s fire prevention officer, went to the property at 10 a.m. Friday where
they met Bragg. “... Based on the conversations with fire prevention officer, it wasn’t a good place to be living,” Laskowski said. The visit likely came in response to a complaint from a tenant to the city’s Crime Free Housing Bureau that the toilets in the apartment building did not work. “[Inspectors] found the toilets were backing up over the bowl,” Laskowski said. “They also had a strong belief there was urine in the hallways.”
See RESIDENTS, page A9
Danielle Guerra – dguerra@shawmedia.com
Leaning on his car Friday outside 912 Edgebrook Drive, Antowyn “T Clouds” Washington looks at his phone to try to figure out housing after his apartment building was condemned by the city of DeKalb. He had been living there for a year with his girlfriend, and said his front door won’t close correctly and his toilet doesn’t flush.
U.S. open to attacks on ISIS in Syria
Joining the ‘Huskie Family’ Thousands of students arrive on NIU move-in day
By ROBERT BURNS The Associated Press WASHINGTON – A senior White House official raised the possibility Friday of a broader American military campaign that targets an Islamic extremist group’s bases in Syria, saying the U.S would take whatever action is necessary to protect national security. “We’re not going to be restricted by borders,” said Ben Rhodes, President Barack Obama’s deputy national security adviser. The White House said the president has received no m i l i t a r y o p - Ben Rhodes tions beyond those he autho- Inside rized earlier this month for n Islamic limited airState backers strikes against t h e I s l a m i c under scruState group in tiny in U.S. Iraq and mili- PAGE A9 tary aid to Iraqi and Kurdish forces. Thus far, the United States has avoided military involvement in Syria’s threeyear civil war. But faced with the Islamic State making gains across the region and the beheading of an American journalist, the administration’s resistance may be weakening. Rhodes spoke a day after Obama’s top military adviser warned the extremists cannot be defeated without “addressing” their sanctuary in Syria. Many prominent Republicans and some Democrats have called on Obama to hit back harder at the Islamic State militants. Sen. Marco Rubio, R-Fla., a prospective 2016 presidential candidate, said in an interview Friday that attacking their supply lines, command and control centers and economic assets inside Syria “is at the crux of the decision” for Obama. The risk of “getting sucked into a new war” is outweighed, he said, by the risk of inaction.
Photos by Danielle Guerra – dguerra@shawmedia.com
Junior transfer student Shane Bardell (left center) poses for a picture with friend and roommate Mark Neuzill (right center) taken with the women of the Alpha Phi sorority by Bardell’s mother Kathy Bardell on her cellphone after the young women moved into Gilbert Hall on Friday. Bardell and Neuzill grew up together in Davis, Illinois, and transferred from Highland Community College. Alpha Phi was one of the many Greek organizations that staffed more than 1,300 student volunteers campuswide to help with move-in day. To view more photos, visit Daily-Chronicle.com. By KATIE DAHLSTROM
By the numbers
kdahlstrom@shawmedia.com DeKALB – If Emily Parczany is going to stay at Northern Illinois University, she’s going to need a few things. Topping the list for the 18-year-old freshman who moved into her new dorm room on Friday: a connection. “I would say I need a sense of belonging, a sense of purpose,” she said while unpacking her belongings in her room at Neptune North with her mom, Rose Parczany. The need to connect with new students in particular also tops the list of NIU’s official priorities. Under President Douglas Baker, the university has put more effort into student retention to curb a decade of enrollment declines. Part of that effort included changing move-in day to Friday and compressing four days of welcome
See NIU, page A9
Number of students living on campus
4,239 Students who moved in Friday
3,100 Students moving in over the weekend
900 Northern Illinois University freshman Emily Parczany, 18, looks out the window of her new room in Neptune North as mother Rose Parczany helps with her duvet cover Friday. Parczany, a Crystal Lake native, says she plans on going home every other weekend to visit friends at home but having family in nearby Sycamore helps.
Source: Northern Illinois University spokesman Paul Palian
See ISIS, page A9
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