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HOME IMPROVEMENT Habitat helps county veterans fix up their homes
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Prime season for deer crashes Accidents prompt officials to warn drivers: Watch out By ALLISON GOODRICH agoodrich@shawmedia.com
H. Rick Bamman – hbamman@shawmedia.com
Standing in the doorway of his kitchen, veteran Jim Nor of Richmond recalls the day he was shot by a sniper in Vietnam. The bullet ricocheted off the lip of his helmet sending bullet fragments into his head. Nor was awarded the Purple Heart for his injuries. With the help of Habitat for Humanity and Aeroseal Solutions, Nor’s home ventilation system is being upgraded. BELOW: Aeroseal Solutions technicians Jeff Swearingen (left) and Nick Christiansen work with an injector to seal air leaks in the ventilation system in Jim Nor’s Richmond home.
By CHELSEA McDOUGALL cmcdougall@shawmedia.com
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arch 7, 1966. Qui Nho’n, Vietnam. It’s 6 p.m., and the sun is setting over a hill, as troops from Jim Nor’s Marine battalion approached on North Vietnamese entrenched in the hillside. Nor was a 21-year-old McHenry County farm kid looking for something a little different than life in the Hebron and Richmond area had offered him. He had enlisted in the U.S. Marine Corps shortly after high school graduation. In Vietnam, he was part of the deadly Operation Utah, remembered in history books as some of the first heavy fighting in North Vietnam. The three-day offensive resulted in significant fatalities. Nor was almost one of them. A day into the offensive, he
On the Web To view video of Habitat for Humanity of McHenry County volunteers in Richmond, visit NWHerald.com.
was hiding behind an uprooted tree and exchanging fire with the North Vietnamese. As the sun started setting behind the hill, Nor adjusted his helmet to block the sun’s bright rays, when a jolt
See IMPROVEMENT, page A6
How to help: Habitat for Humanity of McHenry County is always looking for volunteers to lend a hand on any of its projects. Interested parties should call 815-7599002 or visit www.habitatmchenry.org. Veterans Day celebration livestream: Watch Crystal Lake South High School’s Veterans Day celebration live on NWHerald.com. Live broadcast is scheduled for 9 a.m. Tuesday.
If ever there was a time throughout the year to be cautious of deer on the road, this is it. There were seven vehicle crashes caused by deer over the weekend, McHenry County Sheriff’s Deputy Aimee Knop said. Plus, two more crashes were caused as drivers tried to avoid deer. “This is one of our peak times for deer,” Knop said, referring to now through the next several weeks. “We see an increase in the fall to early winter.” According to the University of Illinois Extension, most motor vehicle-deer collisions occur during October, November and December – aligning with hunting and mating season – which puts Illinois drivers right in the midst of the peak time frame. The sheriff’s office has recorded an average of about 200 deer-vehicle collisions a year for the past seven years. In 2014, there have been 130, but the records go through only October. A 2014 report from State Farm indicates Illinois is a medium-risk state with drivers’ odds of colliding with a deer being 1 in 211, slightly higher odds than in 2013. Spokesman for the Illinois Department of Transportation Guy Tridgell said IDOT recorded 14,811 deer-vehicle crashes in 2013. In order to avoid becoming part of the statistics, he said cautiousness is crucial, especially during dusk and dawn. “Deer tend to be more active during those periods,” Tridgell said. “Drivers should try to keep track of the locations where they’ve seen deer in the past and when driving past those spots, slow down and be prepared to stop.” Other points to remember, according to the University of Illinois Extension, include
See DEER, page A6
Obama calls for tougher regulation for Internet providers By ANNE FLAHERTY The Associated Press WASHINGTON – President Barack Obama on Monday embraced a radical change in how the government treats Internet service, coming down on the side of consumer activists who fear slower download speeds and higher costs but angering Republicans and the nation’s cable giants who say the plan would kill jobs. Obama called on the Federal Communications Commission to more heavily regulate Internet providers and treat
broadband much as it would any other public utility. He said the FCC should explicitly prohibit Internet providers like Verizon and AT&T from charging data hogs like Netflix extra to move their content more quickly. The announcement sent cable stocks tumbling. The FCC, an independent regulatory body led by political appointees, is nearing a decision on whether broadband providers should be allowed to cut deals with the content providers but is stumbling over the legal complexities.
“We are stunned the president would abandon the longstanding, bipartisan policy of lightly regulating the Internet and calling for extreme” regulation, said Michael Powell, president and CEO of the National Cable and TelecommuBarack Obama nications Association, the primary lobbying arm of the cable industry, which supplies much of the nation’s Internet
access. This “tectonic shift in national policy, should it be adopted, would create devastating results,” added Powell, who chaired the FCC during the Bush administration until 2005. Consumer groups and content providers hailed Obama’s move, with Netflix posting to its Facebook page that “consumers should pick winners and losers on the Internet, not broadband gatekeepers.” “Net neutrality” is the idea that Internet service providers shouldn’t block, slow or ma-
nipulate data moving across its networks. As long as content isn’t against the law, such as child pornography or pirated music, a file or video posted on one site will load generally at the same speed as a similarly sized file or video on another site. In 2010, the FCC embraced the concept in a rule. But last January, a federal appeals court struck down the regulation because the court said the FCC didn’t technically have the legal authority to tell broadband providers how to manage their networks.
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Ethics code for appointees on the way to McHenry County Board / A3
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The uncertainty has prompted the public to file some 3.7 million comments with the FCC – more than double the number filed after Janet Jackson’s infamous wardrobe malfunction at the 2004 Super Bowl. On Monday, Obama waded into the fray and gave a major boost to Internet activists by saying the FCC should explicitly ban any “paid prioritization” on the Internet. Obama also suggested the FCC reclassify consumer broadband
See INTERNET, page A6
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