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County Board to ratify rule changes Members to vote Thursday on items By KEVIN P. CRAVER kcraver@shawmedia.com
Sarah Nader – snader@shawmedia.com
Rick Slusin, a weather spotter with the McHenry County Emergency Management Agency, shows storm activity on his laptop while posing for a portrait recently at Lippold Park in Crystal Lake.
IN THE MIDST OF
TORNADO SEASON Officials urge residents to prepare for emergencies What to know before a disaster n A tornado watch means tornadoes are possible and people should prepare to take shelter. n A tornado warning means a tornado has been sighted and people should take shelter immediately. n A basement or cellar will provide the best protection in the case of a tornado. If underground protection isn’t an option, use an interior room or hallway on the lowest level.
Source: Illinois Emergency Management Agency
Voice your opinion Have you ever seen a funnel cloud? Vote online at NWHerald.com.
By KATIE DAHLSTROM kdahlstrom@shawmedia.com When a storm threatening to turn into a tornado moves across McHenry County, there’s a good chance Rick Slusin is following close behind it. One of the most recent tornado scares came June 30, knocking down trees from Marengo to Route 31. Slusin notified the McHenry County Emergency Management Agency where he’s a volunteer storm spotter. In turn, the agency knew about the potentially dangerous storm before the National Weather Service issued a tornado warning. The storm dissipated around 2:30 a.m. after knocking down some trees, Slusin said, but it could have ended much worse. “We had the juice and the
Rick Slusin, a weather spotter and storm chaser poses for a portrait recently at Lippold Park in Crystal Lake. atmosphere ready to go,” Slusin said. Warmer weather will bring with it more chances for severe weather. In Illinois, tornado season typically stretches from mid-March to June,
bringing an average 47 tornadoes each year, according to the Illinois Emergency Management Agency. On top of storm spotters,
The McHenry County Board on Thursday will vote to ratify changes to its rules to accommodate for a popularly elected chairman starting in 2016. Board members are scheduled to vote on the changes as part of its Thursday morning agenda. The 9 a.m. meeting will be preceded by a 45-minute Committee of the Whole in which proposed changes will be presented and the reasoning behind them explained. While the County Board always reviews its rules after each November election, the top priority for the Management Services Committee in charge of the task was delineating the powers of the chairman. Voters last year approved a referendum to elect the chairman to four-year terms, instead of the 24-member County Board electing the chairman to two-year terms. The chairman will be a 25th member who calls meetings and can only vote to break a tie, and has little added authority under state law. Proposed rule changes give the chairman the power to appoint the chairpeople and the membership of the standing committees in which much of county government’s work gets done, with the consent of a majority vote of the County Board. The chairman gets one more chance if the board rejects the roster, and the job falls to the board itself it members reject the chairman’s plans a second time. The power to appoint the vice chairman also is given to the chairman under the new rules, with the consent of a board majority.
What it means The McHenry County Board will vote this Thursday to ratify changes to its rules, especially adjusting for having a popularly-elected chairman. The meeting starts at 9 a.m. at the county Administration Building, 667 Ware Road, Woodstock.
On the Net You can read the text of the proposed McHenry County Board rule changes at http://shawurl. com/1swm.
See PREPARATION, page A10 See RULES, page A10
ANALYSIS
Nuke deal risks projecting weakness By DAN PERRY The Associated Press CAIRO – On a basic level, the framework deal between world powers and Tehran will be judged by whether it prevents an Iranian bomb, but that will take years to figure out. A more immediate issue is the projection of Western power. Supporters of the framework deal can argue that the U.S. and world powers extracted significant concessions from Iran, breaking a decade-long impasse and proving that diplomacy
backed by tough sanctions can bring about positive change even in the Middle East. But if, as critics contend, the agreement ends up projecting U.S. weakness instead, that could embolden rogue states and extremists alike, and make the region’s vast array of challenges – from the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and the Syrian civil war to the fighting in Libya and Yemen – even more impervious to Western intervention. The United States wants to rein in Syria’s President Bashar Assad as his ruinous civil war grinds into year five.
It would like to encourage more liberal domestic policies in Egypt and push Iraq’s leaders to govern more inclusively. Despite years of setbacks, the U.S. would still like to see a two-state solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. But if leaders in those places read the fine print of the agreement the U.S. and other world powers hope to reach with Iran by June 30 and conclude that they were duped or have flinched, these leaders will be less likely to give in to pressure in the future, rendering the Iran agreement a lonely foreign
policy achievement clouded by the region’s chaos. The implications may first be seen in Iran itself. If the agreement leads to acceptance of Iran’s theocracy, hard-liners could feel less pressure to curb their support of regional militant groups and crack down even harder on dissent at home. They would be flush with cash from the lifting of sanctions and emboldened in their confidence that the West will turn a blind eye. Alternatively, the deal could mark a major victory
See DEAL, page A10
AP photo
European Union High Representative for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy Federica Mogherini (from left), Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif, British Foreign Secretary Philip Hammond and U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry line up for a news announcement Thursday after a new round of nuclear Iran talks in the learning center at the Swiss federal Institute of Technology in Lausanne, Switzerland.
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