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Project slated for ’16 draws concern
Barrington Hills government drops support of long-awaited Longmeadow Parkway Work on the long-planned Longmeadow Parkway likely will start as anticipated next spring, despite opposition that now includes one of the local governments that originally backed it. The project has been sought by local governments for more than 20 years, but the government of Barrington Hills
Algonquin Village President John Schmitt, whose village long had dealt with Do you support construction of congestion issues and sought the Longmeadow Parkway? Vote ways to alleviate them, said online at NWHerald.com. the time has come to begin construction, and the support still is strong among the nine other switched its support position municipalities, and the Kane and denounced the proposed and McHenry county boards, 5.6-mile, east-west corridor as a that want it built. bad idea for the village that was “Everything has been done not accurately presented to its and everything will continue residents. to be done to ensure that this
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is nothing but a positive influence on the area,” Schmitt said. The project, which lies entirely within Kane County and will be supervised by its division of transportation, calls for building a four-lane road from Huntley Road east to Route 62 in Barrington Hills, and adds another Fox River bridge crossing that will require a toll to pass. Total construction is estimated at about $115 million,
with $42.2 million coming from the Illinois Department of Transportation, about $5 million each coming from the Kane/Kendall Council of Mayors and the federal government, as well as local building impact fees and revenues from the toll bridge that will be used to pay off bonds. Supporters repeatedly have assured the public that existing funds will cover the cost and a tax increase will not be needed.
After years of support, which included a successful 2006 advisory referendum, the Barrington Hills Village Board in June stated it now opposes the parkway. The village, which is fiercely protective of its suburban enclave of open space, large lots and rural characteristics, now says the Longmeadow project threatens that.
See PARKWAY, page A6
Typhoon hits China after leaving 6 dead, 4 missing in Taiwan
CHILD POVERTY IN McHENRY COUNTY
The ASSOCIATED PRESS
Matthew Apgar – mapgar@shawmedia.com
Noelia Colin, 5, of McHenry eats fruit during a free lunch program Thursday at the McHenry Public Library in McHenry. The program provides free lunches from the Northern Illinois Food Bank in Geneva for children on weekdays from June 8 through Friday. To see a video from the event, visit www.NWHerald.com.
RATES ON THE RISE Area children in poverty nearly triples from 1999 to 2012 By ALLISON GOODRICH agoodrich@shawmedia.com
T
he Rev. Eric Blachford, a pastor in Harvard for the past year, sees it in small ways. A child in clothes that don’t quite fit. Parents’ questions about where to find help with food and school supplies. A school official wondering whether his son needed free and reduced lunch when registering last year because so many other students in the area needed it. As the plague of child poverty spreads to suburban areas across the country, Blachford said it’s become apparent enough in Harvard for him to do something. At the First United Methodist Church – Harvard this year, he implemented a free summer lunch
More online See a graphic including child poverty numbers at NWHerald.com. program, done through the Northern Illinois Food Bank, which has been attended by as many as 50 people in one day. “I started wondering, what happens in the summer when school’s over?” Blachford said. “We found out there wasn’t really ready-made lunches available anywhere, so we looked into doing it ourselves. Then someone mentioned the Northern Illinois Food Bank.” In 2013, about one in five kids in Illinois – about 600,000 – lived in households with incomes below poverty level (about $18,750 for a family of three), according to the 2015 Illinois
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Kids Count from the Voices of Illinois Children. Of the five collar counties, Research Director Larry Joseph said McHenry County has seen the most growth in child poverty, about an 178 percent increase from 1999 to 2012. That’s about 9,000 kids up from 3,200 in 13 years, well below the number of impoverished youth in surrounding counties. Still, Joseph said the tripling of the local poverty level clearly is cause for concern, noting McHenry County’s inclusion in the trending suburbanization of poverty, despite a seemingly recovering economy. “There are two major factors at play ... the first being the migration of low-income families from central cities to suburban areas,” he said. “So
See CHILD POVERTY, page A6
LOCAL NEWS
Facility improvements Survey of land ownership another item off list that stands between Cary, Metra project / A3 STYLE
Ill. tourism up for 4th year Executive director of area’s tourism center credits increased marketing, recovering economy for McHenry County growth / D1
‘Who you are in your soul’ McHenry County women use nontraditional hobbies to discover themselves / Style 5-7
WHERE IT’S AT Advice ...............Style 8-10 Business .................... D1-4 Classified.....................F1-7 Community ....................B1 Local News................ A2-9 Lottery............................A2 Movies...................Style 11 Nation&World...........B3-5 Obituaries .....................A9 Opinions ........................B2 Puzzles ....................... F5, 8 Sports....................... C1-10 State ...............................B3 Style..........................Inside Weather .......................A10
BEIJING – A typhoon was pounding southeast China late Saturday, leaving more than a million homes without power after lashing Taiwan, where it downed trees, traffic lights and power lines, and left six people dead and four missing. Typhoon Soudelor hit the city of Putian in Fujian province late Saturday night and was expected to move across the region, China’s official Xinhua News Agency reported. The storm earlier caused more than 3 million households in Taiwan to lose electricity, with streets strewn with fallen trees. All 279 domestic flights on the island were canceled Saturday, as well as at least 37 international flights. At least 101 people were injured in the storm. An 8-year-old girl and her mother died when they were swept out to sea Thursday from a beach on the east coast, Taiwan’s official Central News Agency reported. The girl’s twin sister remains missing.
Other casualties included a firefighter who was killed and another injured after being hit by a drunken driver as they attempted to move a fallen tree in the island’s south. The center of the storm made landfall in eastern Taiwan before daybreak Saturday. By mid-morning, Soudelor was packing maximum sustained winds of 100 miles per hour, Taiwan’s Central Weather Bureau said. The typhoon weakened later Saturday with top winds of up to 89 mph while moving away from the island in a northwesterly direction. Strong winds and heavy rains were expected to continue in Taiwan. Authorities in southeast China evacuated about 163,000 people and ordered around 32,000 ships back to port ahead of the typhoon, Xinhua reported. More than 7,000 soldiers and police were on standby, provincial authorities said. The provincial capital of Fuzhou was being battered by heavy rain and strong winds, and all flights to the city
See TYPHOON, page A6
AP photo
A boy searches through the storm-damaged remains of his home Saturday and finds a mother cat nursing two kittens in Saipan, Northern Mariana Islands. President Barack Obama has declared the Commonwealth of the Northern Mariana Islands a disaster area and is ordering federal aid to help the U.S. territory in the aftermath of a destructive typhoon.
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