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County to take up proposed project RALLYING AGAINST RANDALL
Could discuss interchange in Marengo as early as mid-Oct.
Illustration by R. Scott Helmchen shelmchen@shawmedia.com
By STEPHEN Di BENEDETTO
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sdibenedetto@shawmedia.com
“I believe there’s room for improvement on Randall Road. But the thing I have a problem with is, is it really a $100 million improvement?”
Opponents go online, use social media to fight road’s multimillion dollar expansion
Paul Serwatka, a Lakewood resident and By KEVIN CRAVER kcraver@shawmedia.com Deborah Jenssen has always had good reason to follow the proposed Randall Road improvement plan – an original version would have taken her Lake in the Hills home and 25 others in her neighborhood. That version met a hasty end – Jenssen and her neighbors fought like mad and village government officials made it clear they would never approve taking homes by eminent domain. But she continued to keep an eye on the project, concerned about the environmental impact on the creek feeding the village’s main lake, as well as its scope and overall cost. While trying to find the Facebook page that the McHenry County Division of Transportation maintains for the project, she came across one set up by the opposition group Stop the Randall Road Robbery, and she’s been a regular since liking it. She and others have taken to McHenry County Board meetings, a website, social media and in protests along the road itself to question the benefit versus a cost that could well exceed $100 million.
“I don’t believe that the traffic problem warrants the plans. I understand that the intersection … needs to be fixed. But this plan is just insanely excessive,” Jenssen said. Almost all of the debate in recent years over the proposal to widen Randall Road to six lanes from Ackman to County Line roads has been dominated by the much-ballyhooed proposal to relieve congestion at Randall and Algonquin roads by building a continuous-flow intersection. But to opposition group co-founders Joe Tirio and Paul Serwatka, the CFI debate was a sideshow. With that intersection plan now rejected in favor of a more traditional fix, opponents now are focusing their attention on the overall project itself, which they allege is an unnecessary behemoth in the name of shaving a few minutes off of the average driving trip. And like other grass-roots initiatives, the online component is an integral part of the fight, Tirio, of Woodstock, said. Website visits and Facebook hits spike when the project is in the newspaper or protesters hold up signs at the intersection, he said. “I think the website and social media are working in concert with one anoth-
Grafton Township precinct committeeman
Voice your opinion
Do you think planned improvements on Randall Road are worth the expense? Vote online at NWHerald.com. er. It really helps people. The meeting agendas and minutes are on the county website, but they don’t give the public a clear message as to what’s important to you as a citizen,” said Tirio, who used to live in Lake in the Hills not far from Randall Road. Board members voted earlier this month, 17-7, to ditch plans for a CFI at Randall and Algonquin roads in favor of adding more left-turn lanes on Algonquin and Randall roads, eliminating several curb cuts and limiting several other retail exit points. In the CFI plan, the left-turn lanes at Randall Road would have started several hundred feet back at a new set of signals that would – for a stretch – direct the cars onto the oncoming traffic lanes.
MARENGO – City officials could soon embark on critical negotiations with various local governments that would bring a proposed interchange at Route 23 and Interstate 90 in Marengo closer to reality. But hurdles remain before officials reach that point. First and foremost, a proposed engineering agreement that would have McHenry County contribute $289,600 to cover interchange design costs needs to clear the County Board. The agreement could be introduced at the county’s transportation committee as early as mid-October, Marengo City Administrator Gary Boden said. In an early indicator on the fate of the project, the full County Board earlier this month approved a resolution on a 19-4 vote that voiced general support for a Marengo interchange, which would be the county’s first. “The county now is at the point where we recognize they’re going to contribute to this financially,” Boden said. “The question now is how much.” The engineering agreement with the county, if approved, would complete about 30 percent of the design work to Marengo’s long-sought interchange. The city already has
“The county now is at the point where we recognize they’re going to contribute to this financially. The question now is how much.”
Gary Boden Marengo city administrator
See OPPONENTS, page A5 See COUNTY, page A5
Obama says U.S. misjudged Iraqi army, militants’ threat By KEVIN FREKING The Associated Press WASHINGTON – President Barack Obama acknowledged that U.S. intelligence agencies underestimated the threat from Islamic State militants and overestimated the ability and will of Iraq’s army to fight. Questioning Obama’s strategy to destroy the group, House Speaker John Boehner
said the U.S. may have “no choice” but to send in American troops if the mix of U.S.led airstrikes and a ground campaign reliant on Iraqi forces, Kurdish fighters and soon-to-be trained Syrian rebels fails to achieve that goal. Boehner, in an interview broadcast Sunday, did agree with the White House that Obama had the power to order airstrikes in Iraq and Syria,
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but said he believes Congress should consider a resolution authorizing the use of force for this specific mission. Boehner, R-Ohio, said he would bring lawmak- Barack Obama ers back to Washington – they are not set
to return until after the Nov. 4 election – if Obama were to seek such a resolution. O b a m a described the U.S. intelligence assessments John Boehner i n r e s p o n s e to a question during a CBS “60 Minutes”
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Hong Kong police use tear gas
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interview that aired Sunday night. He was asked about how Islamic State fighters had come to control so much territory in Syria and Iraq and whether it was a surprise to him. The president said that during the Iraq war, U.S. military forces with the help of Iraq’s Sunni tribes were able to quash al-Qaida fighters, who went “back under-
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ground.” “During the chaos of the Syrian civil war, where essentially you have huge swaths of the country that are completely ungoverned, they were able to reconstitute themselves and take advantage of that chaos,” Obama said, according to an excerpt release before the show aired.
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