Suburbs should secede from county

In the movie "Enough," the character gets fed up with being abused by her husband and sets out to put a stop to it. It's clear that with all that is transpiring in Cook County government, it's time that we, the citizens, do that very same thing. Here's why:

1. Cook County is made up of 17 commissioners. Eleven represent Chicago residents. So 65 percent of the voting power is slanted to the interests of Chicago citizens at the expense of the suburbs.

2. Mr. Todd Stroger seems unfit for his duties. He avoids the media in Chicago when asked to defend many of his reckless proposals and immature actions while thinking he is above recourse or being held accountable for those proposals and actions.

How can anyone propose a 2 percentage point sales tax increase? Eleven-cent sales tax? That will have the effect of ruining Woodfield Mall and all other retail business in Cook County forever while driving retail business and the jobs that go with it to Lake, DuPage and Kane counties.

3. Mr. Stroger also insists that Cook County continue to run Stroger Hospital for no apparent reason other than his father's name is on it. That's not the real reason. The real reason is they provide free medical care there. How else can we explain why this hospital never collects from many of its patients? Wouldn't it be great to see the State of Illinois come in and audit this facility?

4. The Cook County assessors office seems to think my property value in Schaumburg has gone up 17 percent from 2006 to 2007, when every other independent agency tells me my property value has decreased 4.5 percent. Houses in our neighborhood have taken up to a year to sell while others are simply taken off the market altogether. Who makes these decisions anyway?

5 And now , Commissioner William Beavers actually accused white commissioners of being racist for expressing opinions contrary to his own or refusing to go along with Mr. Stroger's plan to bankrupt retail business in Cook County. Is he serious? That type of small-minded thinking has no place in society.

Citizens in every suburb of Cook County, this is your rallying call.

If you aren't fed up with all this, you darn well should be. Cook County as an effective and fair form of government is broke. There is no cure for the current system. Citizens in Chicago have needs that differ from citizens in the suburbs. The only cure is to have the suburbs secede from Cook County and form a new county government with responsible and accountable commissioners that look after our interests.

The time for action is now.

Steve Safley

Schaumburg