Cook Co. fencepost
Good to have comprehensive plan
Mount Prospect fire officials are to be commended for putting a federal grant to good use, coming up with a comprehensive plan for how local school officials and public safety workers should handle 22 different kinds of school emergencies. In this time of heightened concerned about the safety of our youth when in school, it's good to know that such an effort for a coordinated response has been undertaken. And rather than narrowly looking at just their town, Mount Prospect has worked with adjoining communities so that other schools and safety officials in the area can benefit from the work that's been done. It's good to see planning take precedence over parochialism.
JOO, but …
The community message board outside Schaumburg's Station 1 firehouse along Schaumburg Road always offers pertinent news or helpful advice, and the current message is no exception: "Texting while driving spells trouble." The bigger issue, though, is that this message even has to be delivered. C'mon, now … texting while driving? (Editor's note: For those who do not text -- while driving or otherwise -- JOO is Just Our Opinion.)
21st century book reports
Read a book. Make a video book report. Put it on the Web. Win some dough. That's the premise of a Gail Borden Public Library reading program that has gone national. Called StoryTubes, the program is designed to engage youngsters to read and then report on what they've read via video. Submissions are then voted upon, with winners and their sponsoring organizations getting $500 to $1,000 in free books. While the world may not need any more unsolicited videos, it certainly needs more and better readers. Libraries and StoryTubes certainly can't hurt.
Honoring Barrington's lead-off hitter
Before Tom English, there was no youth baseball in the Barrington area. Fresh from serving in the Navy in World War II, English wanted to get the ball rolling, so to speak, on starting up a baseball program. So, he wrote to officials of the Little League in Pennsylvania, itself a mere 10 years old at the time, and got the first baseball program running in 1949. The program, now 1,600 players strong and called Barrington Youth Baseball and Softball, will kick off its season April 19 with a ceremony honoring one of its founding fathers. Caps off to Mr. English.
Root, root, root for the cold team
Speaking of baseball, while the Cubs and the White Sox have been training in temperate Arizona, high school baseball and softball teams have started their season in conditions that hardly resemble the desert Southwest. Now these teams don't expect to have a string of nice days, not when their games begin in March in the Midwest. But the colder than usual spring has made playing the games even more miserable than usual. But we take off our hats - and offer stocking caps - to the high school players who take to the diamond on the frozen tundra with great enthusiasm, and hit, field and pitch with skill despite frozen fingers.
Good deed, bad deed
Elgin Mayor Ed Schock and wife Karen were trying to help a troubled young woman, taking her in when she had nowhere to go. They were repaid by her taking their cars without permission, apparently more than once. The most recent joyride ended with two blown tires and the young woman's arrest on a misdemeanor criminal trespass to a vehicle charge. The mayor and his wife were "disappointed" and not inclined to post bail for her. And no doubt reconsidering the cynical adage that no good deed goes unpunished.