Lester: Group for fallen officers gives Fox Lake cop's family $15,000
An organization dedicated to helping the families of fallen first responders quietly presented the family of slain Fox Lake Police Lt. Charles Joseph Gliniewicz with a $15,000 check on Wednesday.
Heather Sattler, chief operating officer of the 100 Club of Chicago, tells me that another $35,000 will be given to Gliniewicz's family in the coming weeks, as well as offers for legal and financial advice and help with college financial assistance.
“There's no paperwork, no bureaucracy,” Sattler says of the checks. “This helps because a lot of time the surviving spouse is grappling with immediate (financial) worries, like how do I make the next house payment.”
Gliniewicz, a 52-year-old father of four, had planned to retire at the end of this month after 30 years with the police department before he was shot and killed Tuesday morning.
The 100 Club of Chicago, long active in Cook County, expanded just last year to also cover Lake County, Sattler says. She noted Lake County, where Fox Lake is located, hadn't seen a line of duty fatality since the early 1980s.
Other 100 Clubs exist around the country, including in DuPage, Will and Grundy counties. The first emerged in 1952 in Detroit, Michigan, when a group presented an officer's widow with a $1,000 check to make sure she had enough money to pay the bills. The Chicago chapter was started soon after the Detroit group was featured in the Saturday Evening Post in 1956.
The 100 Club of Chicago is led by Joe Ahern of Barrington Hills, who was president and general manager of both WBBM-TV and WLS-TV.
You can donate to the 100 Club or become a member at www.100clubchicago.org/.
Fox Lake police are warning about bogus fundraising accounts on social media claiming to be aiding the Gliniewicz family.
Those who want to donate can contribute to the Lt. Joe Gliniewicz Memorial Fund at any BMO Harris Bank or can send checks to the Lake Zurich Police Department, c/o Missy Gaffney, 200 Mohawk Trail, Lake Zurich, IL 60047.
Gaffney, a police dispatcher, is a close friend of the Gliniewicz family, Lake Zurich Police Commander David Bradstreet said.
Changing law for U-46 CEO
Elgin Area School District U-46 CEO Tony Sanders doesn't have the required certification to also be superintendent of the state's second largest school district.
But school board members want to give him the additional title, saying it will save them having to do a costly candidate search.
So they approached state Rep. Fred Crespo, a Hoffman Estates Democrat, who introduced a bill that would allow Sanders to take on the superintendent job as long as he also remains CEO. Now, retired Community Unit District 300 superintendent Kenneth Arndt handles U-46 superintendent duties, but he's ready to hand them off.
Crespo said he expects his bill will face some modification. “Anytime you make an exception to a law it's a slippery slope,” Crespo says.
State School Superintendent Tony Smith inspired the position of chief of equity and social justice at U-46.
Smith held that title when he worked in Oakland, Calif., schools, where he became friends with Jose Torres, then with the San Ysidro, Calif, public school system.
Torres created the job when he became superintendent at U-46. When Torres moved on to lead the Illinois Math and Science Academy in Aurora, Sanders moved up to head U-46.
And he's keeping the equity and social justice chief, whose job it is to help erase the achievement gap between racially and economically diverse groups of students, according to the U-46 website.
Local church on PBS
PBS Television was at St. James Parish last Sunday to film a segment about Mary Margaret O'Connor of Arlington Heights. O'Connor was profiled by my Daily Herald colleague Melissa Silverberg earlier this summer about the divorce ministry she's formed at the parish.
Wes Craven at Wheaton College
Wes Craven, director of films including “A Nightmare on Elm Street” and “Scream,”
didn't see his first movie (“To Kill a Mockingbird”) until he was a college student. Craven, who died this week at 76, went to Wheaton College from 1957 to 1963, where he edited the school's student literary magazine. Wheaton College was kind enough to look through its archives and send us a photo of Craven from the 1963 Tower Yearbook.
Summer's last fling
Looking to savor one last bit of summer? The Naperville Jaycees Last Fling festival, arguably one of the biggest and best in the 'burbs, kicks off Friday along the Riverwalk in downtown Naperville with Daughtry headlining its Saturday night concert.
Schaumburg's Septemberfest also opens Saturday with free admission and music.
As for me, I'm Michigan-bound to tackle a half marathon.
Today's selfie
Aww. Congratulations to State Rep. Tom Morrison of Palatine and wife Bethany on the birth of their third child, Elena Jane, whom he describes as a “peanut” weighing in at just under 7 pounds upon her arrival in late August. Morrison was a running buddy when I worked in Springfield and has struck me as a kid at heart himself, occasionally dashing through lawn sprinklers on particularly hot mornings.