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2007 in retrospect

It was a notable year in many respects. Here is a look back at the top stories of 2007 in the Tri-Cities area:

Kane County

A flooded Fox River, public health scares and transportation issues were three of the biggest issues Kane County leaders dealt with in 2007.

Heavy August rains flooded the Fox River, its tributaries and other northern Illinois bodies of water. The storms felled trees, knocked out power throughout the Chicago area, and raised the water level of rivers and creeks, flooding basements and even the first floors of some buildings.

More than $4 million in damage was reported by hundreds of property owners, with Kane and other counties declared federal disaster areas.

The county's public health department responded to outbreaks of hepatitis A and salmonella this year. More than 2,900 people who ate at Houlihan's in Geneva in January, when the hepatitis outbreak was reported, received immunoglobulin shots to protect against the disease. Although no additional contaminations were reported, a class-action lawsuit later was filed against the restaurant. The incident was traced to contaminated ice served by an infected server.

In March, health department officials traced a salmonella outbreak to an unlicensed Mexican-style cheese sold at local Hispanic grocery stores. Thirty people reported being infected; health department officials believe many more were affected, however, because anecdotal evidence suggests most salmonella victims don't seek treatment.

On the transportation front, the Kane County Board voted to double the county's share of the gasoline tax and revamp its transportation impact fee. Both moves are expected to bring in additional funds for road projects.

The gas tax increased from 2 to 4 cents per gallon, effective April 1. The increase is expected to generate $4.6 million in revenue annually.

In June the board approved a developer-funded impact fee structure that will fund $1.2 billion in road projects over the next eight years. A complex formula was developed in response to complaints that the previous impact fee system, adopted in 2005, was unfair.

Also in June, the Illinois Department of Transportation unveiled the proposed route for the 37-mile Prairie Parkway through Kane, Kendall and Grundy counties. The so-called B5 alignment, chosen over the B2, begins at the Reagan Memorial Tollway and travels south, meandering east through Kendall County before connecting with Interstate 80 near Minooka. If built, it would spur economic development near interchanges in both Kane and Kendall counties.

But a lack of future funding sources could jeopardize construction. The project's biggest backer, former U.S. Rep. and Speaker of the House Dennis Hastert, retired Nov. 26 after more than two decades in Congress.

The Plano Republican's early resignation will trigger a special election next year. Eight candidates are vying for his seat; his district includes most of Kane County and parts of other counties, stretching from DuPage County to the Mississippi River.

--Lisa Smith

Batavia

For Batavia, 2007 was a year of transition.

For the vast majority of the year, getting from one side of town to the other was made more difficult by the re-construction of the Wilson Street bridge.

In the spring, voters approved a $75 million building referendum that will add an auditorium, field-house and classroom addition to the high school.

It will also add an additional gym at Rotolo Middle School, and move the district's early childhood center to Alice Gustafson Elementary School. That is scheduled to open for next school year.

During the summer, the seven buildings that made up the C.W. Shumway Foundry along Shumway Avenue were demolished. The foundry operated for 130 years, from 1872 to 2002.

Another longtime Batavia building, the Campana Building, may be in for a change in the future.

Developers suggested moving the structure, including its 100-foot tower, as a way to make the land profitable but retain the building, which is on the National Register of Historic Places.

In August, several spots in Batavia were hard-hit with heavy rains and flooding. The patio at the Venice Tavern, as well as most of Clark Island Park, were under water.

And toward the end of the year, the city decided to begin looking again at a controversial topic -- the possibility of a second bridge in town.

The city convened a citizens' panel to outline potential crossings late in the year, but they don't expect that report to be finished until 2009.

-- Leslie Hague

Campton Hills

Campton Hills became a village this year, but the activities that followed will make 2008 an eventful year as well.

With 55 percent of voters supporting the town's incorporation, Campton Hills became a municipality after an April referendum. But not much time would pass before vigorous efforts were under way to revert the rural area to unincorporated turf.

Thousands of residents signed petitions this fall to put another referendum on an upcoming ballot to undo the incorporation.

But appointed village leaders fought the drive at nearly every turn, maintaining something of a little-village-that-could defense.

"I think it's unfortunate that we have residents who are not willing to give the village the opportunity to exist and grow before they decide what we're offering is unacceptable," Village President Patsy Smith said Oct. 19.

While the village board concentrated on setting up the town's first village hall and police department, it also spent weeks -- if not months -- in court, battling neighborhood petitions to disconnect, and hearing challenges over the referendum push and candidate filings for the Feb. 5 election.

As of mid-December, the referendum push to dissolve the village appeared bound to be stalled until November, with the Kane County Electoral Board reviewing challenges to the petition to put the referendum on the ballot.

A Kane County judge also ruled there isn't enough room on the Feb. 5 ballot for the question, because the village had already placed three advisory referendums -- the limit -- on it.

Arguments for and against the town's existence are similar to the word wars that played out before the April referendum.

Village opponents fear higher taxes as a result of additional government, and also question why the village was formed. Proponents, meanwhile, maintain the village can be run on a minimal budget, and its existence is necessary to fend off encroaching municipalities.

Outside of that debate, the village board hired Greg Anderson, formerly second-in-command for the Aurora Police Department, as Campton Hills' first police chief.

Anderson hired several police officers and had the department up and running with around-the-clock coverage by Oct. 31.

-- Josh Stockinger

Elburn/Sugar Grove

• The peace of a country summer night was shattered at 3 a.m. Aug. 4 when a 23-year-old Aurora man drove his 2007 Nissan into a field at the T intersection of Dugan and Scott roads in Sugar Grove Township and crashed into a tree. The force split the car in two length-wise.

Batavia residents Andrew Berger and Joshua Sutton, both 21, were killed in the crash.

Thomas Ofenloch Jr. was charged with aggravated driving under the influence and reckless homicide. Still bloodied from the wreck, just hours later, he told a Kane County judge he would never drink again.

Residents were stunned to learn that Ofenloch, Berger and possibly Sutton were at a Sugar Grove party that had been raided by police because of underage drinking just hours before the crash. Ofenloch is out on bond and due in court Jan. 24.

• Joe Wolf was chosen as Sugar Grove citizen of the year -- perhaps the consolation prize for being ousted from the village board during the April election, when Melisa Taylor captured the seat.

Taylor led the charge to ban ice cream vendors after a man was arrested for exposure while selling ice cream in the village. But residents raised their voices to save the tradition and the board voted to regulate the vendors, not banish them.

In September, the village celebrated its 50th anniversary with food, hula hoop contests, and dancing to the music of the 1950s.

• About 500 residents turned out for a ceremony and stayed to shop when a Jewel-Osco opened in May at routes 38 and 47 in Elburn. Residents were happy to have a major grocery store available, making trips to St. Charles and Sugar Grove an inconvenience of the past.

The village board gave final approval for the construction of a Walgreen drugstore, with a drive-through pharmacy, to be built near the new Jewel.

• For the Kaneland school district, the issue of the year was space: Who had it, who didn't, and whether residents were willing to pay for more.

At least for 2007, the answer was no.

Voters rejected a $53.2 million building referendum in the spring that would have included a new middle school and a new elementary school addition.

As a result, the eighth grade class started the school year by spending the majority of their day at the high school building.

-- Nancy Gier

Geneva

What happened in Geneva this year?

Thankfully, so far, no murders. Few robberies. No fatal fires.

There was a huge Fox River flood, of course, that shut Island Park down for weeks, destroyed the lower half of the Mill Race Inn and canceled a legendary folk music festival.

This was the year that voters gave Geneva schools the OK to spend $75 million on building two new elementary schools and renovate the rest of the elementaries. Voters also agreed to raise the city's sales tax rate.

You could start drinking at bars and taverns two hours earlier on Sundays, at 10 a.m., starting in September. You could also visit the Geneva Public Library on Sunday afternoons in the summer.

Senior citizens got a new place to recreate, as the Geneva Township Senior Center opened in Wheeler Park in the former Geneva History Center.

Organic and local-foods advocates flocked to a new farmers market, the Geneva Green Market on River Lane, on Thursdays to buy fresh produce, flowers, plants, cheese, baked goods and more.

Just to the north of that, Geneva Bottling Works closed after an 86-year run. Construction started on an Aldi's grocery store, set to open any day now, on the east side of town.

Just outside of Geneva, Thumper's Gentlemen's Club strip joint (formerly the Sugar Bomb, formerly Club 38) was shuttered for failure to pay rent and insurance, failure to report sales tax and failure to get a liquor license.

Geneva opened a parking deck on South Third Street near the Metra train station, in hopes of alleviating parking woes for commuters and shoppers. Drivers lived through the re-widening of the intersection of Kirk Road and Route 38, as well as that of Route 31 and State Street. And the state finally repaved the bumpy stretch of East State.

The Viking Ship at Good Templar Park won $52,000 for preservation and restoration work, in a contest run by American Express Foundation that involved online voting by the public.

Mayor Kevin Burns took a stab at running for Congress to fill the seat vacated by Rep. Dennis Hastert, but gave up when Hastert endorsed Jim Oberweis of Aurora.

And the city starred in two national television shows, thanks to its residents.

Cook and author Renee Ferguson was featured in November on "Throwdown! with Bobby Flay" on the Food Network, and an essay from Kathie Fischer got "The Ellen DeGeneres Show" to send its DJ, Stryker, to film a segment at the Christmas Walk in December.

--Susan Sarkauskas

North Aurora

For North Aurora residents, 2007 was a year of deciding what they want their village to be -- and what they want left out.

The year started on a violent note when Robert Sanchez Zepeda killed himself and Maria Del Carmen Pina in his Butterfield Trails apartment in January. Police said they didn't know why Zepeda killed the mother of two from Elgin, with whom he had a relationship.

In March, voters approved a 50-cent increase in the West Aurora school district's operating expenses for staffing, security, technology and temporary classrooms.

In the spring, residents organized in opposition to a Wal-Mart store at Orchard Road and Oak Street.

Opponents, especially from the Waterford Oaks subdivision, said the development would bring too much noise, pollution, light and traffic near their homes.

In the end, the proposal was voted down, but the retail giant may come back with the a different proposal in the village or in Aurora.

On Veterans Day, officials and residents dedicated and opened their own Veterans Memorial near Willow Way and Fairview Drive.

The memorial was three years in the making, and the $120,000 cost was financed mostly through donations.

With one major project down, the village started on another this year: a revamped riverfront.

The village sent out surveys and met with residents to find out what they would like to see in the area between routes 25 and 31.

Ideas included a boardwalk, pedestrian bridge, lookout tower and children's garden.

The village plans to put some money for startup costs in its budget for next year, as well as applying for grants.

-- Leslie Hague

St. Charles schools

Leaders disgraced, a student shuffle, public outrage, a changing of the guard -- so went a tumultuous 2007 for the St. Charles school board, which only recently has appeared on the mend.

The year began without a break from controversy spilling over from 2006, as the board tackled lingering issues such as the revision of all school boundaries and the hiring of retiring chief Barbara Erwin's successor.

Parents were outraged when they learned the boundary revisions meant changing where hundreds of children went to school.

The anger only intensified later, when it revealed the board in 2005 silently approved a potentially lucrative contract extension for Erwin out of public view.

Soon to follow was an ultimatum for the board to clean up its act from Erwin's replacement, Superintendent Don Schlomann; and, one day later, the abrupt resignation of the board's longest-serving member, Chris Hansen. Meanwhile, there was plenty of infighting -- particularly between past board presidents Bobbie Raehl and Jim Gaffney -- to dominate headlines for months.

"We wouldn't accept in our classrooms what you accept at this table," Schlomann told the board July 24. "I desperately need your help to move this district forward."

Two months earlier, voters elected newcomers Bob Lindahl and Scott Nowling to the board, and re-elected Kathy Hewell, who became president, and Gaffney, who toppled Raehl in a head-to-head match for a two-year term.

After Hansen's resignation, which he said was to "help the community move forward," board members appointed longtime district volunteer James Chimienti to serve until 2009.

For Schlomann -- a former Belvidere superintendent hired by St. Charles after a months-long search -- the first course of action was restructuring his administrative team to fill multiple vacancies leftover from Erwin's tenure.

Schlomann also was quick to initiate a "community engagement process," which began in November and was ongoing at the end of the year. The new superintendent took a little heat for proposing the process at a cost of $11,000 a month but, as of early December, hundreds of parents were actively participating in the goal-setting series of meetings.

Although the board soap opera continued to be the talk of the town for much of 2007, students also were in the limelight regularly for winning awards in academics, art and sports, and achieving -- almost districtwide -- above the state average on annual tests.

As the year came to a close, board relations appeared to be on the mend.

Several members attributed the turnaround to Schlomann's leadership, as well as his recommendation to scale back the number of monthly board meetings and create sub-committees where members collaborate on a more personal level.

--Josh Stockinger

St. Charles city

Commercial redevelopment was the hot topic across the city of St. Charles for much of 2007, as officials took steps toward revitalizing several struggling properties.

It also was a year of victory for hundreds of residents north and east of Charlestowne Mall, as Wal-Mart scrapped controversial plans to build a 24-hour Supercenter near their homes.

Outside the development arena, the city and its firefighters union finally settled a longstanding contract dispute over promotion practices, just in time for the holidays. The city also brought in a new fire chief, Patrick Mullen, who replaced retiring chief Al Schullo in October.

Meanwhile, the city made significant progress on the monumental, $105 million First Street redevelopment project. Although the six-block revamp led to street and bridge closures that were blamed for the demise of several small businesses, the project was moving ahead full-steam and on schedule as the year came to a close.

Notable progress includes construction of a multi-level parking deck, which now looms along the downtown horizon and will eventually serve visitors to First Street shops, offices; and residences, scheduled to open in 2012.

City officials also got good news in the form of a redevelopment plan for the old St. Charles mall site, at Route 38 and Randall Road.

After years of sitting empty, developers have proposed a plan to rebuild the site with a mix of retail, residences, restaurants and offices.

As for Wal-Mart, the company withdrew its plans after months of heated public hearings and an eminent-domain lawsuit by the city.

Nearby, in December, it was revealed that plans were in the works to physically reposition Charlestowne Mall, 3800 E. Main St., in an attempt to revitalize the shopping center after years of it struggling to attract shoppers and tenants.

Other notable city efforts include attempts to increase the amount of affordable housing and progress on construction plans for a new downtown fire station.

--Josh Stockinger

Mayor John Hansen speaks to the gathered crowd during the dedication of a new North Aurora Veterans Memorial on Willow Way last month. John Starks | Staff Photographer
Dirt and debris fill the air as work continued in July to demolish the Shumway buildings, including the foundry, to make way for new development in Batavia. Robinette Demolition was handling the tear-down. Rick West | Staff Photographer
Kane County Health Department nurse Diane Ferriss gives an injection to Adam Miller and his wife, Shanin, in January. The North Aurora couple was exposed to Hepatitis A when they were at Houlihan's in Geneva. Jeff Knox | Staff Photographer
Marty Kamysz of St. Charles looks out of his friend's garage as the Fox River closes in around the house, along Route 25 in St. Charles in August. Rick West | Staff Photographer
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