October 01 2006
Half an hour in jail Tours of the jail are one part of DuPage County Safety Day
James Fuller Daily Herald Staff Writer
It's hard not to get a sinking feeling in your stomach when stepping onto a DuPage County sheriff's bus.
Outside, the signs at the DuPage County Fairgrounds on Saturday morning read "10th Annual Safety Saturday." Inside the bus, it was me and the rest of the criminals.
Alleged, that is.
I walked down the aisle looking for a friendly face, a would-be cellmate to endure the trip to the big house. I settled on a seat across the aisle from an unusually short and young looking guy toting a blue "Sheriff John Zaruba" balloon.
Talk about a criminal just asking to get arrested.
The bus was segmented into four compartments by black metal cages. The same cages adorned the windows, letting us know we weren't going anywhere but jail.
"Ready to go?" the sheriff's officer asked after yanking the bus doors closed.
"Yaaaaaaay," responded my fellow inmates. Clearly these were rookies to the criminal justice system.
Smiling officers awaited our arrival at the jail. For some reason, they took the time to show us their crime investigation facilities, perhaps mocking us for how easy we were to catch.
It was there I found my one glimmer of hope. Forensic Scientist Leroy Keith told us finding fingerprints and identifying matches is still mostly done by hand, and much more difficult than TV shows like "CSI" would have us believe.
"People really have unreal expectations on what we can do," Keith said. "We can't compete with some of the shows."
On to the lockup. Officers escorted us through the metal detectors. All the while we were conspicuously free of handcuffs or shackles. My potential 3-foot cellmate still grasped his balloon, smiling.
We were led into a small room dubbed "the mantrap" and the metal doors closed behind us.
"Now we're in trouble," said yet another unusually short criminal, holding the hand of someone named "Mom." It seemed to be an evil nickname.
An elevator ride later and we were all inside a small gym. One basketball hoop. One weight machine. One chin-up bar. We'd be able to use the facility about 10 people at a time, one hour a day.
Then came the visitation room. It's just like in the movies. No human contact. You can only stare through the glass and chat on a phone. If you're lucky, there's a bin your lawyer can pass documents to you for signatures.
Then came the dreaded cells. Two floors of rooms too small to lay on the floor width-wise and not have to scrunch your legs. The beds are green pads with thin blankets. There are rubber bins for your belongings, and an actual hole in the wall to store toilet paper. Perhaps that's where I could start digging for an escape.
The officers told us this room, and the commons area directly outside, would be where we'd spent our entire day. Checkers, chess, dominoes, Scrabble and one television are the entertainment.
Then, a miracle came. Maybe there was some legal glitch that let us fall through the cracks. We were all whisked back onto the elevator and led to an escape route out the back door.
I decide to high-tail it out of there before anyone changed their minds.
"That was cool," said the balloon-toting, short man. Apparently, he hasn't learned his lesson. I suspect a long life of crime may be ahead of him. There was even talk of going back to the fairgrounds to meet a particularly good, but dog-faced, detective named "McGruff."
Not me. Maybe the jail is nice for the 800 or so people living there, but I count myself lucky to not be one of them.
Thursday
Watchdog fallout: Park director resigns, still gets paid
Here are two stories detailing the fallout from an investigation I did a few weeks earlier about the costs of remodeling the director's home being much more than the park district publicly reported.
September 21 2006
Wheaton Park District director calls it quits
James Fuller Daily Herald Staff Writer
Friday December 22 2006
September 21 2006
Wheaton Park District director calls it quits
James Fuller Daily Herald Staff Writer
Wheaton Park District Director Rob Robinson unexpectedly resigned Wednesday night following community backlash about taxpayer dollars pumped into his free housing at Arrowhead Golf Course.
The announcement at the start of the park board meeting fueled public comments laced with vitriol. The comments were based on two Daily Herald reports.
The first report put the cost of upgrades to Robinson's house at $83,000. The second report cited documents obtained by the Daily Herald putting the actual cost at about $180,000, resulting in an explanation from the district that no one actually looked at the hard numbers before reporting the $83,000 figure.
Labor costs and a new garage will eventually put the cost of the project at about $300,000.
Park commissioners explained they had no idea the house needed such extensive repairs because they hadn't seen the inside in many years.
Community members said Wednesday night the house isn't worth the cost or the repairs night.
"I just don't think that's the best use of the public's dollars," Aileen Haslett told the park board.
"I want to make sure we get the most for our money."
Overall, the community expressed support for Robinson's leadership. It was exactly the opposite when he came to the park board.
One resident, Don Immekus, went so far as to call for the resignation of all seven park commissioners.
"As elected officials you have all violated your fiduciary responsibility," Immekus said. "You, as a board, lied to (Robinson) to get him here. That house was (former Director) Bob Dunsmuir's dog kennel. How long have you been on the board? Not one of you was ever in that house?"
Park commissioners defended the remodeling of the house as a necessary action to attract a quality director, and as an investment in an asset.
Park Board President Paul Fullerton said it's not a major ongoing cost to taxpayers, and no park maintenance went unperformed as a result of staff time spent on the house.
"We were not constantly updating the house," Fullerton said. "The reason costs were incurred was because the home had not been updated for some time."
Robinson offered no public comment about his resignation. Fullerton read a statement that said Robinson was resigning to return to Colorado because of family issues.
In the weeks leading up to Wednesday night's resignation, Robinson expressed concern to the Daily Herald about how news reports on the housing issue were stressing out his family and causing some of his children to endure uncomfortable questioning by peers at school.
Robinson did not immediately respond to an interview request after Wednesday night's meeting.
Park commissioners met in closed session to discuss a date for Robinson's departure and any legal obligations about severance pay.
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Friday December 22 2006
Ex-Wheaton park director still being paid
James Fuller Daily Herald Staff Writer
Rob Robinson isn't executive director of the Wheaton Park District anymore. He doesn't live in free park district housing. Nor does he live in Illinois.
But he'll still get paid for another month as if he was, a sum totaling a little more than $10,000, according to a copy of Robinson's resignation agreement.
Robinson's Sept. 20 resignation took effect immediately. At that moment he lost all his park district privileges. He turned in his park district cell phone. He relinquished the 2003 Ford Explorer the park district gave him to use for business purposes. And he had until the end of the year to move out of the free housing the district provided for him and his family.
Robinson is already out of that house, but he'll still see some money related to the housing down the road.
The park district places the fair market value of the free housing it provided Robinson at $25,000 for the year. Robinson must now include that as gross income on his taxes. For that, the park district will reimburse him up to $2,222 for the taxes owed.
But Robinson will receive more money for temporary housing the district provided while fixing up the park district home used to house the director. From Jan. 1 to June 30, the park district shelled out $24,000 in rent for Robinson and his family to live in temporary housing at 821 N. Wheaton Ave. That comes out to $4,000 a month in rent.
"It was basically a supply and demand thing," park board President Paul Fullerton said. "It was the only house we could find."
Robinson must also include the temporary housing payment in his gross income. The park district will reimburse him up to $9,600 for doing so.
Robinson exhausted all his personal and sick time before he left, which supports his statement about resigning because of health concerns. However, the park district did cut Robinson a check for $4,662 for 73 hours of unused vacation time.
Unless he gets a new job before then, Robinson keeps his health and dental benefits until Jan. 31. That's also the last day he'll receive a paycheck under the resignation agreement, for a total of four months of severance pay since September. Before taxes and retirement contributions, that's about $40,000.
The Daily Herald obtained Robinson's resignation agreement through a Freedom of Information request, a process some park commissioners indicated was costly and burdensome on park staff this week.
Fullerton agreed the public should know the details of Robinson's resignation agreement. However, because it is a "dicey" employment issue, the park board paid for a legal opinion on what it could and should release.
Fullerton said it does the same for all Freedom of Information requests.
"I'm into full disclosure and openness," he said.
Robinson did not respond to an interview request.
Under the resignation agreement, he is not allowed to make disparaging comments about the park district.
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Tuesday
Sept. 11, 2006: The Stories
Men work to make sure victims of 9/11 are not forgotten
By James Fuller
Daily Herald Staff Writer
NEW YORK — Vinny Forras should be dead.
Forras, a volunteer firefighter in suburban South Salem, N.Y., went to ground zero on Sept. 11, 2001. His volunteer status detracted nothing from his desire to get there as fast as possible.
It did not diminish for the three weeks after the terrorist attacks he spent digging through the rubble.
His only departure from the site was to go home and wish his daughter Brittany happy birthday on Sept. 19.
The pile of rubble to sift through was daunting. The Twin Towers were the tallest buildings in Manhattan by far, and they were only part of the debris. Much of the pile remained on fire for weeks. Navigating around it was guesswork much of the time.
“It was like ants trying to attack a mountain,” Forras said.
While scaling one of the steep slopes of the pile, he plunged into an abyss. He found himself wedged like a cork in a bottle at the bottom.
“The pile shook and that was it,” Forras said. “I was in. It was panic city. You couldn’t see your hand in front of your face. I was stuffed in there like a cork. I was burning. My boots were melting because I was basically on fire.”
Images flooded his mind. The births of his three children came to him. All the sensory feelings. The smell of new babies surrounded him.
“I got to face death,” Forras said.
No one knew he was trapped. There was no way to communicate to other rescue personnel. There was no real equipment necessarily able to rescue him from his particular predicament either.
So Forras pushed and wiggled and dug himself free. It was an encounter with death that had a purpose.
Ground Zero pledge
In the aftermath of the recovery effort, Forras formed the Gear Up Foundation. The nonprofit is dedicated to bringing firefighting equipment to areas of the world that lack basics like fire trucks and ambulances. Gear Up relies on donations of funds and equipment from communities.
That’s where Barrington resident Joe Cantafio comes in.
Cantafio is a stock trader by trade, but a musician at heart.
Four years ago, he came to New York with his guitar and boxes of T-shirts on a mission with two purposes: raise money for families of fallen firefighters and, more importantly, help ease some of their pain.
It was there that Cantafio and Forras formed a friendship. Now Cantafio hopes to use his goodwill in the Chicago area fire departments to help keep the Gear Up Foundation thriving.
His first target is Schaumburg, where several firefighters connected with Cantafio during his local fundraising efforts for the families of Engine 55 four years ago.
Schaumburg Fire Department Lt. Rick Kolomay has agreed to be the Chicago-area coordinator for the effort. He spent part of Monday’s anniversary — “a wonderful day to start,” he said — appealing to area departments to donate equipment to the cause, even one set of gear.
“A lot of departments have recycled or older gear in storage or in a basement,” Kolomay said. “If every department donates one or two, that’s like 30 sets of gear to go to (a department) less fortunate. … It’s a big task, but we’ll get it.”
More 9/11 victims
Cantafio called Forras “just an unbelievable guy. He’s a hero. And what he’s doing with the foundation is just part of who he is. It’s from the heart. Everything he does is from the heart. What a great thing.”
Cantafio is considering a director’s position with the foundation. It’s partly because of Cantafio’s fundraising and event planning ability.
The other part has to do with building a leadership committee within the foundation that will outlast Forras, if need be.
He suffers a number of ailments that he traces back to his ground zero service and the “terrible, toxic cocktail” of chemicals and dust he breathed during the rescue effort.
Health and government officials proclaimed the air safe in the area at the time just after the attacks. That doesn’t explain why so many of the workers have lung problems and resulting health ailments that come with that.
“People are still dying from 9/11, even today,” Forras said.
Five years out from the terrorist attacks, Forras and Cantafio somehow find the inspiration to keep their healing missions going.
At night, the two men sit together figuring out their next steps with smiles on their faces and determination in their eyes. On the wall above Forras’ desk, in a home office cluttered with firefighting memorabilia, is a poster that describes their work: “A living memorial dedicated to doing great deeds around the world in name of those who perished in 9/11.”
By James Fuller
Daily Herald Staff Writer
NEW YORK — Vinny Forras should be dead.
Forras, a volunteer firefighter in suburban South Salem, N.Y., went to ground zero on Sept. 11, 2001. His volunteer status detracted nothing from his desire to get there as fast as possible.
It did not diminish for the three weeks after the terrorist attacks he spent digging through the rubble.
His only departure from the site was to go home and wish his daughter Brittany happy birthday on Sept. 19.
The pile of rubble to sift through was daunting. The Twin Towers were the tallest buildings in Manhattan by far, and they were only part of the debris. Much of the pile remained on fire for weeks. Navigating around it was guesswork much of the time.
“It was like ants trying to attack a mountain,” Forras said.
While scaling one of the steep slopes of the pile, he plunged into an abyss. He found himself wedged like a cork in a bottle at the bottom.
“The pile shook and that was it,” Forras said. “I was in. It was panic city. You couldn’t see your hand in front of your face. I was stuffed in there like a cork. I was burning. My boots were melting because I was basically on fire.”
Images flooded his mind. The births of his three children came to him. All the sensory feelings. The smell of new babies surrounded him.
“I got to face death,” Forras said.
No one knew he was trapped. There was no way to communicate to other rescue personnel. There was no real equipment necessarily able to rescue him from his particular predicament either.
So Forras pushed and wiggled and dug himself free. It was an encounter with death that had a purpose.
Ground Zero pledge
In the aftermath of the recovery effort, Forras formed the Gear Up Foundation. The nonprofit is dedicated to bringing firefighting equipment to areas of the world that lack basics like fire trucks and ambulances. Gear Up relies on donations of funds and equipment from communities.
That’s where Barrington resident Joe Cantafio comes in.
Cantafio is a stock trader by trade, but a musician at heart.
Four years ago, he came to New York with his guitar and boxes of T-shirts on a mission with two purposes: raise money for families of fallen firefighters and, more importantly, help ease some of their pain.
It was there that Cantafio and Forras formed a friendship. Now Cantafio hopes to use his goodwill in the Chicago area fire departments to help keep the Gear Up Foundation thriving.
His first target is Schaumburg, where several firefighters connected with Cantafio during his local fundraising efforts for the families of Engine 55 four years ago.
Schaumburg Fire Department Lt. Rick Kolomay has agreed to be the Chicago-area coordinator for the effort. He spent part of Monday’s anniversary — “a wonderful day to start,” he said — appealing to area departments to donate equipment to the cause, even one set of gear.
“A lot of departments have recycled or older gear in storage or in a basement,” Kolomay said. “If every department donates one or two, that’s like 30 sets of gear to go to (a department) less fortunate. … It’s a big task, but we’ll get it.”
More 9/11 victims
Cantafio called Forras “just an unbelievable guy. He’s a hero. And what he’s doing with the foundation is just part of who he is. It’s from the heart. Everything he does is from the heart. What a great thing.”
Cantafio is considering a director’s position with the foundation. It’s partly because of Cantafio’s fundraising and event planning ability.
The other part has to do with building a leadership committee within the foundation that will outlast Forras, if need be.
He suffers a number of ailments that he traces back to his ground zero service and the “terrible, toxic cocktail” of chemicals and dust he breathed during the rescue effort.
Health and government officials proclaimed the air safe in the area at the time just after the attacks. That doesn’t explain why so many of the workers have lung problems and resulting health ailments that come with that.
“People are still dying from 9/11, even today,” Forras said.
Five years out from the terrorist attacks, Forras and Cantafio somehow find the inspiration to keep their healing missions going.
At night, the two men sit together figuring out their next steps with smiles on their faces and determination in their eyes. On the wall above Forras’ desk, in a home office cluttered with firefighting memorabilia, is a poster that describes their work: “A living memorial dedicated to doing great deeds around the world in name of those who perished in 9/11.”
Sept. 11, 2006: The Stories
Still seeking answers in New York City
People with suburban ties recall their role in September 2001
BY JAMES FULLER
Daily Herald Staff Writer
Posted Monday, September 11, 2006
NEW YORK - The rising sun streaks the morning sky, and visitors stake out spots at ground zero.
TV news reporters are stationed on the rooftop of buildings overlooking this hallowed ground. They chronicle the attacks. They interview the widows, the rescue workers sickened by the toxic dust.
America still seeks answers.
That quest draws thousands, the mourners and the curious, to the site of the nation's most lethal terror attack. Almost 3,000 people died here. Nearly half were never recovered.
Lower Manhattan bustles again, but people slow down and look as they walk by. Even New Yorkers who didn't lose most-cherished loved ones can't forget.
Janet Stevens was compelled to do something that awful day five years ago. The former Lake Zurich resident went to see if anyone could use a 55-year-old massage therapist. She soon found a gig at St. Paul's, a church near ground zero.
Wednesdays from 2 to 8 a.m. for six months, she tried to rub away the horrors for the workers. She'd go home covered in ash and dust. But she'd never go to ground zero.
Today, she finally made it.
"It's not what you expect," Stevens said. "You can't prepare for it. ... All of us, we'd do it again in a New York second. We did what we had to do."
Gone, today, is the 10-story pile of steel, ash, glass and remains. Gone are the seas of letters, trinkets and "Have you seen this person?" posters. Gone are the triage centers, the morgues, the firefighters sleeping on the streets, using helmets for pillows, searching for their brethren for weeks without going home.
What remains is the pain.
Pat Gambaro, a former Wheaton resident, is executive vice president of operations for the New York Board of Trade, which lost five people on Sept. 11. It might have been six if Gambaro hadn't gone to visit his newborn grandson.
Including the New York Mercantile Exchange, he lost 33 colleagues. His cousin Anthony Colandonato, a Cantor Fitzgerald broker, was also among the dead.
"I don't cry," Gambaro said. "I didn't cry at my dad's funeral and we were closer than close. I don't show my emotions."
Today, though, he's tearing up when the 33 names are read at a commemoration ceremony at the Board of Trade. Wives, fathers, daughters too small to reach the microphone deliver messages of love to those lost. Rudy Giuliani speaks.
Gambaro, who got the market reopened six days after the attacks, will persevere.
What's less clear is how the shaking and tearful, here and at ground zero, will persevere without their loved ones. Five years have not filled the void.
Bells toll all day long, counting off the victims. Night comes. Hearts break anew.
Five years are in the books.
America has not forgotten.
People with suburban ties recall their role in September 2001
BY JAMES FULLER
Daily Herald Staff Writer
Posted Monday, September 11, 2006
NEW YORK - The rising sun streaks the morning sky, and visitors stake out spots at ground zero.
TV news reporters are stationed on the rooftop of buildings overlooking this hallowed ground. They chronicle the attacks. They interview the widows, the rescue workers sickened by the toxic dust.
America still seeks answers.
That quest draws thousands, the mourners and the curious, to the site of the nation's most lethal terror attack. Almost 3,000 people died here. Nearly half were never recovered.
Lower Manhattan bustles again, but people slow down and look as they walk by. Even New Yorkers who didn't lose most-cherished loved ones can't forget.
Janet Stevens was compelled to do something that awful day five years ago. The former Lake Zurich resident went to see if anyone could use a 55-year-old massage therapist. She soon found a gig at St. Paul's, a church near ground zero.
Wednesdays from 2 to 8 a.m. for six months, she tried to rub away the horrors for the workers. She'd go home covered in ash and dust. But she'd never go to ground zero.
Today, she finally made it.
"It's not what you expect," Stevens said. "You can't prepare for it. ... All of us, we'd do it again in a New York second. We did what we had to do."
Gone, today, is the 10-story pile of steel, ash, glass and remains. Gone are the seas of letters, trinkets and "Have you seen this person?" posters. Gone are the triage centers, the morgues, the firefighters sleeping on the streets, using helmets for pillows, searching for their brethren for weeks without going home.
What remains is the pain.
Pat Gambaro, a former Wheaton resident, is executive vice president of operations for the New York Board of Trade, which lost five people on Sept. 11. It might have been six if Gambaro hadn't gone to visit his newborn grandson.
Including the New York Mercantile Exchange, he lost 33 colleagues. His cousin Anthony Colandonato, a Cantor Fitzgerald broker, was also among the dead.
"I don't cry," Gambaro said. "I didn't cry at my dad's funeral and we were closer than close. I don't show my emotions."
Today, though, he's tearing up when the 33 names are read at a commemoration ceremony at the Board of Trade. Wives, fathers, daughters too small to reach the microphone deliver messages of love to those lost. Rudy Giuliani speaks.
Gambaro, who got the market reopened six days after the attacks, will persevere.
What's less clear is how the shaking and tearful, here and at ground zero, will persevere without their loved ones. Five years have not filled the void.
Bells toll all day long, counting off the victims. Night comes. Hearts break anew.
Five years are in the books.
America has not forgotten.
Sept. 11, 2006: The Journal
Monday in New York
Daily Herald Staff Writer James Fuller spent the 9/11 anniversary in New York City observing the commemorations. Here are some of this thoughts from the day.
By James Fuller
Daiily Herald Staff Writer
Posted Tuesday, September 12, 2006
NEW YORK - Day 2 in New York begins before dawn. Vinny Forras, my host, is scheduled to be on the “Today” show with Matt Lauer and Tom Brokaw for this morning.
That means we’re up at 5:20 a.m. I’ve logged a grand total of 2¨ hours sleep. I find it hard to rest at Forras’ home. Not because it feels unwelcome, but just from the buzz of the household, with its two high school kids, two college kids, Vinny, his wife Monica and Joe Cantafio.
Cantafio is a Barrington stock trader and musician looking to add his knowledge and passion to Vinny’s Gear Up Foundation. Cantafio has experience raising funds and providing entertainment for the families of New York firefighters who died in the attacks, and for U.S. troops overseas. Vinny wants to bring much-needed fire fighting gear and training to communities in need around the world.
NBC is operating from the rooftop of the One World Financial Center across the street from Ground Zero. As soon as we step off the elevator at the 10th floor, I get a wakeup call about what the aftermath of Sept. 11 has meant to journalists. The Wall Street Journal also has working space on the 10th floor. There is a plaque on the wall dedicated to the memory of Daniel Pearl. Journalists are not immune to death and torture even as we try to find the meaning and rationale behind it.
Vinny heads off for some last-minute beautification with the makeup crew. I step out onto the roof to see the set. CNBC, NBC and MSNBC are all broadcasting within 2 feet of each other. Chris Matthews, Matt Lauer, Tom Brokaw and some MSNBC host I don’t recognize are all working their TV magic. Behind them is the acreage that used to be the World Trade Center buildings.
Ground Zero ceremonies are already beginning. Reflecting pools have replaced the 10-story-high, mangled mass of steel and rubble and bodies. People line up to say prayers, shed tears and drop roses of various colors in the pools in memory of the dead. The last time I was here, you could still taste the dust in the air, feel it on your skin. That was 2002, less than a year after the attacks. Mourning was still in full effect. Four years later, there are still some tears, but dark sunglasses seem to have replaced watery eyes for the most part. I crack a faint smile to the thought that perhaps some healing, some peace has finally come for those carrying the grief of Sept. 11.
I can’t hear what the newscasters are saying from my vantage point. I go inside and watch a monitor, waiting for Vinny to appear. While I wait, I continue to gaze out the window. Police and fire vehicles are everywhere, standing at the ready. On the wall are four clocks with different time zones. One is New York. One is Turin, Italy. One is Asia. The last clock is stuck at 5 p.m. It’s labeled “Beer O’Clock.” Who says journalists don’t know how to have fun?
I look back to the monitor when I hear Vinny’s voice. He begins to talk about his experiences at Ground Zero. At first he came to save people. There were almost none left alive to save. Just random abysses in the pile that held the promise of saving a life, but often revealed only death when explored.
I look at the New York clock again. It’s 9:11 a.m.
At our next destination I soon find that I may have misjudged the amount of healing that has taken place.
The New York Board of Trade and New York Mercantile Exchange host a memorial tribute to 33 traders they lost when the Twin Towers collapsed. Vinny will speak here, too. He talks about how key the perseverance of the exchange was for the economy and defeating the terrorists’ goal of crippling America.
“You showed them we’re Americans, and we’re not going to let you do this to us,” Forras said. “Never forget 9/11. Keep your loved ones in your heart always.”
Then it begins. The names of the fallen stock traders are read from Evan Bauen to Elkin Yuen. One group at a time their surviving family members come to a microphone and talk about loved ones. Some bring children who aren’t even tall enough to reach the microphone. They’ve lost their daddies. Some families share memories. But some come to the podium and can barely do more than cry. They quiver with emotion, and can’t keep it all in. When their tears come, so do ours. We don’t know them, but somehow, in the hours glued to television watching those planes slam into the towers, we’ve bonded with them.
A dad cries into the microphone about how much he misses his son. His daughter rubs his arm. Next is a little girl. Next is a woman who is more composed, or so it seems. Some fight the tears. They won’t let themselves cry. So we cry for them. Finally we come to Yuen’s name, the last on the list. A little girl stretches up tiny hands to the microphone and announces she is Yuen’s daughter. The crowd loses it. I look around and everyone is whisking away a tear.
This little girl will never know her father. She’ll have only stories and most of those may be about how her dad was murdered by terrorists. Now my tears are flavored with a hint of anger. It’s wrong for this little girl to be robbed of her father. I’ve time warped back to five years ago, sitting in front of my TV. Shock and sadness mix with a simmering fury as the images of the crashes and collapses, the running and screaming play over and over.
There’s no complete outlet for such emotions, and I didn’t even lose anyone I knew.
After the ceremony I chat with one of the traders at the exchange. She tells me how depression sank in after the attacks a little more each day. Even when the market re-opened, it wasn’t the same without her 33 fallen colleagues. The audible cues were out of whack. The pit calls weren’t coming from their usual directions. No one was standing in the right place. No one knew how to fill the voids left by those 33 traders. At night she’d go home, but she couldn’t sleep unless the curtains were shut tight.
“It was sick, but I couldn’t look out onto the city, and it was almost like keeping the curtains closed would somehow stop the planes from flying into my windows,” she said, asking not to be named.
How do you get past such a fear? How long does it take to get back to “normal?” And when you do, how do you rationalize for the instant loss of 33 people who used to be part of your life five days a week?
Maybe it takes five years. Time, and picking apart things to their basic parts has helped her.
“I woke up this morning thinking about something that my son said to me when he was little and got stung by a bee,” she said. “He said it hurt, but it also hurt more because I he didn’t know bees could hurt him. He thought bees were his friends.”
Travel is part of so many New Yorkers’ lives, but planes no longer fly in the friendly skies. America has not fully recovered from Sept. 11. The stock trader’s story reveals something to me about myself that I had not considered before. Americans love America. We’ve fought wars before. We’ve even been attacked before. But it’s never been about outright hate before. Hate for America’s beliefs, values and way of life led to mass murder. Maybe part of healing is realizing that not everyone loves America.
Daily Herald Staff Writer James Fuller spent the 9/11 anniversary in New York City observing the commemorations. Here are some of this thoughts from the day.
By James Fuller
Daiily Herald Staff Writer
Posted Tuesday, September 12, 2006
NEW YORK - Day 2 in New York begins before dawn. Vinny Forras, my host, is scheduled to be on the “Today” show with Matt Lauer and Tom Brokaw for this morning.
That means we’re up at 5:20 a.m. I’ve logged a grand total of 2¨ hours sleep. I find it hard to rest at Forras’ home. Not because it feels unwelcome, but just from the buzz of the household, with its two high school kids, two college kids, Vinny, his wife Monica and Joe Cantafio.
Cantafio is a Barrington stock trader and musician looking to add his knowledge and passion to Vinny’s Gear Up Foundation. Cantafio has experience raising funds and providing entertainment for the families of New York firefighters who died in the attacks, and for U.S. troops overseas. Vinny wants to bring much-needed fire fighting gear and training to communities in need around the world.
NBC is operating from the rooftop of the One World Financial Center across the street from Ground Zero. As soon as we step off the elevator at the 10th floor, I get a wakeup call about what the aftermath of Sept. 11 has meant to journalists. The Wall Street Journal also has working space on the 10th floor. There is a plaque on the wall dedicated to the memory of Daniel Pearl. Journalists are not immune to death and torture even as we try to find the meaning and rationale behind it.
Vinny heads off for some last-minute beautification with the makeup crew. I step out onto the roof to see the set. CNBC, NBC and MSNBC are all broadcasting within 2 feet of each other. Chris Matthews, Matt Lauer, Tom Brokaw and some MSNBC host I don’t recognize are all working their TV magic. Behind them is the acreage that used to be the World Trade Center buildings.
Ground Zero ceremonies are already beginning. Reflecting pools have replaced the 10-story-high, mangled mass of steel and rubble and bodies. People line up to say prayers, shed tears and drop roses of various colors in the pools in memory of the dead. The last time I was here, you could still taste the dust in the air, feel it on your skin. That was 2002, less than a year after the attacks. Mourning was still in full effect. Four years later, there are still some tears, but dark sunglasses seem to have replaced watery eyes for the most part. I crack a faint smile to the thought that perhaps some healing, some peace has finally come for those carrying the grief of Sept. 11.
I can’t hear what the newscasters are saying from my vantage point. I go inside and watch a monitor, waiting for Vinny to appear. While I wait, I continue to gaze out the window. Police and fire vehicles are everywhere, standing at the ready. On the wall are four clocks with different time zones. One is New York. One is Turin, Italy. One is Asia. The last clock is stuck at 5 p.m. It’s labeled “Beer O’Clock.” Who says journalists don’t know how to have fun?
I look back to the monitor when I hear Vinny’s voice. He begins to talk about his experiences at Ground Zero. At first he came to save people. There were almost none left alive to save. Just random abysses in the pile that held the promise of saving a life, but often revealed only death when explored.
I look at the New York clock again. It’s 9:11 a.m.
At our next destination I soon find that I may have misjudged the amount of healing that has taken place.
The New York Board of Trade and New York Mercantile Exchange host a memorial tribute to 33 traders they lost when the Twin Towers collapsed. Vinny will speak here, too. He talks about how key the perseverance of the exchange was for the economy and defeating the terrorists’ goal of crippling America.
“You showed them we’re Americans, and we’re not going to let you do this to us,” Forras said. “Never forget 9/11. Keep your loved ones in your heart always.”
Then it begins. The names of the fallen stock traders are read from Evan Bauen to Elkin Yuen. One group at a time their surviving family members come to a microphone and talk about loved ones. Some bring children who aren’t even tall enough to reach the microphone. They’ve lost their daddies. Some families share memories. But some come to the podium and can barely do more than cry. They quiver with emotion, and can’t keep it all in. When their tears come, so do ours. We don’t know them, but somehow, in the hours glued to television watching those planes slam into the towers, we’ve bonded with them.
A dad cries into the microphone about how much he misses his son. His daughter rubs his arm. Next is a little girl. Next is a woman who is more composed, or so it seems. Some fight the tears. They won’t let themselves cry. So we cry for them. Finally we come to Yuen’s name, the last on the list. A little girl stretches up tiny hands to the microphone and announces she is Yuen’s daughter. The crowd loses it. I look around and everyone is whisking away a tear.
This little girl will never know her father. She’ll have only stories and most of those may be about how her dad was murdered by terrorists. Now my tears are flavored with a hint of anger. It’s wrong for this little girl to be robbed of her father. I’ve time warped back to five years ago, sitting in front of my TV. Shock and sadness mix with a simmering fury as the images of the crashes and collapses, the running and screaming play over and over.
There’s no complete outlet for such emotions, and I didn’t even lose anyone I knew.
After the ceremony I chat with one of the traders at the exchange. She tells me how depression sank in after the attacks a little more each day. Even when the market re-opened, it wasn’t the same without her 33 fallen colleagues. The audible cues were out of whack. The pit calls weren’t coming from their usual directions. No one was standing in the right place. No one knew how to fill the voids left by those 33 traders. At night she’d go home, but she couldn’t sleep unless the curtains were shut tight.
“It was sick, but I couldn’t look out onto the city, and it was almost like keeping the curtains closed would somehow stop the planes from flying into my windows,” she said, asking not to be named.
How do you get past such a fear? How long does it take to get back to “normal?” And when you do, how do you rationalize for the instant loss of 33 people who used to be part of your life five days a week?
Maybe it takes five years. Time, and picking apart things to their basic parts has helped her.
“I woke up this morning thinking about something that my son said to me when he was little and got stung by a bee,” she said. “He said it hurt, but it also hurt more because I he didn’t know bees could hurt him. He thought bees were his friends.”
Travel is part of so many New Yorkers’ lives, but planes no longer fly in the friendly skies. America has not fully recovered from Sept. 11. The stock trader’s story reveals something to me about myself that I had not considered before. Americans love America. We’ve fought wars before. We’ve even been attacked before. But it’s never been about outright hate before. Hate for America’s beliefs, values and way of life led to mass murder. Maybe part of healing is realizing that not everyone loves America.
Sept. 11, 2006: The journal
Sunday in New York
Daily Herald Staff Writer James Fuller is spending the five-year anniversary of 9/11 in New York City observing the commemorations. Here are some of this thoughts from his first day in New York Sunday.
James Fuller
Daily Herald Writer
Posted Monday, September 11, 2006
NEW YORK - I awake this morning, Sept. 10, 2006, already thinking about Sept. 11, 2001. It’s been five years since I sat transfixed in front of my TV by the images of America being attacked. I was shocked. I was angry. And, yes, a little scared. No attack on America on that scale had ever happened during my lifetime. Pearl Harbor was just a story in my history books that seemed so long ago and so impossible to recreate.
Perhaps it was a bit of that lingering fear that causes me to put on my blessed medal of St. Christopher before heading out to O’Hare airport. I rarely wear it, but he’s supposed to protect travelers. It’s not Sept. 11, but the Orange Alert status at the airport reminds me that it’s close enough.
I sit on a bench in the terminal and watch the line of United Airlines passengers waiting to check their bags. If you’re at the end of that line, you can’t even see where it begins. I’m surprised how many people are willing to travel so close to a landmark anniversary for the attacks. But then again, it is Sept. 10. Maybe all these people are just trying to avoid traveling on Sept. 11.
Me and my beat-up, green suitcase are waiting for Joe Cantafio. Today we will travel to New York, back to the main stage for the horror of Sept. 11. I have not been there since July 2002.
I spent a week with Joe living with the men of Engine 55 in New York’s Little Italy neighborhood. I spent my days and nights trying to understand the emotions the men felt in losing five of their brothers when the Twin Towers collapsed. Joe spent his days and nights trying to heal that pain. Joe was a Barrington stocktrader by trade, but a musician by heart. He’d already spent months touring the suburbs of Chicago with his guitar to raise money for the families of New York firefighters who lost their dads, brothers, husbands and cousins on Sept. 11.
Joe, like many Americans, felt like he had to do something in response to the attack. In his late 40s at the time of the attack, the Army rejected him when he tried to enlist. Joe decided his alternative outlet was his music. So he went around the Chicago suburbs playing small gigs and selling T-shirts to raise money that would benefit New Yorkers. In choosing whom should receive the money, he randomly selected Engine 55 out of a hat.
It’s four years later. Joe is still on a mission. As we chat over some airport scrambled eggs, I find he hasn’t changed a bit.
Joe is sometimes criticized for his eye-for-an-eye reaction to the terrorist attacks. If his finger was on the red button, Afghanistan and Iraq would’ve been bombed into oblivion and any survivors would spend the rest of their lives chipping the resulting glass back into sand.
Joe is so unapologetic about his stance that he once walked out of a homily at Mass when the priest began lecturing about how the current war on terror is wrong.
“Jesus didn’t have to deal with suicide bombers,” Joe explains. “They’re killing themselves to kill us. The war is the lesser of two evils.”
Joe doesn’t even pull punches with his own family. On Sept. 9, Joe played at a “Family Freedom Festival” in Barrington with a strong military theme. At the same time in Oak Park, Joe’s nephew played in a band at a peace festival. Joe’s nephew believes the war is wrong.
“I told him we’re gonna take all of our missiles and tanks at our rally and point them right at him at his peace rally,” Joe said.
When we move to our gate, Joe spots three young U.S. Navy personnel coming through the security checkpoint. They’re on their way to Connecticut for more training. When Joe sees them in line to buy coffee, he springs up to pick up the tab. Joe lost a cousin who was fighting in Iraq to the war. In some way, these young seamen seem to be adopted children to Joe. It’s the same whenever he encounters a firefighter or soldier.
“Now they know a little bit about what the American citizen thinks about what they’re doing,” Joe explains.
As we board the plane, Joe tells one of the flight attendants his seat number and advises her he’s available and ready for anything that may happen.
Vinny Forras picks us up from LaGuardia airport. Vinny is why Joe is in New York this time. Tomorrow, Vinny will ring the opening bell at the New York Board of Trade. When I find out why Vinny was bestowed the honor, it makes perfect sense that he and Joe are teaming up.
Vinny was a volunteer firefighter serving out of South Salem, New York. On Sept. 11, he responded to the World Trade Center along with his full-time brethren. While working to rescue people in the pile, he fell into a cavern and was trapped. It took well over an hour to extract him because the right equipment was not available.
“The pile shook and that was it,” Vinny says “I was in. It was panic city. You couldn’t see your hand in front of your face. I was stuffed in there like a cork. I was burning. My boots were melting because I was basically on fire.”
Vinny used that near-death experience as inspiration. He started the Gear Up Foundation to take fire equipment that’s being discarded and find new homes for it in areas with little to no equipment at all. That mission has taken him as far away as Ecuador to deliver that fire gear and train fire fighters.
Vinny’s work at Ground Zero has had unintended consequences. Five years later, Sept. 11, 2001, is still claiming victims. Someday, Vinny may very well be one of them. The air at Ground Zero has played havoc with Vinny’s health - so much so that he’s already worried about how much time he has left.
He’s asked Joe to get involved with the foundation because of Joe’s track record with being an apt fundraiser and organizer. Vinny is building a board of directors for the foundation that will be able to take over if he’s suddenly no longer around.
Joe serves a second purpose because of his connections with firefighters in Chicago and its suburbs. Vinny hopes Joe will help kick start an effort to get Chicagoland fire departments to donate their excess or used equipment to the Gear Up effort. Schaumburg is first on Joe’s target list of departments to give.
The banter between Vinny and Joe in the car shows me they’ve hit it off because their views on the war are so similar. Vinny’s son, Michael, enlisted in the Marines because of Sept. 11. Some parents would’ve tried to talk their son out of enlisting during and evident time of war. Not Vinny. When we arrive at his house, pictures of Michael in his uniform line the walls. Is he proud of his son’s decision to enlist?
“Oh my God, you have no idea,” Vinny responds.
Sept. 11 wasn’t about plane crashes. It wasn’t about some sort of freak accident. It wasn’t about heroic efforts.
“Sept. 11 was an attack,” Vinny says. “It was an attack against America.”
Vinny may very well be dying. His lung capacity is significantly diminished. His hair began to turn gray within weeks of the attack. He doesn’t have the same energy level. The chemicals he breathed into his lungs and swallowed everyday he worked on the pile are doing untold damage to him. This follows many affirmations my various levels of government that the air at Ground Zero was safe.
That would be enough to make anyone mad.
But factor in that he doesn’t get the same workman’s compensation the full-time firefighters receive. He has to go through insurance company doctors who always tell him nothing is wrong with him, then get overwhelming evidence to the contrary from independent doctors to get any assistance.
And yet, you’d be hard-pressed to find a bigger fan of President Bush. The walls of Vinny’s home have photos of himself shaking hands with the president. There are signed, personalized letters thanking Vinny for his service and continued efforts.
On TV interviews, you’ll never hear Vinny say anything negative about the president. All he asks in return his help with his health care and the medical needs of all the other volunteers at Ground Zero who are in his same situation.
“I blame the terrorists for this,” Vinny says about his health. “I’m assuming decisions were made for the good of Americans about work at Ground Zero and keeping the country going. Now Americans must make a commitment to take care of us and our families.”
At night, we go to Fox TV studios in New York. Vinny is interviewed about the health problems of rescue personnel at Ground Zero and Sept. 11 in general. His answers are never rehearsed. Having spent the past six hours with him, I now know they come straight from the heart.
The emotional impact of Sept. 11 on New Yorkers and people like Vinny is immeasurable. Those who deal with it the best are the ones who talk about it. Not all the time. Talking about it all the time brings the pain to a level of unhealthy obsession. Vinny admits that he feeds off interviews and the Gear Up Foundation like the one on Fox tonight to help him cope. They are distracting salves. They keep his mind from going back in the same way Vietnam War veterans have flashbacks.
“If I didn’t have this forget it,” Vinny explains. “I’d be a wreck. I’d be crying my eyes out at Ground Zero.”
Tomorrow, Vinny will go back to Ground Zero. Joe will accompany him, as will I.
My visit 10 months after the attack chilled me. I felt tears that just wouldn’t come to the surface. For others visiting the site, tears flowed unabated. I wonder what the morning will bring. I’ll pray tonight for the souls I felt there last time. I hope when I visit tomorrow I’ll feel a sense of peace.
-30-
Daily Herald Staff Writer James Fuller is spending the five-year anniversary of 9/11 in New York City observing the commemorations. Here are some of this thoughts from his first day in New York Sunday.
James Fuller
Daily Herald Writer
Posted Monday, September 11, 2006
NEW YORK - I awake this morning, Sept. 10, 2006, already thinking about Sept. 11, 2001. It’s been five years since I sat transfixed in front of my TV by the images of America being attacked. I was shocked. I was angry. And, yes, a little scared. No attack on America on that scale had ever happened during my lifetime. Pearl Harbor was just a story in my history books that seemed so long ago and so impossible to recreate.
Perhaps it was a bit of that lingering fear that causes me to put on my blessed medal of St. Christopher before heading out to O’Hare airport. I rarely wear it, but he’s supposed to protect travelers. It’s not Sept. 11, but the Orange Alert status at the airport reminds me that it’s close enough.
I sit on a bench in the terminal and watch the line of United Airlines passengers waiting to check their bags. If you’re at the end of that line, you can’t even see where it begins. I’m surprised how many people are willing to travel so close to a landmark anniversary for the attacks. But then again, it is Sept. 10. Maybe all these people are just trying to avoid traveling on Sept. 11.
Me and my beat-up, green suitcase are waiting for Joe Cantafio. Today we will travel to New York, back to the main stage for the horror of Sept. 11. I have not been there since July 2002.
I spent a week with Joe living with the men of Engine 55 in New York’s Little Italy neighborhood. I spent my days and nights trying to understand the emotions the men felt in losing five of their brothers when the Twin Towers collapsed. Joe spent his days and nights trying to heal that pain. Joe was a Barrington stocktrader by trade, but a musician by heart. He’d already spent months touring the suburbs of Chicago with his guitar to raise money for the families of New York firefighters who lost their dads, brothers, husbands and cousins on Sept. 11.
Joe, like many Americans, felt like he had to do something in response to the attack. In his late 40s at the time of the attack, the Army rejected him when he tried to enlist. Joe decided his alternative outlet was his music. So he went around the Chicago suburbs playing small gigs and selling T-shirts to raise money that would benefit New Yorkers. In choosing whom should receive the money, he randomly selected Engine 55 out of a hat.
It’s four years later. Joe is still on a mission. As we chat over some airport scrambled eggs, I find he hasn’t changed a bit.
Joe is sometimes criticized for his eye-for-an-eye reaction to the terrorist attacks. If his finger was on the red button, Afghanistan and Iraq would’ve been bombed into oblivion and any survivors would spend the rest of their lives chipping the resulting glass back into sand.
Joe is so unapologetic about his stance that he once walked out of a homily at Mass when the priest began lecturing about how the current war on terror is wrong.
“Jesus didn’t have to deal with suicide bombers,” Joe explains. “They’re killing themselves to kill us. The war is the lesser of two evils.”
Joe doesn’t even pull punches with his own family. On Sept. 9, Joe played at a “Family Freedom Festival” in Barrington with a strong military theme. At the same time in Oak Park, Joe’s nephew played in a band at a peace festival. Joe’s nephew believes the war is wrong.
“I told him we’re gonna take all of our missiles and tanks at our rally and point them right at him at his peace rally,” Joe said.
When we move to our gate, Joe spots three young U.S. Navy personnel coming through the security checkpoint. They’re on their way to Connecticut for more training. When Joe sees them in line to buy coffee, he springs up to pick up the tab. Joe lost a cousin who was fighting in Iraq to the war. In some way, these young seamen seem to be adopted children to Joe. It’s the same whenever he encounters a firefighter or soldier.
“Now they know a little bit about what the American citizen thinks about what they’re doing,” Joe explains.
As we board the plane, Joe tells one of the flight attendants his seat number and advises her he’s available and ready for anything that may happen.
Vinny Forras picks us up from LaGuardia airport. Vinny is why Joe is in New York this time. Tomorrow, Vinny will ring the opening bell at the New York Board of Trade. When I find out why Vinny was bestowed the honor, it makes perfect sense that he and Joe are teaming up.
Vinny was a volunteer firefighter serving out of South Salem, New York. On Sept. 11, he responded to the World Trade Center along with his full-time brethren. While working to rescue people in the pile, he fell into a cavern and was trapped. It took well over an hour to extract him because the right equipment was not available.
“The pile shook and that was it,” Vinny says “I was in. It was panic city. You couldn’t see your hand in front of your face. I was stuffed in there like a cork. I was burning. My boots were melting because I was basically on fire.”
Vinny used that near-death experience as inspiration. He started the Gear Up Foundation to take fire equipment that’s being discarded and find new homes for it in areas with little to no equipment at all. That mission has taken him as far away as Ecuador to deliver that fire gear and train fire fighters.
Vinny’s work at Ground Zero has had unintended consequences. Five years later, Sept. 11, 2001, is still claiming victims. Someday, Vinny may very well be one of them. The air at Ground Zero has played havoc with Vinny’s health - so much so that he’s already worried about how much time he has left.
He’s asked Joe to get involved with the foundation because of Joe’s track record with being an apt fundraiser and organizer. Vinny is building a board of directors for the foundation that will be able to take over if he’s suddenly no longer around.
Joe serves a second purpose because of his connections with firefighters in Chicago and its suburbs. Vinny hopes Joe will help kick start an effort to get Chicagoland fire departments to donate their excess or used equipment to the Gear Up effort. Schaumburg is first on Joe’s target list of departments to give.
The banter between Vinny and Joe in the car shows me they’ve hit it off because their views on the war are so similar. Vinny’s son, Michael, enlisted in the Marines because of Sept. 11. Some parents would’ve tried to talk their son out of enlisting during and evident time of war. Not Vinny. When we arrive at his house, pictures of Michael in his uniform line the walls. Is he proud of his son’s decision to enlist?
“Oh my God, you have no idea,” Vinny responds.
Sept. 11 wasn’t about plane crashes. It wasn’t about some sort of freak accident. It wasn’t about heroic efforts.
“Sept. 11 was an attack,” Vinny says. “It was an attack against America.”
Vinny may very well be dying. His lung capacity is significantly diminished. His hair began to turn gray within weeks of the attack. He doesn’t have the same energy level. The chemicals he breathed into his lungs and swallowed everyday he worked on the pile are doing untold damage to him. This follows many affirmations my various levels of government that the air at Ground Zero was safe.
That would be enough to make anyone mad.
But factor in that he doesn’t get the same workman’s compensation the full-time firefighters receive. He has to go through insurance company doctors who always tell him nothing is wrong with him, then get overwhelming evidence to the contrary from independent doctors to get any assistance.
And yet, you’d be hard-pressed to find a bigger fan of President Bush. The walls of Vinny’s home have photos of himself shaking hands with the president. There are signed, personalized letters thanking Vinny for his service and continued efforts.
On TV interviews, you’ll never hear Vinny say anything negative about the president. All he asks in return his help with his health care and the medical needs of all the other volunteers at Ground Zero who are in his same situation.
“I blame the terrorists for this,” Vinny says about his health. “I’m assuming decisions were made for the good of Americans about work at Ground Zero and keeping the country going. Now Americans must make a commitment to take care of us and our families.”
At night, we go to Fox TV studios in New York. Vinny is interviewed about the health problems of rescue personnel at Ground Zero and Sept. 11 in general. His answers are never rehearsed. Having spent the past six hours with him, I now know they come straight from the heart.
The emotional impact of Sept. 11 on New Yorkers and people like Vinny is immeasurable. Those who deal with it the best are the ones who talk about it. Not all the time. Talking about it all the time brings the pain to a level of unhealthy obsession. Vinny admits that he feeds off interviews and the Gear Up Foundation like the one on Fox tonight to help him cope. They are distracting salves. They keep his mind from going back in the same way Vietnam War veterans have flashbacks.
“If I didn’t have this forget it,” Vinny explains. “I’d be a wreck. I’d be crying my eyes out at Ground Zero.”
Tomorrow, Vinny will go back to Ground Zero. Joe will accompany him, as will I.
My visit 10 months after the attack chilled me. I felt tears that just wouldn’t come to the surface. For others visiting the site, tears flowed unabated. I wonder what the morning will bring. I’ll pray tonight for the souls I felt there last time. I hope when I visit tomorrow I’ll feel a sense of peace.
-30-
Wednesday
Scoop:Petition investigation leads to indictment
*This story, along with a couple others I wrote about it, eventually led to the indictment of GOP pollster Rod McCulloch in DuPage County. The case is still in the courts.
Township assessor defends petitions amid forgery claims
February 04 2005
James Fuller Daily Herald Staff Writer
If you believe Jim Gumm's nominating petitions for re-election as Milton Township assessor, he has the full support of Frank Haywood.
The Wheaton resident seems to support Gumm so much he signed Gumm's nominating petitions twice: once as Frank Haywood and again, directly below that, as Frank Hayward, at the same address.
The problem is the real Frank Haywood says he didn't pen either signature.
"Whoever did this was pretty dumb," he said. "If you're trying to hide something like two fake signatures, you'd think you'd bury them someplace other than one after the other."
That example, and possibly hundreds of others, are behind claims of fraud in a pending objection to Gumm's petitions.
If it proves true, Gumm could be booted off the April 5 ballot.
An unscientific check of the signatures suggests at least some might be false. Of eight people contacted, all said they never signed a Gumm petition.
A signature allegedly belonging to Scott Kozas seems particularly questionable. He's lived in Texas for the past year and a half, said his father, Michael, whose signature appears directly above on one petition.
"Jim Gumm? I don't even know who he is," Michael Kozas said.
Fellow Wheaton resident Wayne Hill also denied signing Gumm's petition.
"I don't even know where (Milton Township) is," Hill said.
Consultant Rod McCulloch obtained most of the nearly 750 signatures in question and said no one should be surprised by a few mistakes.
"There are errors on every set of petitions ever filed," he said.
McCulloch said he and a crew worked for four days during a snowstorm to get the names. He said he either personally obtained them or was within 15 feet of the signer.
It's not uncommon for someone to sign a fake name, McCulloch said. He's even seen rival campaigns send out people to sign phony names.
Keri-Lyn Krafthefer, the attorney for the objector, Joe Nesbitt, also noted that residents from the same streets appear on several different pages of petitions. That suggests an illogical effort of jumping block-to-block rather than door-to-door, she said.
McCulloch said those are the words of someone ignorant to the process.
"That's just stupid and a stupid complaint," he said. The multiple addresses are the result of workers taking breaks to get warm, he said. "For (them) to think that someone's going to walk for five hours on a street during a blizzard just shows the amateurishness of the complaint," he said. "It's just unfortunate that I've gotten caught up in this web of hatred they have for (Gumm)."
For his part, Gumm said he's certain the petitions circulated by 14 other volunteers are genuine.
What's really behind the objection, Gumm said, is politics. He said witnesses told him Milton Township Trustee Jim Flickinger submitted the objection with Nesbitt, though Flickinger's name does not appear on it.
Gumm said Flickinger wants to see him off the ballot so Flickinger can take credit for getting Gumm booted.
That effort began back when Gumm says Flickinger helped manufacture a sexual harassment claim against Gumm back in 2001. Flickinger is one of several defendants in a federal lawsuit Gumm filed, claiming a clandestine effort to smear his name to get him removed from office. All the defendants deny the allegations.
"This isn't going to stop until I walk away, and I'm not going to walk away," he said. "All I'm looking for is the opportunity to get on the ballot. Why not let the people make the choice?"
Flickinger declined to comment.
Gumm's ballot fate could be decided at a hearing, which will likely occur next week. The hearing panel would consist of township Supervisor Chris Heidorn, Clerk Arlene DeMotte and Trustee Barbara Murphy. But Murphy and Heidorn are also defendants in Gumm's suit. If they are dismissed or recuse themselves, the next most senior trustee, Ken McNatt, would replace one of them. But all trustees are potential witnesses in Gumm's federal suit.
If the township can't form its own hearing body, DuPage County Chief Judge Robert Kilander must appoint a hearing panel, said Doreen Nelson, assistant director of the DuPage election commission.
Nelson said the judge would possibly draw from members of the election commission's electoral board.
Township assessor defends petitions amid forgery claims
February 04 2005
James Fuller Daily Herald Staff Writer
If you believe Jim Gumm's nominating petitions for re-election as Milton Township assessor, he has the full support of Frank Haywood.
The Wheaton resident seems to support Gumm so much he signed Gumm's nominating petitions twice: once as Frank Haywood and again, directly below that, as Frank Hayward, at the same address.
The problem is the real Frank Haywood says he didn't pen either signature.
"Whoever did this was pretty dumb," he said. "If you're trying to hide something like two fake signatures, you'd think you'd bury them someplace other than one after the other."
That example, and possibly hundreds of others, are behind claims of fraud in a pending objection to Gumm's petitions.
If it proves true, Gumm could be booted off the April 5 ballot.
An unscientific check of the signatures suggests at least some might be false. Of eight people contacted, all said they never signed a Gumm petition.
A signature allegedly belonging to Scott Kozas seems particularly questionable. He's lived in Texas for the past year and a half, said his father, Michael, whose signature appears directly above on one petition.
"Jim Gumm? I don't even know who he is," Michael Kozas said.
Fellow Wheaton resident Wayne Hill also denied signing Gumm's petition.
"I don't even know where (Milton Township) is," Hill said.
Consultant Rod McCulloch obtained most of the nearly 750 signatures in question and said no one should be surprised by a few mistakes.
"There are errors on every set of petitions ever filed," he said.
McCulloch said he and a crew worked for four days during a snowstorm to get the names. He said he either personally obtained them or was within 15 feet of the signer.
It's not uncommon for someone to sign a fake name, McCulloch said. He's even seen rival campaigns send out people to sign phony names.
Keri-Lyn Krafthefer, the attorney for the objector, Joe Nesbitt, also noted that residents from the same streets appear on several different pages of petitions. That suggests an illogical effort of jumping block-to-block rather than door-to-door, she said.
McCulloch said those are the words of someone ignorant to the process.
"That's just stupid and a stupid complaint," he said. The multiple addresses are the result of workers taking breaks to get warm, he said. "For (them) to think that someone's going to walk for five hours on a street during a blizzard just shows the amateurishness of the complaint," he said. "It's just unfortunate that I've gotten caught up in this web of hatred they have for (Gumm)."
For his part, Gumm said he's certain the petitions circulated by 14 other volunteers are genuine.
What's really behind the objection, Gumm said, is politics. He said witnesses told him Milton Township Trustee Jim Flickinger submitted the objection with Nesbitt, though Flickinger's name does not appear on it.
Gumm said Flickinger wants to see him off the ballot so Flickinger can take credit for getting Gumm booted.
That effort began back when Gumm says Flickinger helped manufacture a sexual harassment claim against Gumm back in 2001. Flickinger is one of several defendants in a federal lawsuit Gumm filed, claiming a clandestine effort to smear his name to get him removed from office. All the defendants deny the allegations.
"This isn't going to stop until I walk away, and I'm not going to walk away," he said. "All I'm looking for is the opportunity to get on the ballot. Why not let the people make the choice?"
Flickinger declined to comment.
Gumm's ballot fate could be decided at a hearing, which will likely occur next week. The hearing panel would consist of township Supervisor Chris Heidorn, Clerk Arlene DeMotte and Trustee Barbara Murphy. But Murphy and Heidorn are also defendants in Gumm's suit. If they are dismissed or recuse themselves, the next most senior trustee, Ken McNatt, would replace one of them. But all trustees are potential witnesses in Gumm's federal suit.
If the township can't form its own hearing body, DuPage County Chief Judge Robert Kilander must appoint a hearing panel, said Doreen Nelson, assistant director of the DuPage election commission.
Nelson said the judge would possibly draw from members of the election commission's electoral board.
Watchdog: Is official a ghost payroller?
Is official a money saver or ghost payroller?
February 13 2005
James Fuller Daily Herald Staff Writer
By now, Ron Smith should be used to fighting for his job.
Smith is a code enforcement officer for Milton Township - a position that doesn't even exist in neighboring townships.
While he defends his post, saying he's called on to handle reports of illegally draining sump pumps, abandoned cars or greenery obstructing a line of sight on a township road, his critics say he's nothing more than a politically connected "ghost payroller" collecting a township salary for
work the county should handle.
Smith is an Illinois Republican Central Committeeman whose vote played a role in naming Andy McKenna the new leader of the state party. Smith is also known as a friend of former Illinois Senate President James "Pate" Philip.
Current township Trustee Don Sender of Wheaton goes as far as to call Smith a "ghost payroller."
The battle over the $18,000-a-year job will return to the spotlight in April when the decision to rehire Smith will fall under the power of a new township highway commissioner.
The past
The debate over Smith's job began to burn a little hotter in 2001 when Township Assessor Jim Gumm was accused of sexual harassment. Gumm believes Smith helped fabricate the charges to get him tossed out of office.
The township settled the lawsuit with Gumm's accusers despite his protests. Gumm is now suing Smith, several township officials and Philip for what Gumm believes was a clandestine group effort to smear him.
To head off any confrontations between Smith and Gumm, Smith was banned by the township's insurance carrier from entering town hall during business or lunch hours, said Barbara Murphy, township board member.
"It was strictly just to let things cool down for awhile," she said. "I frankly didn't like it because Ron is a citizen, and he had paperwork to do for his job, but he wasn't able to come in the building anymore. I thought, 'Doggone it, just let Jim Gumm behave for a change.'"
Hank Kruse, who was township supervisor at the time, paints a different picture, more in line with Gumm's lawsuit.
Gumm claims the defendants conspired to fabricate harassment claims against him in retaliation for raising assessments on the properties of the defendants' friends. Smith denies those claims and says he was a whistleblower who made sure women in the assessor's office were treated with respect.
But Kruse said Smith was an "unstable" employee who made physical threats against Gumm and was thus the "cause of great acrimony."
"I made it clear he was not allowed in the building," Kruse said. "If I'd had the power to terminate him, I would have."
Even now, Smith is under orders not to enter the assessor's offices at township hall.
Regardless of his role in the harassment claims and the Gumm lawsuit, Smith defends his job as an appointed part-time employee. He believes he has a solid track record of doing his job whenever called upon.
Vagueness of job
Smith, a Lombard resident, works without benefits for up to 600 hours per year at a salary of $18,000, the equivalent of about $30 per hour.
He was appointed to the post in 1999 because township officials thought, as a former township supervisor, he would know local laws, Smith said.
He's also secretary of the Illinois Republican Party and a longtime activist in the DuPage GOP.
Part of Sender's objection is that apparently no one keeps track of what Smith does.
For one, he doesn't write tickets to violators.
"We try to be informal," Smith said. "We don't want to give people fines. We just want to take care of the problem."
He also doesn't file reports of his township work.
Smith said because he can only work 600 hours a year, or roughly 2 1/2 hours a day, there's not enough time to write reports.
He does keep the message slips taken whenever someone calls the township with a problem that falls under his duties.
"That's basically my record as to what I've been doing," Smith said.
He couldn't say how many of those slips he receives in an average month.
"It depends on the time of year," he said.
During his recent reappointment, Smith held up a 2 1/2-inch thick, multicolored stack of phone message slips as evidence of his work. But the stack doesn't reflect all his work since 1999, he said, because he usually tosses a slip when the issue has been dead for six months or so.
Murphy admits the system for tracking Smith's time is flawed.
"I have no idea how to verify his hours," she said. "But how do you know when anyone is really working when they have a desk job?"
But she defends Smith, saying she hears him receive calls when he volunteers with her at DuPage County GOP headquarters.
"I hear him get calls all the time," she said. "I know he works."
Necessary job?
Addison, Wayne, York and Winfield townships all report they rely on county employees to solve the same problems Smith handles for Milton Township.
The county has six inspectors in its zoning and drainage departments. Plus, the sheriff's office has enforcement deputies with power to write tickets for things such as abandoned vehicles.
Residents in Milton Township pay an extra tax to help cover salaries for the deputies, but they remain under the jurisdiction of the sheriff's office.
Murphy said that's where the cost savings come in.
"Ron's job cuts down on taking time away from our people who really need to be out on the roads," she said. "Do you want your patrolmen to take time knocking on people's doors to tell them when water is backing up out of the big pipes on the sides of the roads? I would rather see them spending their time on patrol."
Milton workers referred all questions about the sheriff's deputies to Township Supervisor Chris Heidorn, who defends Smith's job as a "citizen-friendly" method of enforcing township-specific codes.
Heidorn said having the sheriff's officers do Smith's job would be a waste of their enforcement duties, and county inspectors lack the knowledge of township codes to do the job.
As far as the quality of Smith's work, "if there were ever any question about Mr. Smith's performance, I'm certain the highway commissioner would have advised the board of his dissatisfaction," said Heidorn in an e-mailed statement. "Instead, we have received only the highest recommendations of Mr. Smith."
Mike Dutton, the current highway commissioner, submitted a letter in support of Smith, but declined to talk about Smith's township job.
"I'm going to be out of there in four months," Dutton said in January. "I don't want to get involved."
Township Trustee Ken McNatt defends Smith as someone who "does a pretty good job."
Sheriff's deputies didn't do as good a job enforcing the codes Smith deals with when it was their responsibility, McNatt said, adding it shouldn't matter how other townships handle such work.
"Why do we have to care what the other townships do?" he said.
Trustee James Flickinger echoed McNatt and Murphy's sentiments.
Despite Smith's supporters, Sender's objections remain. He still questions the amount of work Smith does and the scant proof of the hours he keeps.
In hindsight, Sender said he regrets not making a close examination of the 2 1/2-inch thick stack of phone messages to make sure they were genuine.
Sender, who has voted against Smith each year, believes his stance against Smith and support of Gumm resulted in Sender also not being slated for re-election by the GOP. But he doesn't regret either position.
"I voted against Ron Smith every time," Sender said. "He's a troublemaker."
The future
While Smith successfully won enough votes from the Milton Township board in December to keep his job for another year, he has promised to resign in April when a new highway township commissioner is appointed, he says, so he or she can put a new team in place.
The man who's all but certain to become Smith's new boss is fellow Milton Township Republican Precinct Committeeman Gary Muehlfelt, the party's nominee for highway commissioner.
Muehlfelt declined comment for this report while he grieves a recent death in the family.
Flickinger, Murphy and McNatt all backed Smith for reemployment in December.
"He just really wants to do a good job," Murphy said. "He's a hard worker, and he's honest. To me, his job is the kind of thing that saves the taxpayers money."
February 13 2005
James Fuller Daily Herald Staff Writer
By now, Ron Smith should be used to fighting for his job.
Smith is a code enforcement officer for Milton Township - a position that doesn't even exist in neighboring townships.
While he defends his post, saying he's called on to handle reports of illegally draining sump pumps, abandoned cars or greenery obstructing a line of sight on a township road, his critics say he's nothing more than a politically connected "ghost payroller" collecting a township salary for
work the county should handle.
Smith is an Illinois Republican Central Committeeman whose vote played a role in naming Andy McKenna the new leader of the state party. Smith is also known as a friend of former Illinois Senate President James "Pate" Philip.
Current township Trustee Don Sender of Wheaton goes as far as to call Smith a "ghost payroller."
The battle over the $18,000-a-year job will return to the spotlight in April when the decision to rehire Smith will fall under the power of a new township highway commissioner.
The past
The debate over Smith's job began to burn a little hotter in 2001 when Township Assessor Jim Gumm was accused of sexual harassment. Gumm believes Smith helped fabricate the charges to get him tossed out of office.
The township settled the lawsuit with Gumm's accusers despite his protests. Gumm is now suing Smith, several township officials and Philip for what Gumm believes was a clandestine group effort to smear him.
To head off any confrontations between Smith and Gumm, Smith was banned by the township's insurance carrier from entering town hall during business or lunch hours, said Barbara Murphy, township board member.
"It was strictly just to let things cool down for awhile," she said. "I frankly didn't like it because Ron is a citizen, and he had paperwork to do for his job, but he wasn't able to come in the building anymore. I thought, 'Doggone it, just let Jim Gumm behave for a change.'"
Hank Kruse, who was township supervisor at the time, paints a different picture, more in line with Gumm's lawsuit.
Gumm claims the defendants conspired to fabricate harassment claims against him in retaliation for raising assessments on the properties of the defendants' friends. Smith denies those claims and says he was a whistleblower who made sure women in the assessor's office were treated with respect.
But Kruse said Smith was an "unstable" employee who made physical threats against Gumm and was thus the "cause of great acrimony."
"I made it clear he was not allowed in the building," Kruse said. "If I'd had the power to terminate him, I would have."
Even now, Smith is under orders not to enter the assessor's offices at township hall.
Regardless of his role in the harassment claims and the Gumm lawsuit, Smith defends his job as an appointed part-time employee. He believes he has a solid track record of doing his job whenever called upon.
Vagueness of job
Smith, a Lombard resident, works without benefits for up to 600 hours per year at a salary of $18,000, the equivalent of about $30 per hour.
He was appointed to the post in 1999 because township officials thought, as a former township supervisor, he would know local laws, Smith said.
He's also secretary of the Illinois Republican Party and a longtime activist in the DuPage GOP.
Part of Sender's objection is that apparently no one keeps track of what Smith does.
For one, he doesn't write tickets to violators.
"We try to be informal," Smith said. "We don't want to give people fines. We just want to take care of the problem."
He also doesn't file reports of his township work.
Smith said because he can only work 600 hours a year, or roughly 2 1/2 hours a day, there's not enough time to write reports.
He does keep the message slips taken whenever someone calls the township with a problem that falls under his duties.
"That's basically my record as to what I've been doing," Smith said.
He couldn't say how many of those slips he receives in an average month.
"It depends on the time of year," he said.
During his recent reappointment, Smith held up a 2 1/2-inch thick, multicolored stack of phone message slips as evidence of his work. But the stack doesn't reflect all his work since 1999, he said, because he usually tosses a slip when the issue has been dead for six months or so.
Murphy admits the system for tracking Smith's time is flawed.
"I have no idea how to verify his hours," she said. "But how do you know when anyone is really working when they have a desk job?"
But she defends Smith, saying she hears him receive calls when he volunteers with her at DuPage County GOP headquarters.
"I hear him get calls all the time," she said. "I know he works."
Necessary job?
Addison, Wayne, York and Winfield townships all report they rely on county employees to solve the same problems Smith handles for Milton Township.
The county has six inspectors in its zoning and drainage departments. Plus, the sheriff's office has enforcement deputies with power to write tickets for things such as abandoned vehicles.
Residents in Milton Township pay an extra tax to help cover salaries for the deputies, but they remain under the jurisdiction of the sheriff's office.
Murphy said that's where the cost savings come in.
"Ron's job cuts down on taking time away from our people who really need to be out on the roads," she said. "Do you want your patrolmen to take time knocking on people's doors to tell them when water is backing up out of the big pipes on the sides of the roads? I would rather see them spending their time on patrol."
Milton workers referred all questions about the sheriff's deputies to Township Supervisor Chris Heidorn, who defends Smith's job as a "citizen-friendly" method of enforcing township-specific codes.
Heidorn said having the sheriff's officers do Smith's job would be a waste of their enforcement duties, and county inspectors lack the knowledge of township codes to do the job.
As far as the quality of Smith's work, "if there were ever any question about Mr. Smith's performance, I'm certain the highway commissioner would have advised the board of his dissatisfaction," said Heidorn in an e-mailed statement. "Instead, we have received only the highest recommendations of Mr. Smith."
Mike Dutton, the current highway commissioner, submitted a letter in support of Smith, but declined to talk about Smith's township job.
"I'm going to be out of there in four months," Dutton said in January. "I don't want to get involved."
Township Trustee Ken McNatt defends Smith as someone who "does a pretty good job."
Sheriff's deputies didn't do as good a job enforcing the codes Smith deals with when it was their responsibility, McNatt said, adding it shouldn't matter how other townships handle such work.
"Why do we have to care what the other townships do?" he said.
Trustee James Flickinger echoed McNatt and Murphy's sentiments.
Despite Smith's supporters, Sender's objections remain. He still questions the amount of work Smith does and the scant proof of the hours he keeps.
In hindsight, Sender said he regrets not making a close examination of the 2 1/2-inch thick stack of phone messages to make sure they were genuine.
Sender, who has voted against Smith each year, believes his stance against Smith and support of Gumm resulted in Sender also not being slated for re-election by the GOP. But he doesn't regret either position.
"I voted against Ron Smith every time," Sender said. "He's a troublemaker."
The future
While Smith successfully won enough votes from the Milton Township board in December to keep his job for another year, he has promised to resign in April when a new highway township commissioner is appointed, he says, so he or she can put a new team in place.
The man who's all but certain to become Smith's new boss is fellow Milton Township Republican Precinct Committeeman Gary Muehlfelt, the party's nominee for highway commissioner.
Muehlfelt declined comment for this report while he grieves a recent death in the family.
Flickinger, Murphy and McNatt all backed Smith for reemployment in December.
"He just really wants to do a good job," Murphy said. "He's a hard worker, and he's honest. To me, his job is the kind of thing that saves the taxpayers money."
Monday
Watchdog: Firefighters make more than chief via overtime
Does overtime work pay too well? Some Wheaton firefighters even wind up taking home money more than chief does
February 04 2006
James Fuller Daily Herald Staff Writer
Wheaton firefighters are racking up so much overtime pay that a few of them earned more than the fire chief last year.
City records show that, for about half of the department's firefighters, overtime pay accounted for 20 percent to 40 percent of their entire yearly earnings.
Wheaton's city manager said it can actually cost local taxpayers more for Wheaton to hire additional firefighters than to pay the hefty overtime bill.
But city officials are investigating whether the overtime is leading to even longer work shifts for firefighters, and whether that could compromise their safety and effectiveness on the job.
Numbers show Wheaton taxpayers paid more last year for firefighters' overtime than for police overtime, even though the fire department is less than one-fourth the size of the police force.
In fact, seven fire department employees, most lieutenants, worked so much overtime in 2005 they brought home bigger paychecks than their boss, Wheaton Fire Chief Greg Berk.
How does an $80,000 salary turn into a $130,000 pay check? By the city trying to save some money.
It's actually cheaper for the city to allow fire staff to log a grand total of $669,000 in overtime than to hire more firefighters, City Manager Don Rose said.
The reason is firefighters and police personnel, by contract, move up the pay scale relatively quickly. Plus, the benefits both police and fire personnel receive cost the city a pretty penny.
Factoring in health, life and unemployment insurance; social security; pensions; uniforms; cleaning costs; training; workman's compensation and other benefits, and the total costs to the city of a first-year police officer is $95,000, Rose said.
Add in the cost of a new squad car and vehicle depreciation and it comes closer to $170,000. A first-year firefighter costs about $100,000.
Rose said the city learned its lesson about hiring more personnel to try and cut overtime costs a few years back.
In 2000, the fire department had 18 firefighters and overtime costs of $527,000. Three firefighters were hired the following year to try and cut that cost by an estimated $256,000.
"We didn't come anywhere close to meeting that mark," Rose said. "You hire new guys, all of sudden they've been here four or five years. They're getting three weeks vacation, training, they're gone for other reasons."
The city actually only saved $134,000 the first year the three firefighters were hired. By 2004, the fire department's overtime costs were back up to $534,000 - even more than it was before they hired the new staffers just three years before.
"Just hiring people doesn't necessarily reduce your overtime in that department because of the work schedules, time off and benefits they get in those positions," Rose said.
The work schedule of a firefighter - typically 24 hours on duty followed by 48 hours off -already results in them working more than the typical office worker in a calendar year.
Rank-and-file firefighters declined comment for this report and Berk, the chief, was out of town at a conference on Friday. But Rose said the fire staff doesn't mind the overtime.
In fact, there's a pecking order that essentially gives the most senior fire staffers the first shot at overtime. Overtime pay factors into pension benefits because the calculation uses highest total earnings in recent months. So working overtime pays a long-term benefit to Wheaton firefighters thinking about retiring soon.
So the question for the city in recent years has become, at what point does overtime translate into burnout?
Rose said the city developed an internal committee to investigate how many firefighters are needed to keep the city safe at any given time.
The committee also plans to look at how much overtime firefighters can work before they become a danger to themselves or others.
And to address possible staffing concerns, the coming budget likely will include additional ambulance services and probably some restructuring in the fire department's administration, he said.
Berk has asked for up to 12 more firefighters, depending on how the restructuring is done. Rose said 12 is a "truly unrealistic" number given the costs. Four new firefighters would be the minimum in Berk's request.
"It's up to the city council to set the priorities," Rose said. "If you want more people, you have to figure out how you're going to go about it."
GRAPHIC: Overtime costs add up at fire department
Several Wheaton Fire Department employees earned through 2005 overtime pay enough to surpass the salary of the fire chief.*
Top fire department earners:
1. Fire Lieutenant A: $130,924 (includes $50,526 in overtime)
2. Fire Lieutenant B: $129,691 ($50,619 in overtime)
3. Fire Lieutenant C: $126,861 ($47,789 in overtime)
4. Fire Lieutenant D: $126,783 ($48,083 in overtime)
5. Fire Lieutenant E: $124,673 ($46,641 in overtime)
6. Fire Lieutenant F: $124,186 ($45,114 in overtime)
7. Firefighter A: $97,557 ($30,908 in overtime)
8. Fire Chief Greg Berk: $95,615 (no overtime)
Source: City of Wheaton, which did not provide names of earners cited above, except for the fire chief.
*Overtime includes standard overtime wages plus "firefighter replacement pay." By the city's definition, such pay is given for overtime earned when a firefighter substitutes for a co-worker who is absent because of sick time, vacation time or other reasons.
GRAPHIC: Understaffed?
A look at staffing levels for the Wheaton police and fire departments.
Employees
- Police: 151 paid positions
- Fire: 37 paid positions
Overtime eligibility
- Police: 89 employees received overtime
- Fire: 33 employees received overtime
Non-overtime salary costs
- Police: $6,119,410
- Fire: $2,477,076
Total: $8,596,486
Overtime salary costs
- Police: $602,420
- Fire: $668,707
Total: $1.27 million
Total salary cost, including base pay and overtime
- $9.86 million
Source: City of Wheaton, based on 2005 earnings.
February 04 2006
James Fuller Daily Herald Staff Writer
Wheaton firefighters are racking up so much overtime pay that a few of them earned more than the fire chief last year.
City records show that, for about half of the department's firefighters, overtime pay accounted for 20 percent to 40 percent of their entire yearly earnings.
Wheaton's city manager said it can actually cost local taxpayers more for Wheaton to hire additional firefighters than to pay the hefty overtime bill.
But city officials are investigating whether the overtime is leading to even longer work shifts for firefighters, and whether that could compromise their safety and effectiveness on the job.
Numbers show Wheaton taxpayers paid more last year for firefighters' overtime than for police overtime, even though the fire department is less than one-fourth the size of the police force.
In fact, seven fire department employees, most lieutenants, worked so much overtime in 2005 they brought home bigger paychecks than their boss, Wheaton Fire Chief Greg Berk.
How does an $80,000 salary turn into a $130,000 pay check? By the city trying to save some money.
It's actually cheaper for the city to allow fire staff to log a grand total of $669,000 in overtime than to hire more firefighters, City Manager Don Rose said.
The reason is firefighters and police personnel, by contract, move up the pay scale relatively quickly. Plus, the benefits both police and fire personnel receive cost the city a pretty penny.
Factoring in health, life and unemployment insurance; social security; pensions; uniforms; cleaning costs; training; workman's compensation and other benefits, and the total costs to the city of a first-year police officer is $95,000, Rose said.
Add in the cost of a new squad car and vehicle depreciation and it comes closer to $170,000. A first-year firefighter costs about $100,000.
Rose said the city learned its lesson about hiring more personnel to try and cut overtime costs a few years back.
In 2000, the fire department had 18 firefighters and overtime costs of $527,000. Three firefighters were hired the following year to try and cut that cost by an estimated $256,000.
"We didn't come anywhere close to meeting that mark," Rose said. "You hire new guys, all of sudden they've been here four or five years. They're getting three weeks vacation, training, they're gone for other reasons."
The city actually only saved $134,000 the first year the three firefighters were hired. By 2004, the fire department's overtime costs were back up to $534,000 - even more than it was before they hired the new staffers just three years before.
"Just hiring people doesn't necessarily reduce your overtime in that department because of the work schedules, time off and benefits they get in those positions," Rose said.
The work schedule of a firefighter - typically 24 hours on duty followed by 48 hours off -already results in them working more than the typical office worker in a calendar year.
Rank-and-file firefighters declined comment for this report and Berk, the chief, was out of town at a conference on Friday. But Rose said the fire staff doesn't mind the overtime.
In fact, there's a pecking order that essentially gives the most senior fire staffers the first shot at overtime. Overtime pay factors into pension benefits because the calculation uses highest total earnings in recent months. So working overtime pays a long-term benefit to Wheaton firefighters thinking about retiring soon.
So the question for the city in recent years has become, at what point does overtime translate into burnout?
Rose said the city developed an internal committee to investigate how many firefighters are needed to keep the city safe at any given time.
The committee also plans to look at how much overtime firefighters can work before they become a danger to themselves or others.
And to address possible staffing concerns, the coming budget likely will include additional ambulance services and probably some restructuring in the fire department's administration, he said.
Berk has asked for up to 12 more firefighters, depending on how the restructuring is done. Rose said 12 is a "truly unrealistic" number given the costs. Four new firefighters would be the minimum in Berk's request.
"It's up to the city council to set the priorities," Rose said. "If you want more people, you have to figure out how you're going to go about it."
GRAPHIC: Overtime costs add up at fire department
Several Wheaton Fire Department employees earned through 2005 overtime pay enough to surpass the salary of the fire chief.*
Top fire department earners:
1. Fire Lieutenant A: $130,924 (includes $50,526 in overtime)
2. Fire Lieutenant B: $129,691 ($50,619 in overtime)
3. Fire Lieutenant C: $126,861 ($47,789 in overtime)
4. Fire Lieutenant D: $126,783 ($48,083 in overtime)
5. Fire Lieutenant E: $124,673 ($46,641 in overtime)
6. Fire Lieutenant F: $124,186 ($45,114 in overtime)
7. Firefighter A: $97,557 ($30,908 in overtime)
8. Fire Chief Greg Berk: $95,615 (no overtime)
Source: City of Wheaton, which did not provide names of earners cited above, except for the fire chief.
*Overtime includes standard overtime wages plus "firefighter replacement pay." By the city's definition, such pay is given for overtime earned when a firefighter substitutes for a co-worker who is absent because of sick time, vacation time or other reasons.
GRAPHIC: Understaffed?
A look at staffing levels for the Wheaton police and fire departments.
Employees
- Police: 151 paid positions
- Fire: 37 paid positions
Overtime eligibility
- Police: 89 employees received overtime
- Fire: 33 employees received overtime
Non-overtime salary costs
- Police: $6,119,410
- Fire: $2,477,076
Total: $8,596,486
Overtime salary costs
- Police: $602,420
- Fire: $668,707
Total: $1.27 million
Total salary cost, including base pay and overtime
- $9.86 million
Source: City of Wheaton, based on 2005 earnings.
Watchdog: Park District director's home more expensive than reported
Director’s home really cost $183,000 to fix
August 18, 2006
By: James Fuller
Daily Herald Staff Writer
Wheaton Park District officials say they never tried to intentionally mislead the public. They just didn’t do their homework.
Last week, the Daily Herald reported the district spent $80,000 to remodel the home it owns at Arrowhead Golf Course for its executive director, Rob Robinson, to live in.
Faced with evidence suggesting that figure was far below the actual cost, parks officials have now acknowledged the remodeling price tag so far is $183,000. The board shared the higher number at a meeting Wednesday night after seeing a document obtained by the Daily Herald showing the true costs.
District spokeswoman Mary Perotti supplied the original $80,000 figure in response to an inquiry about the remodeling costs. That figure was supported by Robinson and clarified by board President Paul Fullerton, who said $80,000 was the amount in this fiscal year’s budget for the project.
At the time, Perotti said that quantifying what was spent before this fiscal year was nearly impossible because the district had switched to new accounting methods.
But the day after the $80,000 price tag was reported, the Daily Herald obtained a spreadsheet that contained dated, line-item expenses for work on the director’s house, complete with the account numbers for the payments.
Perotti confirmed Thursday the spreadsheet is nearly identical to a report generated by the district staff for commissioners the day the Daily Herald’s original report was published.
The spreadsheet was generated at the request of commissioners, Perotti said in explaining she only learned after the spreadsheet came to her attention that the $80,000 wasn’t the full cost.
Fullerton said there was no intent to mislead the public.
“It would be insane for us to think we’re going to tell you it’s $80,000 when it’s $180,000 because, eventually, you’re going to find it out, anyway,” he said. “What happened is nobody went and looked at the numbers. Nobody was actually looking at a spreadsheet and adding all the numbers together.”
Fullerton said he knew the actual costs were higher than $80,000, but he, like Perotti and Robinson, had not personally gone back to add up the costs.
“I didn’t know it was twice as much, but the numbers are what they are,” Fullerton said. “If people think we spent too much, then people should come to the meetings and tell us we’re not being frugal.”
Commissioners explained the remodeling costs at the Wednesday meeting. They said they felt obligated to renovate the house fully to keep a promise to Robinson before he became the new director last November.
Commissioners pitched the job with a four-bedroom, rent- and mortgage-free house as an optional part of the compensation package. The prior director, Bob Dunsmuir, lived in the house for years until his retirement in late 2005.
“We led (Robinson) to believe it was in move-in condition, and it clearly was not,” Fullerton said at the meeting.
Robinson’s contract requires him to live in the district. Leaving his former job in Colorado meant taking a pay cut from nearly $200,000 to his current pay of $132,000.
“If the housing isn’t part of the park job, I needed to know because I wouldn’t have considered the position,” he said.
The park district would have increased Robinson’s salary if he had not opted for the free housing, as to allow him to live in Wheaton.
After the offer, commissioners learned the house had “astronomical” damage, including a leaky roof, rodents, a hornets nest in the ceiling, mold and other structural maladies. Thus, the repairs were necessary, commissioners said.
And, they’re nearly complete. What remains is some landscaping and the construction of a new two-car garage.
Regardless of the promise to Robinson, the park board had already decided to keep the house and possibly use it for public meetings or retreats.
August 18, 2006
By: James Fuller
Daily Herald Staff Writer
Wheaton Park District officials say they never tried to intentionally mislead the public. They just didn’t do their homework.
Last week, the Daily Herald reported the district spent $80,000 to remodel the home it owns at Arrowhead Golf Course for its executive director, Rob Robinson, to live in.
Faced with evidence suggesting that figure was far below the actual cost, parks officials have now acknowledged the remodeling price tag so far is $183,000. The board shared the higher number at a meeting Wednesday night after seeing a document obtained by the Daily Herald showing the true costs.
District spokeswoman Mary Perotti supplied the original $80,000 figure in response to an inquiry about the remodeling costs. That figure was supported by Robinson and clarified by board President Paul Fullerton, who said $80,000 was the amount in this fiscal year’s budget for the project.
At the time, Perotti said that quantifying what was spent before this fiscal year was nearly impossible because the district had switched to new accounting methods.
But the day after the $80,000 price tag was reported, the Daily Herald obtained a spreadsheet that contained dated, line-item expenses for work on the director’s house, complete with the account numbers for the payments.
Perotti confirmed Thursday the spreadsheet is nearly identical to a report generated by the district staff for commissioners the day the Daily Herald’s original report was published.
The spreadsheet was generated at the request of commissioners, Perotti said in explaining she only learned after the spreadsheet came to her attention that the $80,000 wasn’t the full cost.
Fullerton said there was no intent to mislead the public.
“It would be insane for us to think we’re going to tell you it’s $80,000 when it’s $180,000 because, eventually, you’re going to find it out, anyway,” he said. “What happened is nobody went and looked at the numbers. Nobody was actually looking at a spreadsheet and adding all the numbers together.”
Fullerton said he knew the actual costs were higher than $80,000, but he, like Perotti and Robinson, had not personally gone back to add up the costs.
“I didn’t know it was twice as much, but the numbers are what they are,” Fullerton said. “If people think we spent too much, then people should come to the meetings and tell us we’re not being frugal.”
Commissioners explained the remodeling costs at the Wednesday meeting. They said they felt obligated to renovate the house fully to keep a promise to Robinson before he became the new director last November.
Commissioners pitched the job with a four-bedroom, rent- and mortgage-free house as an optional part of the compensation package. The prior director, Bob Dunsmuir, lived in the house for years until his retirement in late 2005.
“We led (Robinson) to believe it was in move-in condition, and it clearly was not,” Fullerton said at the meeting.
Robinson’s contract requires him to live in the district. Leaving his former job in Colorado meant taking a pay cut from nearly $200,000 to his current pay of $132,000.
“If the housing isn’t part of the park job, I needed to know because I wouldn’t have considered the position,” he said.
The park district would have increased Robinson’s salary if he had not opted for the free housing, as to allow him to live in Wheaton.
After the offer, commissioners learned the house had “astronomical” damage, including a leaky roof, rodents, a hornets nest in the ceiling, mold and other structural maladies. Thus, the repairs were necessary, commissioners said.
And, they’re nearly complete. What remains is some landscaping and the construction of a new two-car garage.
Regardless of the promise to Robinson, the park board had already decided to keep the house and possibly use it for public meetings or retreats.
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