Get the latest news from around Illinois.
Chicago Tribune: Millions of dollars fail to brighten dismal academic picture at troubled Chicago high schools
For at least 25 years, Chicago’s Bowen High School has endured tumultuous and often disheartening change, with educators trying one reform after another to improve dismal academic performance at the South Chicago neighborhood school.
Chicago Public Schools tried a “school-within-a-school” plan in the 1990s, creating small schools within the massive red-brick building. Then came intervention teams to guide educators, and a “redesign” that closed Bowen in favor of four separate high schools that operated within its building for many years.
Chicago Tribune: Vote coming for O'Hare Fly Quiet plan that could last two years
This week, communities around O’Hare International Airport will decide whether to OK a controversial Fly Quiet plan that spreads around the pain of nighttime jet noise by alternating which runways are used for arrivals and departures from week to week.
But even if approved, the plan would be a while coming and would not last forever. The plan could take as much as a year, and would last only about two years, before the opening of a major new east-west runway in late 2020.
Northwest Herald: McHenry City Council to vote on $64,440 budget amendment for parking design services
The McHenry City Council on Monday will consider a budget amendment of up to $64,440 to begin its downtown parking project.
The funding would go toward design engineering services regarding improvements around McHenry, including enhancing lighting around Veterans Park, Court Street lots and Riverside alley, as well as expanding the south Riverside Drive parking lot and constructing a lot at 1206 Court St.
Bloomington Pantagraph: Hearing set Monday for Normal tax hike
Residents will get a chance Monday to sound off on a proposed tax hike of more than 6 percent for Normal property owners.
The Normal City Council will host a public hearing at 7 p.m. on the fourth floor at Uptown Station before its regular meeting, which is expected to include approval of a $13 million property tax levy, which would be large enough to trigger a 6.38 percent tax rate hike. State law requires a “truth in taxation” hearing for levy increases of more than 5 percent.
Belleville News-Democrat: Hofbräuhaus says it expects late-January opening in Belleville; hotel still planned
The Hofbräuhaus on Friday announced that the German restaurant and brewery under construction off Illinois 15 in Belleville will open in late January and that the developers still plan to build a hotel next to the restaurant on the bluff overlooking the Mississippi River and St. Louis skyline.
The restaurant, which is being built by Chuck Keller, of Effingham, and his son, Chane Keller, was originally scheduled to open in the summer of 2016 and other targeted opening dates have been missed since then. Construction on the $12 million restaurant began in 2015.
Belleville News-Democrat: Sheriff candidates need to figure out crowded jail, too few deputies
St. Clair County Sheriff Rick Watson is going to have some competition on Nov. 6.
“It’s America. Anyone can run for office,” he said.
Yes, indeed. And voters win when there is a choice.