With America’s reading and writing habits going electronic, most of the daily mail is both unsolicited and unwanted. I easily toss 75 percent of whatever winds up in my mailbox, and have for years.

Nor do I make regular use of snail mail. I pay my bills online. E-cards ensure that birthday greetings will arrive on the very day you wish.  As for mass-mailings like Christmas greetings, those became a luxury when stamps hit 44 cents.

Now days, I pretty much send mail to elderly relatives who remain steadfastly opposed to e-mail — and that’s about it.

And don’t get me started about the “service” aspect of the Postal Service.  My block seemed to encounter a new carrier every week until our current, hard-working “Q” came on the job.  We also seemed to be an afterthought to the day’s delivery, frequently getting mail after dark.

Things have since improve, I’m happy to report, but no one would call the Postal Service a model of efficiency or transparency. A few years ago, it began surreptitiously began removing mailboxes without announcement or explanation. My efforts to track down an official who could address my questions were an exercise in futility.

So, too, my recent attempts to find out how mail volume in Downers Grove has fared and whether any mailboxes are in danger of disappearing with this round of cuts.  The downtown PO referred me to a district spokesman. After dialing the number numerous times, this was all I got:

“You been forwarded to a voice-mail system. However, the person at 7763 has not subscribed to this service.  Call answering cannot be continued at this time. Transferring to an attendant. One moment please.Your  session can not be continued at this time. Please try again later.”

Maybe they cut that position?

Southworth house at Main and Prairie. G. Curry photo

The shocking aftermath of the Jan. 2 fire in the 4700 block of Main Street is plain to see: A burned-out shell of a house with boarded up windows, blackened siding and a gaping roof.

What isn’t so obvious is the huge outpouring of support that already is being extended to homeowner Beth Southworth and her two children. Within hours, friends, neighbors and residents who have never met the family were seeking ways to help.

I’ve written before on how caring this community is in times of challenge and crisis, but each time I see people reach out to those less fortunate, whether because of illness, hard times or a house fire, I count myself lucky to live here and also to be able to help where I can.

Earlier this week, board members of Helping Girls Navigate Adolescence Inc., offered a helping hand to one of our own whose house burned less than a week before Christmas.

The Southworth fire offers all of us another opportunity to be generous. April Marron is spearheading the collection of gift cards and clothing for the family, who lost everything in the blaze. They’re currently looking for Target, Jewel and other gift cards and clothing donations to provision Southworth, her 10-year-old daughter and her nine-year-old son. The boy wears size 10 or 12, the daughter wears women’s extra-small clothing and Southworth is a size 0.

Donations can be dropped off or mailed to Marron at 3780 Downers Drive, 60515.

“People have been so tremendously generous,” she said, adding that Mike Geisen of My Favorite Toy Store in Downers Grove invited the kids to choose whatever toys they wanted, so they are set for amusements.

Among the harder items to replace will be family photos and other keepsakes. Friends at Belle Aire school are combing through their pictures for ones that include the Southworth kids and the Panther Cheerleaders organization is replacing the daughter’s cheering trophies.

“There is nothing left,” Marron said.

Given the speed at which the house was engulfed, friends and family are thankful that it wasn’t more tragic. Southworth was able to rouse her sleeping children and get out of the house after the fire broke out about 11:15 p.m. Investigators believe the fire started when a curtain was ignited by a burning candle.

“She didn’t even think the fire was that bad at first,” Marron said. “She went back in to get the cat out from under a bed.”

Noting the two fires during comments at Tuesday’s village council meeting, Commissioner Sean P. Durkin urged residents to be careful. The season’s low humidity, dried-out evergreens, and fireplaces and candles are a dangerous combination, he said.

Founded in 1955, the privately held Downers Grove bank has assets of $266.9 million, according to the Tribune.

With branches in Woodridge and Westmont as well as locally,  Diamond reportedly sees DGN as an entree into DuPage County. It also has branches in Elmhurst, Schaumburg and Skokie.

The Tribune reports that DGN has faced struggles similar to others in the industry over the past year:

Downers Grove lost $349,000 in the first half, compared with a profit of $900,000 in the year-ago period. Its percentage of bad loans has risen to 4.84 percent from 2.34 percent, but as of June 30 it was well capitalized by several measures.

Chairman and CEO James Russ Sr., a 36-year veteran of DGN, was quoted as saying the bank had sought a buyer in part to raise capital.  It will continue to be known as Downers Grove National Bank.

Diamond Bank is described on its Web site as “an established and innovative institution dedicated to providing a superior level of highly individualized service.”

“With a focus on individuals and organizations with an entrepreneurial spirit, our clients and their businesses come in all shapes and sizes and have no age boundaries,” according to the Web site.

Diamond offers “an extensive selection of financial services, including deposit and lending solutions as well as a comprehensive mortgage division.”

It also offers  “37,000 surcharge-free ATMs nationwide.”

Reading up for a column on the subject, I came across this factoid from SUNY’s Nelson A. Rockefeller Institute of Government: state tax collections plunged an inflation-adjusted average of 9.2 percent in FY 2009.

As the village council wrestles with its budget challenges — how to deal with a $4.5 million deficit — and other local boards prepare to face their own potential shortfalls, it seems increasingly clear that something more fundamental needs to happen than trimming programs or even reducing local government to its core services, as the mayor and Commissioner Bob Barnett have espoused.

There’s an elephant in the room and its enormous appetite and gargantuan size must be confronted. I’m talking about government personnel costs and pensions, the like of which most mid-level private sector employees will never see.

The joke around my house — where the husband holds an MBA in finance from a premier institution and the wife is a practitioner of a dying craft — is that we should have gone into education.

Never in my wildest dreams did I envision a middle age where the undervalued  teaching profession of my youth (Substandard pay! No respect!) would eclipse financial services, law and — wait for it — journalism in esteem, pay, hours, benefits and, in particular, retirement pensions.

I’m not picking on educators. It’s a tough job and one that warrants a decent paycheck and competitive benefits. Whether that paycheck also should include four years’ worth of six-percent bounces as a career finale, dozens of bankable sick days and a retirement paycheck equal to as much as 75 percent of on-the-job pay, well, maybe — so long as society can afford such largesse. Remembering that similar largesse also applies to municipal workers, federal workers, police, fire and military, and even elected county, state and federal officials.

It’s no wonder that, compared to professional-level, private-sector jobs — which have seen their pay, benefits and job security steadily erode even as work responsibilities and hours have spiraled — the public sector is starting to look pretty cushy.

Case in point: When the economy tanked last year, businesses responded by immediately bringing out the sharp shears and lopping away at pay, benefits and thousands of jobs.

How many accomplished, skilled professionals do you personally know who have seen their pay frozen, their benefit costs increased or their jobs pulled out from under them in the past year? I know several, including close friends and family members.

Reaction to economic conditions has been slower in the public sector, where step increases, staffing levels and other job fundamentals are contractually predetermined.

To its credit, the village acted quickly to put into effect a hiring freeze and work furloughs, and in D99, newly minted teachers are being actively recruited to fill openings left by retiring veterans.

But across the board, pensions remain unassailable because control over them lies farther up the food chain, in Springfield. And pay scales, raises and benefits are steadfastly maintained by boards that can’t fathom how to make changes without unleashing the wrath of the unions or parting company with administrative recommendations.

The inaction fails to address a hard reality: Expenses are far exceeding revenues at virtually every level of government. And especially in terms of labor, which accounts for roughly 75 percent of local governmental budgets.

The future looks even worse, leaving many observers to deduce that the old ways are simply not sustainable, no matter how “deserving” the workers in question or how well-intentioned the taxpayers. It’s not about spreading the private sector’s misery around, it’s about securing a financially viable future.

The issue isn’t partisan, but it is unfortunately highly political, particularly for elected officials who will inevitably see their future prospects dim if they get serious about confronting union clout.

In response to yesterday’s column, a reader shared this response from state legislators he contacted about the issue:

“I made that point in a recent letter to Senators  Dillard and Cronin and Rep. Bellock. Cronin did not even acknowledge  the letter. Dillard and Bellock agreed with my no income tax hike, but  completely ignored my comments about public payroll costs.”

Clearly, it will be up to the voting public to spearhead the necessary changes. And I count among that public government workers who realize that the future economic health of our towns, states and country trumps individual interest and personal gain.

Incidentally, my parents are retired government workers. My 82-year-old father willingly acknowledges that he has taken far more out of the taxpayer coffers than he contributed during his 30-year job as a postal worker.  He and my mother have been comfortably, though not luxuriously, retired for 20 years.

And they are both quite aware that their college-educated children, one of whom holds an advanced degree, will be lucky to be similarly advantaged in their golden years.

This is the first in a series of articles. Look for part two next week.

The reporter, Noreen S. Ahmed-Ullah, had previously covered the D99 board’s attempt to draft new nepotism guidelines that would block Boyle’s participation in closed-session deliberations concerning the teachers’ contract and benefits. Boyle’s brother is a D99 teacher and coach.

Yesterday’s story highlighted Chaplin’s repeated requests for receipts detailing $4,600 in office supplies purchased by the water commission in March and April 2008 and O’Connell’s ongoing attempt to get information about insurance benefit costs for district administrators, among other examples of officials who have been frustrated in their efforts to question the status quo.

Tactics outlined in the story  — requiring officials to file FOIA requests, censuring unruly members and erecting other obstacles to limit access to public records — may be less effective once a revised Freedom of Information law kicks in on Jan. 1 allowing the Illinois Attorney General to impose fines on public boards and commissions that “willingly and intentionally” deny access to such documents. The law also will reduce the allowed time frame for responding to FOIA requests from seven to five days.

If the examples outlined by Ahmed-Ullah are any indication,  the FOIA act overhaul shouldbe welcomed with open arms by advocates of government transparency and access.

What comes through over and over again in the story is the enthrenched belief,  on the part of  elected officials no less, that probing the activities of government and requesting access to public information is somehow wrong, bad or destructive to the fabric of the community.

Several of the quotes had a very familiar ring, for example:

“They’re trying to tell me what I can say and obstructing me from getting the documents I need to perform my duties as an elected official.”

“She’s been asking for more and more   documents and become distrusting of the administration. It starts to look like you’re micromanaging the place and looking to say ‘gotcha’.”

“As a board member, she’s entitled to receive information; that was not the problem. She was not following protocol in meetings and requesting information. She was going in on her own to the (district) office and disrupting their work.”

And another quote, from the executive director of the Citizen Advocacy Center in Elmhurst, which accurately summed up the local response to elected officials who don’t embrace the majority viewpoint:

“Inevitably, someone who is a concerned citizen ends up throwing their hat in the ring to run for public office to effect change. But in the last five years, we’ve been seeing a growing trend of public bodies taking action to squash out board members who are a political minority and make them as ineffective as possible. They may be on the board, but now they’re getting shut down.”

Perhaps it should come as no surprise that many of the clashes described in the Trib article concern school board members.  Long-time observers of the various local boards and commissions understand that school boards seem to operate under a different cultural standard — one heavily influenced by the tenets of the Illinois Association of School Boards, an interest group lacking statutory authority.

While respectful behavior,  a willingness to compromise and a constructive attitude are key traits for board members of every stripe, serving the public — its interests and concerns — is their first and foremost responsibility.

Commenting about the new FOIA law, which was drafted by her office, Illinois Attorney General Lisa Madigan said it would bring the quest for government transparency “out of the Stone Age.”

Given the amount of attention transparency has received locally in the past three years, it should be well past time for recalcitrant members of local boards to go along on that ride.

Former D99 Board of Education member and Downers Grove attorney Craig H. Greenwood received a nine-month suspension from practicing law for mismanaging funds held in an escrow account, neglecting client matters, and failing to cooperate during the ensuing investigation conducted by the Attorney Registration and Disciplinary Commission of the Illinois Supreme Court. The suspension begins Oct. 13.

Greenwood was a 2005 Downers Grove Community Advocates-backed candidate for D99 along with slate-mates Julia Kennedy Beckman, Terry Pavesich and Allyn Barnett.  Beginning in 2008, Greenwood missed several meetings due to poor health, leading to his decision not to run again in 2009.

Greenwood was accused of  14 violations stated in the Nature of the Case.

On January 16, 2007, the administrator filed a three-count complaint against Greenwood, followed on March 22, 2007, by a five-count amended complaint.  The administrator alleged that respondent Greenwood converted client funds, failed to provide competent representation, neglected client matters, failed to return unearned fees, and failed to respond to a lawful demand for information from the administrator.

Greenwood filed an answer to the amended complaint, admitting some of the factual allegations, denying some of the factual allegations, and denying all allegations of misconduct.

Hearings on the matter were held on June 5, October 14, and 15, 2008, at the Chicago offices of the Attorney Registration and Disciplinary Commission. The ARDC filed its report on April 13, 2009 , recommending he be suspended from the practice of law for nine months.

Six witnesses testified against him about alleged problems relating to integrity, truthfulness, and timeliness beginning in 2003 and continuing through 2006.

Three witnesses testified for Greenwood, including:

Megan Schroeder: “Meghan (sic) Schroeder is a member of the District 99 School Board. Respondent is also a member of the School Board. (Tr. 277-78). She has known Respondent since 2002 and knows others in the community who know him. She opined that Respondent has a very good reputation for honesty, integrity and truthfulness.”

and Julia Kennedy Beckman: “Julia Beckman is also a member of the School Board and has known Respondent since 1993. (Tr. 282-83). Beckman believes that Respondent has a very good reputation in the community for honesty and integrity.”

Greenwood stated during the hearings that “he also provides the School Board with pro bono legal advice and monitors litigation involving the board.”

Greenwood, along with supporting testimony from Schroeder and Beckman, also testified to his own poor health.  Greenwood said he suffered a stroke in 2004.

On May 2, 2009, the final D99 board meeting of his term (a meeting Greenwood missed), Beckman noted prior to adjournment Sine Die that due to Craig Greenwood’s poor health, he had been unable to attend the last few meetings and was unable to run for another term.

M.R.23153 – In re: Craig Homer Greenwood.     (September 22, 2009)

Disciplinary Commission.

The motion by the Administrator of the Attorney Registration and Disciplinary Commission to approve and confirm the report and recommendation of the Hearing Board is allowed, and respondent Craig Homer Greenwood is suspended from the practice of law for nine (9) months.

Suspension effective October 13, 2009.

Respondent Craig Homer Greenwood shall reimburse the Client Protection Program Trust Fund for any Client Protection payments arising from his conduct prior to the termination of the period of suspension.

Order entered by the Court.

You can read the full ARD Synopsis of Hearing Board Report and Recommendation here.

On average, 236 of the approximately 5,900 investigations docketed each year result in the filing of formal charges because the investigation produced evidence of serious misconduct.

Failure to cooperate in the investigative stages of a case is a separate ethical offense which can and often does lead to additional discipline.

The Client Protection Trust Fund reimburses claimants who have suffered losses caused by the dishonest conduct of a disciplined attorney. Awards may be made in an amount up to $50,000 per claim and up to $500,000 per attorney.  Greenwood must reimburse the Fund prior to the termination of his suspension.

Greenwood was also investigated and censured by the Illinois Supreme Court June 25, 1992, for violations beginning in 1983.

“There is no confirmed source and no causal relationship among the cases,” said David Hass, a health department spokesman.

Such outbreaks are extremely common and have many possible causes including environmental factors, food or food handling, he said. Health department personnel have taken food histories from those affected.

Five people initially complained of vomiting and diarrhea, including two who were hospitalized at Good Samaritan Hospital. One of those reported his illness to the Daily Herald, where the story first appeared.  All have since recovered, Hass said.

Another four people reported becoming ill in recent days. “A person may not report it for a couple of days and, in many situations, people don’t report it at all,” he said.

Health Department sanitarians have investigated food safety practices of the area restaurants and food service establishments in question. They also have run tests for common food-borne illnesses, all of which came back negative, Hass said.

“As time passes it gets harder to establish causal relationships,” he said.

My kids have grown up in the frightening new world that was ushered in on Sept. 11, 2001. I was serving my kindergartner breakfast when my brother phoned and told me there had been a plane crash in New York. I turned on the television and immediately thought: “Terrorists.”

Like everyone else with a spouse in Chicago that day, I was constantly on the phone with my husband, keeping him posted on the unfolding tragedies in New York, Washington and Pennsylvania and asking him how soon he could come home. He felt safe; he happened to be meeting with City of Chicago officials in a bunker-esque communications center.

There was something about the horrifying images of that morning that made it impossible to stay inside. My daughter and I went for a walk under bright blue skies, exchanged a few shocked words with a neighbor, noted the unusual silence as jets were grounded nationwide. We got in the car and drove over to my son’s elementary school where I struggled with my desire to pull him out of class and bring him home.

I think I took the attacks harder than many. I had worked across the street from the World Trade Center, had conducted many interviews there and dined many times at Windows on the World. That area of lower Manhattan had been my stomping ground, so it was easy to picture myself there as the jets flew into the towers, as I watched them crumble, and to wonder if people with whom I’d rubbed elbows were among the victims.

The coverage in the next day’s Wall Street Journal was excruciating, written by reporters in a state of shock over the nightmare they’d watched from their windows — windows through which I once stared out on the nation’s financial epicenter.

Like many local places of worship, our church held a service that night. I was never so anxious find a pew and hit my knees. But comfort and security would be elusive for weeks.

Eight years later, I remember everything about that day and the months to come, when the nation waited for another shoe to drop. What do you remember? And more importantly, what lasting impact — if any — have the events of 9/11/01 had on you?

The village is one of 20 towns where “residents live a long life, there are lots of doctors and hospitals nearby, and you can pursue an active lifestyle,” according to Money.

The article opens with a glowing description of the Downers Grove Park District facilities and our “vibrant downtown full of restaurants and shopping” before attributing its “hotspot” status to its proximity to Chicago.

Interestingly, only one of the top five finishers is a sunbelt city, Anaheim, Calif., which topped the list. Others were 2) North Hempstead, N.Y.; 3) Fort Lee, N.J.; and 4) Yonkers, N.Y.

Now let’s hear from some retirees: Is DG a good place to while away those Golden Years?