Shiller And Daley Butt Heads Over Inspector General's Powers

Monday, February 8, 2010 | | 1 comments | Bookmark and Share

For years, the City Council, including Ald. Shiller, have opposed the Inspector General poking his nose into their affairs.  Ald. Shiller has called support of the IG's expanded powers "a stunt" and a "political move" and "thinks it’s a bad idea to give the office the authority to investigate aldermen who, unlike city department heads or laborers, have to face voters every four years."

But with the indictment of Ike Carothers (and more to follow?), Mayor Daley has proposed expanding the Inspector General's powers to include the 50 aldermen.  Read all about it here.

Your move, Helen?

Uptown Woman Charged With Stealing CTA Van

| | 0 comments | Bookmark and Share

Was she thinking, "Take that, service cuts!"?  Or just, um, not really thinking through the whole thing?

From WBBM's website:  "An Uptown neighborhood woman was charged with allegedly stealing a Chicago Transit Authority van while a CTA employee was cleaning the Blue Line on the Northwest Side Thursday morning, police said. Allissa Settles, 42, of the 4700 block of North Malden Street was charged at 5:14 a.m. Thursday with felony possession of a stolen motor vehicle, according to police."  Read more here.

Buy A Brick To Support Chase Park

| | 0 comments | Bookmark and Share

From Ald. Schulter's weekly ward newsletter:  "The Chase Park Advisory Council (CPAC) is currently sponsoring a fundraising event to to improve the Chase Park for our growing community of families. Residents and businesses can participate by purchasing a brick to be installed at the new grand entrance to Chase Park at Leland and Clark.  Families will see your business name whenever they come to their favorite park to play!"  The Grand Entrance will be built this spring/summer, and bricks are pretty reasonably priced, starting at $100.  Click here for a form and more information.

Missing Person

| | 1 comments | Bookmark and Share

Seen on a lightpole near Leland and Winthrop.
More info on this case is available here.

Azusa Was Here

Saturday, February 6, 2010 | | 29 comments | Bookmark and Share


The terracotta from the former Azusa Building at Montrose and Broadway is now making its first appearance on the corner entrance of the Wilson Yard project in the same spot. While it is great to see the tiles restored, we can't help but notice that it does not match the rest of the retail facade. We wonder if this will be the extremely ornate entrance to the nail salon, Subway Sandwich, AT&T, or Game Stop...you know, the vibrant retail that is going to save that stretch of Broadway.

Go Towards The Light

| | 2 comments | Bookmark and Share

A neighbor of the Wilson Yard project writes in and asks:
"So when is it appropriate to have 24/7 spotlights on a children's playground? Ever since the Wilson Yard subsidized housing elevated playground was pieced together I have been bombarded with a federal prison spotlight that is also blinding when driving East on Montrose; how can this light be dimmed or hooded so it is less obtrusive to neighbors and drivers in the area?"

Shiller: "We Have To Show We're Serious"

Friday, February 5, 2010 | | 17 comments | Bookmark and Share



Oops! Who voted for a budget requiring City employees to take 15 furlough days but then forgot to take all theirs last year?

Click here for the answer!

Fame da Lupo Offering All You Can Eat Special

| | 4 comments | Bookmark and Share

A reader sends in the following photo and writes:
"My wife noticed this flyer outside our building from Fame da Lupo Pizza and I thought I'd send it in to you all. Sounds like a good deal. Not sure what is included, whether it's pizza or pasta, but $9.95 all you can eat is a great price and valid till April 1. I've had pizza from this place and it was great and the owner is really friendly. I don't think they get a lot of foot traffic on Leland so they really need some word of mouth now. I hope your readers will give them a try either dining in or doing delivery. We need to support our local eateries."

How They Do It In NYC

| | 3 comments | Bookmark and Share

A reader sends in the following link and comment:
"They just made this deal in NY... NYC pays 50 million...15 million tax break...developer pays $5 million and any overages... win win win for Flatbush section of the city!

Wish this could happen to the Uptown Theatre!"

Read the article here




Somerset Fights Weekend Shutdown

| | 11 comments | Bookmark and Share

"Facing an imminent shutdown by federal health-care authorities, the troubled Somerset Place nursing home in Uptown filed a civil lawsuit Thursday to stop the government from administratively shutting it down this weekend."  Read about it in Chicago Breaking News.

Update:  "Violence and abuse at Somerset Place leading to loss of Medicaid, Medicare funding."  Read why this could mean the end of Somerset as we know it, that it took in more than $15million in 2008 and made millions in profits, and that workers there feel it will go back to "business as usual" if allowed to stay open.  Why is it only now, with closure imminent, that Somerset claims it want to work with the community surrounding the facility?

Positive Loitering Seminar On Monday, February 8

| | 0 comments | Bookmark and Share

Today's the last day to RSVP and reserve your spot.  From Mary Ann Smith's newsletter:  "To encourage community residents to take back the streets, Cook County State's Attorney Anita Alvarez is sponsoring a Positive Loitering Seminar on Monday, February 8, 6:30-7:30 p.m. at St. Andrew's Church, 5649 N. Sheridan. Held in conjunction with the Chicago Police Department, the seminar will present strategies that community groups can use to make a difference in their neighborhoods. To reserve, call (773) 334-4066 or email ltrier@cookcountygov.com."

Uptown's Weiss Hospital Is Chicago's Worst

| | 7 comments | Bookmark and Share

This week, Consumer Reports Health posted the Leapfrog Group findings on hospital ICU infection rates. Per Consumer Reports, “Hospitals in the Chicago area vary dramatically in terms of how well their intensive care units (ICUs) prevent central-line bloodstream infections, a cause of death, disability, and expense in our nations' hospitals that is largely preventable.” Consumer Reports Health Ratings Center director John Santa stated, "Infection rates can vary widely from hospital to hospital and even within the same hospital chain or system. Providing patients with infection rate information enables them to identify which hospitals are making patient safety a priority and which ones are not."

Consumer Reports Health highlighted five Chicago hospitals that report infection rates that are more than twice the national average. Topping the “worst hospitals” list was Uptown’s Louis A. Weiss memorial Hospital, which has an ICU infection rate that is a whopping 421 percent worse than the national average.

To read ABC 7’s news story about the findings click here.

Wilson Yard Target Opening On July 25, 2010!!!

Thursday, February 4, 2010 | | 24 comments | Bookmark and Share

All your Target questions have been answered! Ask and ye shall receive!

A reader contacted Jeff DeMoss, the District Team Leader for Target, and asked him some questions about the Wilson Yard location. The reader forwarded on the following:

Target Opening On July 25, 2010!!!

Call To Action: Maryville TIF Red Tape Begins

| | 5 comments | Bookmark and Share

Send a few emails, or show up on Monday, to let your feelings be known about the proposed Maryville TIF.

An eagle-eyed reader tells us that the City Council's Finance Committee is meeting at 10am on Monday, February 8th, in the City Council chambers.  It's very probable that the Wilson Yard amendment will be under consideration at this meeting, although the agenda has not been released yet. The ordinance has been written so that amending it to remove the Maryville parcels (which is what Amendment No. 2 is all about) is a technical change that doesn't require any individual public meetings before passage.  (Great way to get around the Open Meetings Act, isn't it?)

This meeting is very possibly the only public shot people can take at this first step towards a Maryville TIF. If you can skip work to attend -- great!  If not, please contact Ald. Shiller and other members of the Finance Committee and let your feelings be known.  To contact them, click on this link and scroll down to Finance Committee.  Links are there to email them.

One argument you can make is that makes sense for a full plan for the parcel to be in place, before cutting properties out of one TIF to create another TIF to help finance it. Isn't it our right, as citizens and financiers, to know where this development is heading before it's allowed to be funded? Our source says the other aldermen may cite Shiller's prerogative to run her ward how she wants, but it may give some of them something to think about if she does decide to run for re-election and asks for their endorsement.

Happy We'll Be, Beyond The Sea

| | 1 comments | Bookmark and Share

Say it with Sushi!  Blue Ocean Contemporary Sushi, at 4650 N Clark, is offering Valentine's Day dinner specials for two.  Click on the menu to the left for a larger version, or check out Blue Ocean's website.

Blue Ocean is now offering lunch Wednesday through Sunday, as well as dinner every night of the week.

"Endangered Missing Person" In Uptown

| | 4 comments | Bookmark and Share

Chicago Police Dept seeks your help in locating a missing "at risk" person:

STOCKSTILL, DONALD
(18 years old, Male, 5'06", 175 lbs.)
Last seen: Lawrence Ave and Sheridan Road, February 3, 2010
Last seen wearing a dark hoodie, dark jeans and dark shoes.

Subject was being transported to River Edge Hospital in Forest Park, Illinois, when he fled the vehicle.

If you have information that can assist in helping safely locate STOCKSTILL, DONALD, please call 911 or AREA 3 SPECIAL VICTIMS UNIT AT 312-744-8200.
 
This information was sent out using the Chicago Police Department's new Nixle communications system.  Click the link for information on how to sign up.

Local Election Coverage At LEN

Wednesday, February 3, 2010 | | 0 comments | Bookmark and Share

Lake Effect News has quite a bit of local election coverage in today's edition:
Check it out here.

"No Loitering" Signs Surface

| | 5 comments | Bookmark and Share



A reader sends in the following pic and asks:


"So I was driving on Irving Park toward Sheridan and saw a "No loitering....call 911" sign under the L tracks right next to Tom Tunney's Ann Sather park. Is this new?"

Live From Buena Park

| | 11 comments | Bookmark and Share

UU reader "Eye In The Sky" clued us in on a link to this live webcam, showing an aerial view of Buena Park. We aren't sure of the camera's exact location, but maybe one of our clever readers can clue us in. Very cool.

Long Before Challenger Park

| | 6 comments | Bookmark and Share

via "Chicago's North Side Switching" and Tom Burke
"This photo shows the old C&E station at roughly Montrose Avenue, with Graceland Cemetery in the background.

This is the Buena Yard where the Milwaukee Road and the Chicago Rapid Transit interchanged freight cars.

Today the Buena Yard and the interchange tracks are replaced by Challenger Park, a linear park starting at Grace and going up towards almost Irving Park Road. The park is named after the former Challenger space shuttle."

Interesting tidbit from the comments:
"Those of us who lived through the Challenger Park debacle recall - and have the newspaper articles that prove -- that Challenger Park got its name from all the "challengers" who objected to the formation of Challenger Park. The community challengers objected to incoming alderman Shiller's deal to hand over the existing Park District playlot in the 4300 N Kenmore block to a developer and then replacing it with a the Buena Circle playlot located under the noisy and filthy El tracks. The Challengers also objected to the closing of Clifton St that used to run north/south from Irving Park and Montrose between the west side of the El tracks and the Graceland Cemetary wall in exchange for the one-way alley under the El tracks that still has no track shields to prevent debris from falling on cars parked below. The Challengers also objected to the give away of the use of the new "community park" for exclusive Cubs parking use. The losing alderman in that campaign pushed through the paper work to formally name the park "Challenger Park" before Shiller took office.

The Park District and Shiller have tried to re-write history and spin the tale that says that the park was named for the Challenger disaster to hide the historical truth."

"This Much I Know" By Ric Addy

| | 1 comments | Bookmark and Share

The Sun-Times's This Much I Know column today gives the floor to Ric Addy, whose "Shake Rattle & Read" bookstore just celebrated its 44th anniversary as an Uptown legend.

Read all about it here.  (To know him is to love him... this interview makes us like Mr. Addy even more than we did before.)

Push Back - Vote

Tuesday, February 2, 2010 | | 13 comments | Bookmark and Share

The Tribune has a pretty strongly worded editorial today on why you need to get to the polls.  Think of it as a practice run for February 2011:

Your former governor, Rod Blagojevich, will be indicted within days on fresh charges of public corruption. Yet another of Chicago's felonious aldermen, Isaac "Ike" Carothers, learned Monday that he's prison-bound. Prince of darkness Edward Vrdolyak awaits his sentencing by a different federal judge. And the polls close at 7 p.m.

No, those three gentlemen aren't on Tuesday's election ballot. But the Illinois culture of political sleaze is. You can skip the election and, once again, give the insiders of Illinois and Cook County free rein to tax, borrow, spend, reward their cronies and generally lord it over you.

Many of the pols who run Illinois and Cook County still hope you'll forget what they've done. Don't. Push back. You matter.

Free Appetizer With Mention Of UU At La Ciudad

| | 0 comments | Bookmark and Share

Hi, Uptown Update!
La Ciudad would like to offer your readers a free appetizer with their meal if they come in and mention that they saw the offer on Uptown Update! The offer is good today through Thursday, and they can also follow La Ciudad on Twitter @LaCiudadChicago, or on Facebook.

TIFish Farm

| | 6 comments | Bookmark and Share

Want to find out more about that Salvation Army fish farm you're paying a few million dollars for?

Don't look at Ald. Shiller's website... you won't find anything there.

But there's an article about it in Mindful Metropolis magazine.  That's where you'll read that Uptown can't support a farmer's market, so that's why aquaponics is such a good fit.

Uh-huh.

Read about the future of your TIF/Tax dollars here.

New Dining Option On Wilson

| | 0 comments | Bookmark and Share

A reader writes in:
"Heading to work today I spotted a new restaurant at 1118 W. Wilson (next to Viet Bowl). I peeked inside and it looks like they have done a bit of remodeling and added new lighting. Thought your readers would be interested. I think the name is "Agees" judging from the banner but I was at a bad angle when I took the pic. The signs say they offer catfish, burgers, salmon, pizza and gyros, subs, tacos... pretty much everything. I will be stopping in soon to try it out. Hopefully they will be sprucing up their yellow awning, but not with the stickers the place across the street used."

Clarendon Dog Park Organizing Meeting

| | 2 comments | Bookmark and Share

From Clarendon Park Neighbors Association:

"Now that we have secured a large part of our funding, we need to get organized so we can have our Dog Park built as quickly as possible. We will have an organizational meeting on Monday, February 8th, at 7pm. The meeting will be held at the Kahawa Coffee House, 838 W. Montrose. The purpose of the meeting will be to bring everyone up to date, and set our primary goals moving forward. The meeting will take no more than 90 minutes, although we will try to keep it to 60 minutes. Please come if you want to help with the planning and execution of this community resource."

Ald. Shiller Subpoenaed To Testify In Carothers-Related Case

Monday, February 1, 2010 | | 13 comments | Bookmark and Share



Read all about it at Chicago Breaking News

Teen Shot Near Uptown Grade School

| | 25 comments | Bookmark and Share

From Chicago Breaking News, by Carlos Sadovi
Updated:
An 8th-grader was shot in the arm on his way to school on the North Side this morning, police and school officials say.

The 15-year-old boy was headed to the Brennemann Elementary School when he was shot about 8:25 a.m. in front of a convenience store four to five blocks from the school at 4251 N. Clarendon, according to Chicago Public Schools spokeswoman Monique Bond.
The boy ran to the Brennemann school, where school officials called for an ambulance and police, according to Police News Affair Officer Robert Perez.

The boy was taken to Advocate Illinois Masonic Medical Center in good condition, officials said.

Police suspect the boy was shot by a 16-year-old boy who fled, Perez said.

Bil Musleh, owner of the Food Town, 4401 N. Hazel St., said the shooting happened about a half block from his store. He said police were reviewing surveillance video from inside his store and have asked to make a copy of the video. Continue Reading

Buttercup Playlot Advisory Council Forming

Sunday, January 31, 2010 | | 3 comments | Bookmark and Share

Concerned and active neighbors are getting together to form an advisory council for Buttercup Playlot, located at Sheridan and Ainslie, right next to McCutcheon School.  Volunteers are welcome and needed!  The effort is in conjunction with the Sheridan Road Task Force and it's a great way to get involved with like-minded neighbors.

The first meeting is Thursday, February 11, at 6:45pm at the Margate Park Field House.  The agenda will include (1) determinaton of community interest; (2) nominations for BPAC Officers; and (3) setting the dates for meeting and elections.  Hope to see you there.

Valentine's Day Specials At Fontana

| | 5 comments | Bookmark and Share

Wine and dine your honey on Valentine's Day by taking your main squeeze to Fontana (1329 West Wilson).  Two different prix fixe options are offered at very reasonable prices.  Click on the menu for details.

La Ciudad Reviewed In RedEye

Saturday, January 30, 2010 | | 9 comments | Bookmark and Share

RedEye's "Dining" section went to eat at UU's new favorite Mexican restaurant and gave it a rave:  "Don’t go looking for kitschy sombreros, lacquered maracas or any other prescribed trappings of a casual Mexican restaurant at sleek new Uptown BYOB La Ciudad.  Partners and brothers Armando and Hugo De La Rosa wanted to create a more modern vibe in their contemporary 40-seat eatery, and the result is an unexpectedly stylish spot in an otherwise unremarkable strip mall."  Read the whole review here, or get over to La Ciudad (4515 N Sheridan) and check it out for yourself.

People Must Be Dying To Get In

| | 4 comments | Bookmark and Share

Graceland Cemetery's fences are getting that cool gothic Victorian look with the addition of decorative wrought-iron spikes on top of the brick walls.  Seems the permanent inhabitants are being disturbed on a fairly regular basis by wannabe ghost hunters and metal and antiquities thieves.  These fences look pretty forbidding for uninvited guests.

Interested In A Wilson Yard Apartment?

Friday, January 29, 2010 | | 3 comments | Bookmark and Share

Seen on the main door of the Uptown Broadway Building in the 4700 block of Broadway.

"Wholesaler's Row" Gets Some Love From TimeOutChicago

| | 3 comments | Bookmark and Share

Several of the cheap and fabulous wholesale stores on Clark, between Sunnyside and Lawrence, got the attention of TimeOutChicago in an article about "fashion on a budget."  Its one caveat:  "Because the shops are geared toward retailers, there’s a chance you could get turned away without a business tax-ID number. At these prices, we think it’s worth the risk."

Prime Uptown Retail Space Needs Filled

| | 12 comments | Bookmark and Share

We heard from Amy Dressel, leasing associate with Joseph Freed:
"I just wanted to spread the word about a great new lease offer at our Uptown Square property (Borders, T-Mobile, Agami, Soggy Paws, Body Fit) - perhaps you can add to the blog? We have a 791 sf vacancy available immediately adjacent to Borders and we are offering 6 months of free rent for a limited time. The space is in excellent condition - perfect for an office or retail user. Rent is around $2,100 per month including CAM, insurance, and real estate taxes. Please call Amy at 312.675.5397 or email adressel@jfreed.com if interested."

Can you think of some businesses you would like to see in this space?