Some time ago, because of all the freight trains going through and because of safety concerns, I believe the village received from Union Pacific tens of thousands of dollars to put in a walkway from Parkside to Park Avenue coming out somewhere around Punky’s. To date I have not seen any plans for that walk through and I was just wondering, does anybody know where that money actually went or are there any plans to put that in? It would be interesting to know, seeing how many freight trains there are and how people have to wait to cross over. I appreciate it.

Lombard President Bill Mueller, in his annual State of the Village address, mentioned in passing that “With the construction of the pedestrian underpass, our downtown will no longer be separated by railroad tracks,” but did not add any specifics. Since it is against village policy to acknowledge inquiries from an anonymous source, you can call the Lombard Village Hall at 630-620-5700 for further assistance.—JAC

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This is Lombard calling. What are the consequences from the Village of Lombard for not shoveling your sidewalk after it snows? I’m talking about businesses and homeowners, including trustees, who don’t bother to clean their sidewalks. Some have not cleaned it in either one of the two snowfalls we had. What does the village do?

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We have forgotten what is right and what is wrong. We complain about teachers’ salaries and pensions; are they really fair? We complain about the lack of transparency in government. We complain about the lack of representation in our elected officials. We complain and do nothing. Everything we complain about is either swept under the rug or forgotten. And the objects of our ire say we will forget and we do. Will you forget? Those in the know, tell me how to deal with teacher pensions and negotiating salaries and pensions. Those who know, tell me, who is my representative on the village board and his or her phone number? I am past forgetting.

Since you don’t specify where you are calling from, if you live in Lombard, you can call the village hall at 630-620-5700 or visit www.villageoflombard.org to determine in which district you live and therefore, who your trustee is. If you are a resident of Villa Park, you are represented by all the trustees. Call the village at 630-834-8500 or visit www.invillapark.com to find out who they are.—JAC

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Chairman Obama wants to force insurance companies to provide “free” birth control. Even some Democrats can figure out that someone’s going to pay for it one way or another. It isn’t free. And if Obama wants to force insurance companies to provide free birth control, why should he stop there? Why not force them to provide “free” aspirin? “Free” toothpaste? “Free” sunblock? “Free” cough drops? “Free” gym memberships?

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I would like to congratulate Village Manager Hulseberg and his staff for a job well done. We had a flood problem recently which required village involvement. I called David Hulseberg and within 20 minutes village employees were at my home to assist and offer advice. Thank you Dave and staff. You guys are the best.

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It’s good to hear Rick Soderstrom may be considering returning to our village board. We need his experience as we come out of this recession.

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Villa Park. When is the Pete’s Fresh Market on the corner of Roosevelt and Summit going to open? Thank you.

Upon accessing the Oakbrook Terrace Web site, there is link to the Pete’s Fresh Market Web site, which says, “Coming Soon.”—JAC

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Lombard calling. Other countries such as Syria are willing to die for their freedom but we are willing for our president to take away our freedom. Go figure.

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People, let’s quit bashing the bridge to nowhere issue. It’s obvious the project isn’t going to go away. I think the village gets the point that most people think the village’s share is a waste of money.

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To the person in the Feb. 15 SPEAK OUT, I am the one who would buy pizza at Bona on Cruise Nights but I think you missed my point. A previous caller blamed cruise cars for taking up the spaces in front of the pizza shop and thus hurting business there. I was refuting that because I saw for myself that patrons going into Bona were parking there, not cruise cars. That was the point. And though I didn’t shop at every single store that was open during Cruise Nights, because they were mostly eating establishments, I did frequent a number of them on any given Saturday night; at least the ones that were open.

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Three reasons to be a teacher: June, July and August. I used to see that shirt a lot. I think that’s the attitude that’s pretty prevalent. Besides that, other reasons are tenure—which means they can’t get fired although that’s changing, thankfully—and yes, you can get a liberal arts degree and then teach. Get any four-year degree and then go to a college like Trinity, I believe, and you are certified to teach after you student teach. Then you are eligible to work, be a gym teacher and someday make $90,000 a year for playing basketball with kids. Sorry, but that’s the truth. Three reasons to be a teacher: June, July and August; and then two weeks at Christmas and one week in spring. Thank you.

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Hi, this is Lombard calling. I’m walking the area between Willow and Brewster every morning and I’m seeing garbage bags full of dog dirt on the street and now smashed by many cars that have rolled over it. Also noticing a lot of dog dirt on the sidewalks. Can’t these people carry plastic bags and pick up after their dog. Please help us keep our village clean. Thank you.

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Struck by the difference in the two comments in the Feb. 8 SPEAK OUT regarding teachers, one, following the other. First, gosh darned, found teaching easy, and heck, not even needing a degree. But ended by saying he was not beating up on teachers. More to the truth was call number two, expressing that the average teachers, policemen and firemen are far worth more than what they get in dollars and cents.

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Yeah, I’m a teacher and I’m tired of seeing all the bashing in SPEAK OUT. I’ve had a lot of education and had to pay for that education out of my own pocket. I’m not getting paid enough to take care of all your misbehaving kids and I need more time off just to recover from the situations I run into taking care of your unruly kids. Stop bashing teachers. Thank you.

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Hi, this is Lombard calling. First off I’d like to say thank you to the police department for serving and protecting us, but my question is, Where are you? There used to be a time when I saw police going up and down the street and I never seen them anymore driving around. Also, the cars are going so fast—I walk early in the morning when it’s dark out—and then they don’t even stop at the stop signs; they barely roll by, again I wonder, where are you? Could you go back to patrolling the streets, especially Lombard Street, where just this week three cars were going at least 60 mph, one right after the other. I knew they were all together. Please, let me see you. Thank you.

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Yeah, Illinois is a Blue State. Another caller mentioned that. I’m wondering why the federal government’s getting involved in pushing anti-religious rhetoric down Christian health care organizations’ throat. It goes against the Catholic Church, it goes against Christian religions and what they’re doing, whether it’s contraception or abortion. This is very scary. Anybody who votes for this dictator should have your own little country with him as the king—which it seems he thinks he is already—and you are subjected to his rules. I’m not. I’d like to secede from this union and have our own country with our own conservative president and get rid of this garbage. Thank you.

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Hey America, gas prices are up 83 percent since the great President Obama has taken office, and yet this is a good reason to cancel the pipeline. That’s an 83 percent increase in your gas. Gas was $1.80-something when he took office. Today it’s $3.41. Great job, President Obama.

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The State of the Village address was very encouraging. Our village president, board and paid staff did an excellent job weathering this economic storm. Dave Hulseberg deserves more credit than he gets as does Bill Mueller.

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Villa Park calling. I am running into encounters with small dogs running loose on the front lawns of owner’s properties as I walk my “leashed” dog. Who is at fault if my larger dog bites one of these loose running animals that displays aggressive behavior and initiates an attack on my dog or better yet my wife and I while we are walking along a public sidewalk?

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Kudos to the three people who called in on Feb. 15 and took the teacher bashing person to task. Two of these readers were teachers and one was a parent. They were articulate and well educated and as one of them commented, “Please, SPEAK OUT callers, please be informed and educated on the information before you call up and make up stories.”

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Lombard calling. While I don’t always agree with the decisions Trustee Giagnorio makes on his part-time job with the village, I will continue to buy his pizza. His pizza is one of the best. Wouldn’t it be nice if he redeveloped the vacant Flaherty’s to the north of him? If he did that, I wouldn’t have to eat half my pizza on the drive home. Thank you.

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Lombard calling. How does our elected village board pick our village manager and department heads? Do they interview them and ask pertinent questions? Is the village president the main decision-maker? If our elected officials, the village board, don’t take time to seek the facts, maybe we should pay them more. If we don’t pay much for their time, energy and research, we will get what we paid for. For what it’s worth, you can take that to the bank.

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Hi, I’m just replying to the comment about the Obama regime and being on the stick. Now I didn’t call about Obama the last time, but I just want to say I am not under the Obama regime because I didn’t vote for him. Maybe you did, but I didn’t. So all I have to say is, people like you who voted for him put this country in peril. So, the problem is, you don’t know how to see through the forest with one tree. You can’t even see the forest through one tree. God help us if you vote for him again.

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It has been reported that in North Carolina state agents are opening kindergarten children’s lunch boxes and removing food that they deem not acceptable and making them pay for cafeteria food approved by them. This is just like Nazi Germany and like Communist Russia has done to its citizens and we have to stop this stuff in November. This is our last chance for a free America. Democrats can no longer run our country.

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Hello, Lombard calling. Watching this past week’s village board meeting really showed me exactly why so many people are frustrated with government today.  During the meeting, the funding of the Lombard Historical Society’s carriage house was discussed.  While I am completely in favor of this project, I am very frustrated with the manner in which the funding would be obtained was discussed. The original theory was to take $81,000 from the downtown TIF funds as a loan to LHS and it would be paid back. I find this disturbing for two reasons. One is the fact that the TIF funds are to be used only for enhancement of downtown business not as a dipping pool for the village’s pet projects. Two, is the fact that what the village did not disclose is once those funds are taken out of TIF, they cannot be paid back to the TIF funds.  They would go back into the village’s general fund. So, what the village was trying to do without any discussion was to deplete the downtown TIF funds by almost 20 percent and then keep it for themselves once it is paid back. In President Mueller’s State of the Village address, he noted that the village currently has a $5-million-dollar surplus. If President Mueller and Dave Hulseberg are so confident that this loan will be paid back, why are they not suggesting that those funds be taken from the general fund and then paid back to the same fund? I find it very telling that even though President Mueller and the village board keep saying that they are standing with downtown and are in favor of the Downtown Vision Plan that they continue to try to pull the wool over everyone’s eyes and do things that will eventually hurt downtown.

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Hello, this is Lombard calling and every week I’m amazed and equally amused at the community, at the commentary that is posted in SPEAK OUT. The steadfast, ill-informed Republicans complain about Obama, the weak debate about teacher salaries and the apparent joy of bashing the trustees and the village. I invite you to listen to what George W. did in his first two years and compare that to Obama’s first two years in office. Of course you won’t, and you will continue to whine about it. A teacher may make just three times the salary of minimum wage, basically $25 an hour, but there are uneducated construction workers holding stop and go signs making that much. If it is “pretty gosh-darned easy,” maybe more people should be teaching. No, wait. I wouldn’t want a person like that teaching my kids. That person has already had his or her share of weak math teachers. And those of you who openly like to bash our trustees, like Ware, Giagnorio and Breen, you can run for office, you know.