Some may want to cancel the Olympics because of the Zika virus. It’s coming up from the south and we have an open border down there. Welcome Zika virus to America because we don’t know enough how to control our borders from disease, freeloaders, etc.

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This is for the Lombard police. I thought we had a nighttime parking ban. On the cul-du-sac where I live there are cars parked every night, sometimes two, sometimes up to five. In fact there’s one car that hasn’t moved and they have a two-car garage. I don’t know if they’re afraid of driving around the court or they’re just too busy at 3 a.m. If you’re going to have a law, you should enforce it.

The following response was received from the Village of Lombard:

“Midnight shift officers do enforce the overnight parking ordinance and issued over 2,000 citations in 2015. The overnight parking ordinance prohibits parking on village streets between 2 a.m. and 5 a.m. Officers do try to check every street in their assigned beat, but sometimes do not get to them all due to calls for service and other responsibilities such as DUI enforcement. Residents can get parking permission from the police department up to four times per month. If you feel that an area is getting missed or want to report violations, please call 9-1-1 and an officer will be dispatched to check the area and issue citations.”—blm

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It’s kind of nice that President Barack Obama criticizes Trump for wanting to put up a wall to stop the illegal immigration problem, which costs our country billions and billions of dollars. But he doesn’t have a solution. He never did have a solution. He never did try to do anything to stop it but all he can do is criticize. I say, if you’re not part of the solution, you’re part of the problem and he is part of the problem. Bye.

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I’m going to call in to let folks know what a proud person I am of living in Villa Park. If anybody ever paid attention to how many homes have been selling in Villa Park, well, I would say it’s probably because our town does nothing for all the tax dollars we give to them. The streets are the worst anywhere around. I’ve got to live right next to Lombard where they lay brand new concrete streets up and down Madison Street, but our streets, no. Pot holes every street you go down. It’s shameful. It’s shameful and we need to throw these people who are in office out. They’re no better than the wonderful politicians in Washington. Thank you very much.

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Yes, this is Villa Park calling. I’m under the impression that you’re going to make the main part of Villa Park Ardmore across the railroad tracks. You want to beautify that part of town that’s fine, but I have lived in this town all of my life and as far as I am concerned, you’ve got it wrong. The main part of Villa Park is Villa up to the railroad tracks and Ardmore up to the railroad tracks.

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Lombard here. People are out in their yards enjoying the glorious spring weather. Almost all Lombard neighbors are respectful of others when it comes to bringing their music or radios outside. Lombard does indeed have an ordinance that directly applies to residents and the restrictions we face being in close proximity to other neighbors: “No person shall emit beyond the boundaries of his or her property located within the limits of the village any noise that interferes with the enjoyment of life...” My trustee stated that only the person playing their music should be able to hear it. Those residents who think that they can play their music loud enough that neighbors can hear need to be stopped. Our community police officers are ready to approach these thoughtless folks and put a stop to their insensitive behavior. Be a good neighbor this summer and call in a complaint about these noisy few. Paying fines may be the consequence they need.

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Living at the bottom of the Ardmore bridge there are probably 25 semi trucks a day that miss their turn-off of North Avenue. If you’re putting up new signage why not direct the trucks? Why do you have a crosswalk in the middle of someone’s yard not designated as a crosswalk? For what that eyesore cost you could have replaced the entire length of sidewalk that is crumbling and uneven.

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This is in response to Villa Park callers who keep insisting libraries will be obsolete in 10 or 20 years—we probably won’t be needing schools much longer either as you can learn everything you need to know on the Internet. Folks, we can save a lot of money by closing all the schools. Last year over 200,000 visits were made to the Villa Park Library; we don’t have nearly that many students going to all of the schools in town, yet most of our tax bills go to pay for schools, so let’s shut down some schools. We have the Internet. When I was young in the late 1950s, we were sent a little newspaper called the Weekly Reader; they printed an article that stated by the year 2000, “cars would be driven by floating on a cloud of air” and roads would be obsolete. So where is that road referendum money going, since we won’t be needing streets soon? If you thoroughly read the parks and recreation booklet, you have probably seen the sometimes high cost of programs; if you have just as thoroughly read The Resource from the library, you will see very nominal costs for programs and free book discussions, use of computers, etc. Believe it or not, everyone does not own a computer at home and pay monthly fees for it. Do you really want to not have a library in Villa Park—please think about that before you decide. Lastly, riddle me this, what’s the difference between parks and recreation and the library? Books.

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Villa Park is a great place to live, regardless of what the previous caller said. It is one of a very few cities/villages that are actively repairing roads, etc., with a balanced budget. The police are quick to respond when needed, roads are plowed as they said they would be and there is open access to village officials. Sure there is always room for improvement, but we have a pretty good thing going on in Villa Park.

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I’d like to say kudos to Gov. Rauner also. He’s done such a marvelous job of cutting the funding for kids who are dyslexic, for people who need to have home care, the affirmed, elderly, let’s cut that funding too. Let’s cut the funding to the schools, to the colleges, to everything we possibly can cut the funding to, which basically affects most of the middle class people. The flat real estate tax, why doesn’t he raise it on the people who own businesses and could afford to have it raised? Why does he not raise taxes on the wealthy people, but no, let’s do it to the middle class and especially to the seniors, who can barely get their real estate taxes paid and are leaving the state. Yes, Gov. Rauner has done a marvelous job of cutting and slashing the state down, just like every other Republican governor of a state.

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We’d like to express our heartfelt thanks to Police Officer Chris Bakken. His heart and compassion went above and beyond his duty at a recent family emergency. We wish him the best for the future. May God give him many more years to serve our community.

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Regarding the Villa Park Library issue and recent comments, yes, the recreation department does offer many great activities and programs all for a fee. The library activities and programs are free to all residents. As far as meeting rooms, the library is a source of free, quiet, safe space for school-age tutors, ESL tutors, merit badge counselors, students needing quiet study space, etc. Too often they are booked with people needing to use them than there is space. The village hall and park district buildings are generally booked with scheduled meetings and programs, and thus not available to the general public on demand. Maintenance repairs have been ongoing over the last number of years on aging systems that are in great need of updating. Some systems are so old and out of date, repair parts can’t be found anymore, much less knowledgeable repair men who know how to fix these aging systems. People looking to move into a community look at the quality of the school system, the park district and the library to help them choose where to live. Letting a library slide into outdated, outmoded, decrepit condition is not a great selling point for Villa Park and not much help in keeping home values high. Thank you.

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To the person late Friday afternoon who was riding his bike eastbound at the intersection of Maple and Elizabeth, you nearly hit me as I was turning left to go north on Elizabeth, after stopping at the four-way stop sign. You blew the stop sign and had to veer to the right side of my car to avoid hitting me. You looked like someone who is an avid biker—or maybe you just dressed like one—but you should know that you had a lawful duty to obey the same traffic signals as vehicles. You never even stopped at the intersection. Thank goodness I saw you. See, it’s not just at the Prairie Path where some people are not paying attention.

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I see the Lombard Police are going to participate in the Click it or Ticket program over Memorial Day and that’s nice, but I would much rather see them cracking down on people who are on cell phones. People who don’t buckle up are only going to kill themselves. These people who are driving along talking on cell phones, not paying attention, they’re going to kill me. I have yet to see anybody pulled over for cell phones. If you sit in front of Glenbard East on any given morning, there are hundreds of people going by on their way to work talking on cell phones. That’s been illegal for a number of years in a school zone. And, they’re not obeying the school zone speed limit. So, I think when you’re being selective about what you enforce, you ought to enforce something that helps everybody, not just the people who having the potential for killing themselves. Thank you.

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This is Lombard calling. I was at the secretary of state’s office in Lombard and they had no air conditioning. You have to sit there for an hour or so to be waited on because they’re crowded, but no air conditioning. This is ridiculous. You have to go there to get your stuff and you have to sit there and wait to get it. You could die from the heat. They really need to take care of that. Thank you.