A semblance of order should have resulted when the Du Page County Forest Preserve Board voted last week to stop killing deer at Waterfall Glen, a nature preserve that officials said was overrun with the animals.
Proponents contended that it was nature’s order that was being maintained by killing the deer; it was an effort, they said, to keep things in balance. Opponents argued that nature could keep its own house and needed little help from the politicians.
Out of all this orderliness ensued a bit of chaos, at least for two of the animal-rights activists who had fought the deer killing. That provided an opportunity for County Board Chairman Aldo Botti to enter the fray to try to impose his own lawyerly sense of order.
He did so because Christy Nahser of Burr Ridge and Sandra Falcone of Hinsdale had decided to hop into a car and take a spin around the preserve, where about 253 deer had been captured and killed over the last two months.
Nahser and Falcone said they just wanted to make sure no one was monitoring the killing fields the evening after the vote to halt the deer culling.
But someone was. A forest ranger spotted the pair and followed them out of the preserve about 5:20 p.m.
Four hours later, the ranger and a colleague, both in uniform, went to Nahser’s home in Cook County and demanded her driver’s license as a bond card.
Nahser had been trespassing, they said. They found her by tracing her license plate.
Perhaps the rangers hadn’t heard that the program was over; the board had voted at 1 p.m. to end a program that usually began at 4 p.m.
Early the next day, Nahser and Falcone talked about Botti’s offer to help out if there were any problems. Not knowing what to expect from a man who had never formally endorsed the deer program and who had voted to end it the daybefore, they called.
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Within an hour, Botti was ushering the two animal rights activists into his lush, leathery office. Reporters who had been summoned by his public relations person about an unspecified meeting with activists also were there.
Botti asked some questions: “Do you feel you’re being harassed?” “Do you feel that your rights have been violated?” “Do you think it’s retribution?”
Then, with everyone in his office, he picked up the telephone and called Forest Preserve Police Chief Tim Curtin.
“These people don’t want to get arrested,” Botti could be heard telling Curtin. “I’m not trying to tell you what to do, but are they going to get arrested?”
Contacted later, Curtin defended his officers, saying that the activists were in a restricted area where deer meat was still being processed, and where explosive charges were being stored for the rocket-powered nets used to capture the deer.
Said Botti to the activists: “If they are harassing you, I will do something about it. This is not Russia. You were right in your petition to stop the killing of deer. You were right and you stopped it. If this is retribution, as County Board chairman, I will not tolerate it.”
Meanwhile, the women walked out of the office still not knowing whether they might face charges.
Help wanted:
Chances are if you need some kind of service, somebody down at the Glen Ellyn Volunteer Fire Company can do the job.
Have a side of beef that requires cutting? It’s covered.
Running for office and you have to get fliers printed up? There’s somebody there who can do that, too.
“We have all walks of life,” said Fire Chief Stuart Stone, who is in the newspaper publishing business.
But what happens if a pipe breaks at the station and the firefighters can’t turn it off? That depends. If someone dies of embarrassment, the department does include a funeral director.
What it doesn’t have, though, is a plumber. “We’ve never had one,” said Stone. Out of 56 members of the department, not one is a plumber. They’ll take one, though.
Combing the electorate:
Mike Loda, who along with Steven Lakics is trying to unseat Paul Netzel, the incumbent mayor of West Chicago, in next month’s election, wants votes. And he wants voters to look good.
While the other candidates displayed buttons, fliers and bumper stickers at a debate Wednesday night, Loda took a different tack.
“Mike Loda for Mayor” combs were available, as were red, white and blue “Mike Loda for Mayor” emery boards. To round out the display, he also had Mike Loda magnetic calendars and Mike Loda pencils.
Forget me not:
Loda didn’t pick up everything he could have from The Ideas Companies, the company that made his campaign items, but imagine if he did. Think about teeing up your Mike Loda golf ball. Or wiping your sweaty hands with a Mike Loda towel.
The business also has everything from visors to rain bonnets to to sun shades for cars. With the beginning of spring, a popular item is the campaign packet of seeds, according to the manager of the Naperville office. In the catalog, the seeds are for, what else, forget-me-nots.
Like Loda said, “There is something for everybody.”