Two Things
Roosevelt Road Street Fair

As plans move forward to make Roosevelt Road a little more environmentally friendly, the coordinator of an upcoming street fair on the thoroughfare is following suit with a green theme for the festival.

The Roosevelt Road Summer Spectacular Street Fair is set for 10 a.m. to 6 p.m. Saturday, Aug. 23, between East and Oak Park avenues.

Coordinator Paul Zimmerman, president of the Roosevelt Road Business Association and vice president of the Berwyn Development Corp. board, said he organized the event with an Earth-friendliness theme because he would like to see more sustainable development on the thoroughfare.

“This whole streetscape plan that’s going is literally a greening of Roosevelt Road in terms of getting landscaping and trees, which Roosevelt Road has precious little of. I’m hoping that there will be elements that are green in construction,” he said.

He said a project on Marion Street in Oak Park, where storm-water runoff on the street could be filtered and reused to water landscaping there, would be good for Roosevelt Road. The project was led by Duncan Associates in Chicago, the same urban planning consulting firm that representatives from Berwyn, Cicero and Oak Park are working with to revitalize Roosevelt.

Vendors are based in the Chicago area and include Recycle Me, which sells 100 percent organic cotton T-shirts; My Solar Bike, which aims to cut emissions and sells electric bikes; and Green Home Experts, which offers environmentally friendly building products for the home.

Chicago Gateway Green, a nonprofit organization advocating for the beautification of the Chicago area, will be present as well as someone from the Working Bikes Cooperative, a Chicago-based nonprofit that accepts bikes as donations and ships them to needy people across the world. Also, two Smart cars will be exhibited, and a Segway enthusiast plans to show off his preferred mode of transportation.

The music stage is near FitzGerald’s, which will offer outdoor service of featured beers and dedicate its front yard to seating.

On the family stage will be the Oak Park-River Forest High School gospel choir; a music ensemble from Morton West; Circus Boy, a Chicago-based juggler, who rides a unicycle and plays with the audience; and a hip-hop dance group led by an Oak Park youth. David Kovac, who calls himself the “New Vaudevillian” and does magic, will emcee the event.

The stage also will feature snippets from theater companies the 16th Street Theater of Berwyn and the Village Players of Oak Park.

Mitchell Furlett, who calls himself “The Johnny Appleseed of Water Conservation,” will show people how they can conserve water in their homes on a daily basis.

The North Berwyn Park District will set up games for kids and Wonder Works, the children’s museum in Oak park, will host activities.


Non-Partisan Referendum Town Hall Meeting

This will be held Monday, August 25, 2008 at City Hall at 7 pm. The City Council will be voting on Tuesday, the 26th, whether or not to put on the November a ballot a referendum that would change Berwyn's local election of City Officials to non-partisan, rather then Democrat, Republican, etc. I urge you to attend to be educated and ask questions and decide if you wnat to change to a non-partisan way of voting.
- posted by Mark @ 9:17 AM