SUMMER COMES IN LIKE A LAMB

This week marked the official beginning of summer, but the usual things that accompany the often balmy and sweaty season -- domestic violence calls and other acts of random violence, at least in some parts of the city and suburbs -- just aren't happening here in La Grange.

However, we are pleased to report that there have been no reported traffic mishaps along 47th Street since a fender-bender during the evening rush at Peck Avenue on June 15 -- which breaks the chain I first reported on a couple of weeks ago that chronicled an estimated accident every other day.

Yet we are pleased the village has decided to take immediate steps to improve safety for pedestrians walking or riding bikes across 47th west of East Avenue by starting to install curb cuts into the parkway grass where sidewalks on the north and south sides of the busy state roadway have never been properly aligned.

Maybe the reduction in reported accidents along 47th has something to do with the nice, sunny days we've been experiencing of late, but maybe people who take that stretch to or from work or home are finally getting the picture by slowing down, paying attention to the road and drivers and others in their direct and peripheral vision, staying off the cell phone, out of the glovebox
or makeup purse or eating meals at the table instead of at the wheel.

Calling all cars
With the nice weather also brings minor activity that somehow makes it into the police blotter -- raccoons and coyotes on the loose, kids smoking and skateboarding on the parking deck and the latest popular pasttimes: Dumpster diving and swimming in the downtown fountain.

The young boys skateboarding were "caught" on the third floor of the 6th Avenue side of the deck at about 7:45 p.m. June 22, and sent on their way.

Those seen climbing in and out of a Dumpster outside Seventh Avenue School, 701 S. 7th Ave., at about 5:45 p.m. June 20 were gone by the time police arrived, and those playing nighttime basketball in Sedgwick Park, 48th Street and East Avenue shortly after midnight June 21 were sent on their way. Apparently, the Park District left the lights on after hours.

Earlier that day, kids discovered swimming in the nearby fountain -- at 3:56 and 4:06 p.m. -- were given a similar slap on the hand and told to either go away or just sit there.

Meanwhile, whoever was prematurely blowing off fireworks in the 400 block of East (or was that Eberly?) Avenue at 2 a.m. June 21 were also gone on arrival. Wait ... let me clarify that: fireworks, except for certain sparklers, snakes, smoke bombs and those little cardboard champagne bottle poppers, are against the law in Illinois.

Another trio of what several 911 callers believed were just causing trouble turned out to be just lolly-gagging around with what some witnesses at first described as a crowbar in Sedgwick Park. The calls, which were made about 9:15 p.m. June 21, described three boys or young men by the park's concession stand at 47th Street and 9th Avenue and one carrying a crobar. When found and questioned, they told police they all resided in the 400 block of 9th. They said they had found a pipe and were just walking around with it. The pipe was confiscated by an officer.

Perhaps the most serious offenders, mind you, were those bunch of kids on a canopy at Sawyer Park, Lincoln and Washington avenues, who police said were spotted by a resident throwing rocks at people shortly before 8 p.m. June 21. They, too, were nowhere to be found when the fuzz pulled up.

Police, in the meantime, established a special watch at Little People's Country, a preschool at 211 W. Hillgrove Ave., where older kids apparently have been drinking in a rear playground after the school closes and leaving empty beer bottles behind. The latest incident was reported at 5:42 p.m. June 19.

Someone who apparently was really low and, apparently, low on gas for their beige-colored sports utility vehicle drove off to who-knows-where after pumping $25.01 worth of fuel from a pump at the Shell gas station, 4701 S. Willow Springs Road, at about 2:15 p.m. June 20.

THE blue barrel?
Someone else reported to police seeing an apparently mysterious blue barrel on the side of the road near 47th and East at about 11:20 p.m. June 19. The barrel, found at 707 E. 47th, was empty. Aw, shucks.

In other news ...
One accident with injuries was reported involving a red sports utility vehicle, a silver Chevy Impala and a red fire hydrant at 5:09 p.m. June 21. The crash at Brainard and Ogden avenues prompted several 911 calls and resulted in injuries to a 41-year-old La Grange man, who was transported to Adventist La Grange Memorial Hospital for treatment.

Paramedics also were called to a residence at 43 N. Spring Ave., where a 1-year-old child was injured when a chair was accidentally dropped on their toe.

Firefighters were a bit busy this past weekend, either responding to fire calls in La Grange or helping out with mutual aid assistance calls in neighboring communities. La Grange was one of seven departments which responded to a reported house fire at 824 East Ave. at 3 p.m. June 22, not long before a residential fire in Brookfield shortly before 3:30 p.m. and a 2 p.m. fire call, also in Brookfield, that day. At 9:15 that morning, they helped out with a truck fire in McCook and at 12:55 p.m., transported an elderly woman who fell in front of Women's Planned Health, 5201 S. Willow Springs Road, to La Grange Hospital.

Paramedics a day earlier brought Barbara Zlotorowicz, 60, of Crest Hill, to the same hospital after she suffered a broken leg at 86 Bluff Ave. shortly before midnight June 21. Earlier that day, they responded to a report of a structure fire in Brookfield shortly before 5 p.m. and a residential fire call in La Grange Park at 7:55 a.m.

On June 20, firefighters responded to an activated fire alarm in La Grange Park at 4:34 a.m., an 11:30 a.m. fire call in Brookfield, a fire call in McCook after 4 p.m. and a Western Springs structure fire call at 6:45 p.m.

A day earlier, at 3:45 a.m., they also assisted in a smell of smoke call at a house in Western Springs.

A stop sign was also reported down at Brainard and Ogden avenues shortly before 7 a.m. June 22, and one of the paintings in the La Grange Business Association's summerlong public art exhibit -- on display at 712 W. Burlington Ave. -- was apparently damaged by the wind, it was reported to police shortly after 6:30 a.m. June 20.

That's it. Come back soon.