Downers a nice place to live but needs some work
I’ve lived in my home here in south Downers for 31 years. A few of my observations, as one who has run and walked the streets of our town all these many years.

Residents and their guests frequently park their cars across sidewalks with no regard for walkers; one neighbor’s car with three flat tires has sat for at least four years in their driveway; one neighbor has seen fit to build a treehouse on their front lawn; many drivers, particularly on Friday,

Saturday and Sunday evenings, drive 50 to 70 mph on south Dunham Road, 63rd Street and Main Street with impunity; and numerous neighbors expel their sump pumps out the front of their lots, flooding and freezing driveways and sidewalks, also with no regard for walkers.

One neighbor lets local papers pile up in his driveway for weeks on end; most folks pick up solid dog waste, but feel quite free to let their dogs urinate anywhere and everywhere; one house, on 67th Street, just east of Dunham, has been abandoned for countless years and has fallen in to severe disrepair.

Thankfully, most residents give some consideration to the impact of their actions on their neighbors. Perhaps a mayor or village official or police chief will read this and address some of the issues I’ve raised. In the meantime, this is still “mostly” a good place to live, but practicing “live and let live” seems to be more difficult with each passing year.
Richard Nolan, Downers Grove

Column paints inaccurate picture of Bill Ayers
Enough of the liberal dribble. Bill Ayers is an unrepentant terrorist. He is not, as opinion editor Jerry Moore describes him, an “education revolutionary” attributing Ayers a colonial, founding father feel.

Moore’s opinion April 8 column states that Ayers is changing his tune. Both his old tune (bombs) and his new tune (indoctrination of our kids) are both hard to listen to. Moore states Ayers’ popularity is in a resurgence. A more apt term used to describe criminals and lowlife thugs is notoriety.  

There are better role models from the 1960’s to teach our children about how to preserve democracy. Ayers’ Weather Underground had the goal to violently bring democracy down. His old strategy was radical change as an outsider and his new strategy is radical change as an insider.

Moore also paints the opposition to Ayers as coming from people who “incite threats of bodily harm.” This is so typical of the left in making Ayers and those who support him the victims.
Glenn P. Zemel, Downers Grove