The Green Edition 2008

A Possible and Sustainable Future

Green is Everyone’s Favorite Color

Joliet Job Market Among Strongest in Nation

Sustainability Practices That Can Boost Your Bottom Line

VOLUME 5 ISSUE 5 JULY 2008VOLUME 5 ISSUE 5 JULY 2008

THE BUSINESS-TO-BUSINESS FORUM

PRSRT STDU.S. POSTAGE

PAIDPERMIT #565

KANKAKEE, IL

Publication DirectorKen Munjoy

EditorAndrew Wheeler

Art DirectorKim Carpenter

Advertising Manager Jeff Egbert

Copy Editor and Direct Connections CoordinatorVickie St. Louis

Distribution ManagerTerry LaVoie

Distribution CoordinatorBecky Blackwell

Press ForemanDave Grams

ComposingRoss Bertrand and Marcus Jackson

Advertising CoordinatorJanet Jones

Information SystemsMike Steele and Jennifer Hudson

Staff PhotographerMelissa Gaug

Advertising ConsultantsTerry Atkins

Jo Ann Bachar Sandy Behrends

Joanie Copenhaver Amy Eichholz

Thomas Goodrich Gina Harpin

Marcia Hellmuth Myrdis HinesBlake Naylor

Monte Parsons Lisa Sunn

Cary Turner Lyle Turro

uPCoMiNG B2B iLLiNoiS DEADLiNES

August 1, 2008 Publication:

Ad space reservation / article submission deadline: 7/11/2008

Ad approval deadline: 7/21/2008

To advertise, contact your advertising consultant at The Daily Journal: 815.939.6642

HoW To REACH uS

n To receive this publication or change an address, log onto our website: www.b2billinois.com

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B2B Illinois is a free publication of the Small Newspaper Group. Information published in B2B Illinois is the responsibility of the author and may not reflect the

opinions of the B2B Illinois staff. All editorial content and advertising published is the property of the Small

Newspaper Group dba B2B Illinois.

Features regulars4 From the Editor | andrew Wheeler

5 Around the County | ed Piatt News and programs from the Illinois Department of Commerce and Economic Opportunity.

6 From the Desk of Rep. Dugan | lisa Dugan

6 Ask SCoRE | Michael Holtzman Life’s lessons learned from the Service Corps of Retired Executives.

16 organize it! | Karen Mcgregor Suggestions on how to get out from under the clutter and into productivity.

26 Tech Corner | Wade leBeau Tips on utilizing your Internet broadband con-nection to the fullest.

27 innovative Management Solutions | Patrick seaton Operational advice from an industry professional.

30 Spanish Language Training | Dr. Héctor lópez Tips for businesses wanting to access the explod-ing Hispanic consumer market.

33 How’s Business | Bill guertin Branding advice from an industry professional.

28 out & About

31 out & About

34 Direct Connections

37 Direct Connections, Will Co.

Cover story

Seeing Green: sustainability Practices that Can Boost your Bottom lineby Lisa Wogan | B2B Illinois takes a look at sustainability efforts and technologies from around the world, and right outside your back door.

On the cover: Ron Romano of Connected Community with Mark Johnson and Bill Bonner of Rhapsody Cove. Photo by Melissa Gaug.

7 Manpower Releases Third Quarter Employment outlook Survey Results submitted by Beth Brosseau | Local employers relay hiring plans.

9 A Possible and Sustainable Future by Jerry Weber | KCC President Dr. Jerry Weber discusses his institution’s commit-ment to sustainable practices and technologies.

14 Wal-Mart illinois Embraces Local Green Vendors by Andrew Wheeler | Sell or market a sustainable product? If so, Wal-Mart wants to talk to you.

15 Green is Everyone’s Favorite Color by Lindsay Gladstone | Governors State University’s commitment to our environment.

16 Zip-Pak Research Findings Manteno manufacturer part of the solution.

17 Arctic Snow and ice Chooses Bradley Manufacturing Location B2B staff report | Economic Alliance of Kankakee County lands Frankfort manufac-turer.

17 Back Power and Brain Power: Both Jobs Need Education by Nancy J. Ruda | A B2B Illinois report from the “Public Agenda for Higher Educa-tion Summit” held at KCC in June.

18 Green…it’s the New Corporate Color by Nancy J. Ruda | A B2B Illinois report from the June “Go Green and Learn How to Make it Happen” event held at Moraine Valley Community College.

22 Pay Attention to Parents’ investment Strategies by Bob Meyers | Financial advice from industry expert Bob Meyers.

22 Hiring a Business Consultant by Reneé Perry | What to look for in a consultant.

23 Acres of Diamonds at Work by Ron Price | According to author/consultant Ron Price, great managers look for ways to develop each employee’s strengths rather than trying to fix weaknesses.

24 Joliet Job Market Expected to be Among Strongest in Nation Joliet area manufacturers predict their hiring needs for Q3 2008.

25 Going Green in Will County Top Priority by Lawrence Walsh | Green news from Will County Executive Larry Walsh.

29 The Home Energy Tipping Point (or, How Can i Save Money?) by Tom Goodberlet | Tom Goodberlet discusses when it is cost effective to go with green HVAC technology in your home, and in your business.

31 Green Marketing: The Same old Principles Still Apply B2B illinois Staff Report | B2B looks at the latest in Green marketing efforts and the balance between effective branding and ecological stewardship.

32 illinois Accessible Parking by Dorci Schoolman | Is your business compliant with handicap parking laws?

38 What Do Gas Prices and Elder Care Have in Common? by Joe Giunta | According to JJC training director Joe Giunta, telecommuting can be a great way to go green, if done under a few key parameters.

tHanKs to our inDePenDent ContriButors:Beth Brosseau y Manpower y 815.939.7070

Lisa Dugan y State representative, 79th district y 815.939.1983

Joe Giunta y Joliet Junior College y 815.280.1555 y jgiunta@jjc.edu y www.trainingupdate.org

Lindsay Gladstone y Governors State University y 708.534.7090 y l-gladstone@govst.edu

Bill Guertin y The 800-Pound Gorilla y 815.932.5878 y bill@The800PoundGorilla.com

Michael Holtzman y SCORE Chapter 0674 y 815.427.9818

Wade LeBeau y The Daily Journal y 815.937.3332

Dr. Héctor López y BEST Solutions, Inc. y 630.910.4509 y hector.lopez@bestsolutionsinc.com

Bob Meyers y Edward Jones y 815.939.1175

Karen McGregor y Organize It! Professional Organizing Services y 815.936.1108 y www.organizeitillinois.com

Dorcilla C. Schoolman y Options Center for Independent Living y 815.936.0100 x 229

Reneé Perry y Small Business Consultant and Coach y 815.722.0041

Edward Piatt y N.E. Senior Account Manager, Illinois DCEO y 312.636.0739

Ron Price y 866.442.0556 y www.Price-Associates.com

Patrick Seaton y Innovative Management Tools, LLC y 715.340.9606 y pjseaton@tds.net y www.innovativemanagementtools.com

Lawrence Walsh y Will County Executive y 815. 774.7480

Jerry Weber y Kankakee Community College y 815.802.8100 y jweber@kcc.edu

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815-929-9095 office 815-929-9085 fax

Chris Curtis, BrokerCell 815.693.4949

Joe Nugent, BrokerCell 815.509.9005

Pamela BaronCell 815.955.2392

Sandy WursterCell 815.274.2535

Paul WalshCell 815.955.2457

Nate HenrichsCell 815.739.9859

Kankakee. 52,225 SF industrial facility on 5 acres.Features include 6 interior docks, 17’ + clear height, 4,560SF office. Can be leased 25,000-52,225 SF. MLS 190516

$1,750,000

Kankakee. 2,994 SF office/service facility for sale. 1575 SFfinished office w/ track lighting. Large, open 1395 SF area w/12' ceiling and air conditioned. MLS 190847

$275,000

Kankakee. 7,075 SF facility. 5,000 SF clear span showroom w/vaulted wood beam ceiling. 2,025 shop area w/ 10'x12' drive-indoor. 100% sprinklered. 750 SF mezzanine office area. MLS 190887

$265,000 $248,500

Kankakee. 9,300 sq ft cinder block building located on cor-ner lot. Over 1.8 acres for expansion or storage. ZonedIndustrial. Many uses possible. Call Joe Nugent. MLS 190516

$375,000

Grant Park. 5,500 sq ft facility. Multiple overhead doors forease of use. High ceilings. Ideal for operation of business orstorage. On slightly over 1 acre. MLS 191837

$255,000

Kankakee. 18,000 - 80,000 SF for lease. 22' to 24' ceilingheights, up to 8 docks w/ levelers and 4 drive-in doors.480/277 volt/400 amp/3 phase power. MLS 191837

$4.50 PSF gross

Bourbonnais. Low new construction rates. Suites available1,500 SF and larger. High visibility with large 2-story atriumlobby entrance. Suites available for sale also. MLS 191837

$8.00 PSF NNN

Bourbonnais. For sale or lease. 4,680 SF brick & block bldg.Great location on busy Rt. 45 in the path of progress w/ add’lland for expansion. Many uses. MLS 191837

$700,000

Kankakee. Custom built ranch w/ full lookout bsmt. NearKankakee St. Pk. 4 BR, 3 BA. Kit w/brfst nook/sun rm, granite.Mstr Suite w/ Jacuzzi, double sinks, skylight, ceram. shower.

$379,900

Bourbonnais. Spacious 3BR, 2BA brick ranch w/ open floorplan. Kitchen updated. Good size utility/mud room off garagewith new ceramic tile. Fireplace. Shed. MLS 191616

$179,900

Bourbonnais. Ranch w/open floor plan. Kit w/stone back-splash, granite counters, maple cabs. Bsmt w/home thea. sys.,poss 4th BR, rec/family rm. Fenced backyard. MLS 191975

$279,900

Mokena. Wooded land located in city limits. Close to allamenities. 2BR, 2BA, 2 car garage. Borders Hickory CreekForest Preserve. Call Pamela Baron. MLS 191843

$409,000

Bourbonnais, Prarie Chase Subd. New 2-story w/ 4 BR, 2.5BA, 3 car gar & full bsmt. HW flooring. Kit w/ custom cabinets.Master Suite w/Jacuzzi, shower & WIC. MLS 192304

$299,900

Bourbonnais, Prarie Chase Subd. New brick ranch w/ split floorplan. 3 BR, 2 BA, 2 car gar, full bsmt. HW floors. Kit w/ customcabs, isl., pantry. Master Suite w/Jacuzzi, sep shower. MLS 192303

$299,900

Bourbonnais. Neutral colors & lots of space. Partial unfinishedbsmt. Completely remodeled incl: new flooring, fixtures, doors& trim. New Maple cabinets, ceramic tile in kit. MLS 192597

$239,900

Kankakee. Well maintained 2 BR, 2 BA condo. Outside park-ing & 1 car det. garage with storage & electric opener. Updatedkitchen. Condo fee Includes water/sewage. MLS 192579

$88,900

www.nugentcurtis.com

www.nugentcurtis.com

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LOTS AND LAND: Manteno: 80 +/- Acres, $11,000 per acre • Manteno: 224 +/- Acres, $17,500 per acre • Bourbonnais: 75 Acres w/ Preliminary Plat, $50,000 per acre • Bourbonnais: .80 Acre lot on Rt. 45, $300,000

LOTS AND LAND: Limestone: .70 Acre lot in River Crossing, $145,000 • Limestone: .70 Acre lot in River Crossing, $145,000 • Limestone: .78 Acre lot in River Crossing, $145,000

PRICE REDUCED!

PRICE REDUCED!

From The Editor | by andrew Wheeler

“It’s not easy being green.”

Kermit didn’t know how right he was. Al-though his lamentation was centered on the vari-ous problems a frog pup-

pet can encounter, and the trials and tribu-lations associated with being a pork lover, Kermit’s words ring true for businesspeople in today’s economy…and ecology.

Becoming “green” in your operations is no longer a matter of if; it’s a matter of how.

The only real way to address your com-mitment to sound, environmentally-sus-tainable practices is to take a hard look at what you do, and how you do it. Is an in-vestment in green technology ever going to turn black dollars for my company? Is this development in tune with our village’s com-prehensive plan, and more importantly, does my village’s plan address sustainability and green space? Are we going down the right road with all of this intermodal growth in

our area, or should we be focused on reduc-ing the number of trucks on our roads and invest in low emission train transportation?

These are all questions we, as business-people, must ask of our industries and our communities.

While researching this edition, I took a hard look at the sustainable practices of my operation, and the practices of our daily newspaper as well. With regard to our daily paper, all in-house paper waste is recycled into insulation. Our newsprint is made from 30-40 percent post consumer recycled paper, and we use sustainable inks where

available. I was shocked to find that B2B Il-linois is printed on bright white paper that uses no recycled stock. I can find no mill that produces the ideal product, so I have begun the process of finding a mill that manufactures the type of paper I need, switching to lower-end newsprint, and exploring more dramatic options.

There aren’t a lot of easy answers here. The best, long-term decision has to bal-ance the constraints of economics and the accountability to our planets’ ecology. Hopefully this edition of B2B Illinois provides some ideas for both your office, and your home.

On another note:During the Chicago Bears training

Camp in 2007, a group of local economic development leaders, spearheaded by Bradley Mayor Gael Kent and the Illinois Department of Commerce and Economic Opportunity, hosted the first Internation-al Trade Summit in Kankakee County. Trade commissioners from around the

globe spent the day visiting indus-try in the region, and spent an af-ternoon at Bears Camp. This year’s event, spearheaded by Mayors Kent, Green, and Schore, along with the DCEO and Ben-nett Commercial, is set for the end of July. The Tri-Cities Trade Summit is a unique opportunity for local industry to initiate international business opportuni-

ties, and is a much-anticipated event for the trade commissioners themselves. Kudos to the mayors, Jeff Bennett, Ed Piatt, and all of the summit partners for taking advantage of a tremendous marketing opportunity for our community and its employers.

Best,

Andrew H. WheelerB2B Illinois Editor

Lessons from Kermit

06300820196389

Throughout the year, The Daily Journal publishes SpecialSections and Feature Pages of the newspaper. These annualsections target lifestyles, address specific consumer needsand/or feature event information of national and localimportance.

Special Sections and Feature Pages can be a cost-effectiveway to reach thousands of readers with a particular interest.Plus, these sections generally have a longer shelf-life thanthe daily newspaper allowing your business' message to beseen again and again!

SPECIAL SECTIONSMonth Section Publication DateJuly County Fairs Monday, July 14

Bears Extra Thursday, July 24*The Answer Book Thursday, July 31NEW! Regional Restaurant & Delivery Directory July 2008

August Fall Home & Yard Thursday, Sept. 4

Sept. NEW! Constitution Day Section Thursday, Sept. 11Fifty Plus Thursday, Sept. 18Weddings (Fall Edition) Thursday, Oct. 9

FEATURE PAGESJuly Childcare Directory Sunday, July 27

Hire-a-Pro Thursday, July 31

August Pick the Pros Tuesday, Sept. 2Fall Home & Yard Directory Thursday, Sept. 4

*Publication dates are subject to change.

For more information about any of these Special Sections, contactyour Advertising Consultant or call 815.939.6642.

GET YOUR POINT ACROSS

Weijia Wang, from China, listens as Peddinghaus Corporation owner anton Ped-dinghaus greets the group of foreign business leaders and speaks briefly about his company during the 2007 international trade summit. Photo by nicholas Holstein/the Daily Journal

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112 Solid, Experienced, Trustworthy…

We Know Banking Like You Know Your Business!

Kankakee • West Kankakee • Bourbonnais

815.929.4000 www.FirstTrustBankil.comLarry Mulder, Dave West, Mark Christensen & Jeff Smith.

Come Grow With Us!The Right Loans, Deposit

Products and Cash Manage-ment Services for All of Your

Company’s Needs

This month I would like to highlight the Department of Commerce & Economic Opportunity’s clean energy and environ-mentally-friendly business practices and

design assistance grants for “green” com-mercial buildings. These design assistance grants, available through the Illinois De-partment of Commerce and Economic

Opportunity, are for businesses using the LEED (Leadership in Energy and Envi-ronmental Design) building rating system.

LEED is a voluntary rating system pro-moted by the U.S. Green Building Council to allow building owners and developers to benchmark the environmental performance of their building relative to others. The LEED system considers environmental factors such as the energy efficiency of the building, the use of renewable energy and the use of recycled content building materi-als, among other factors. For more informa-tion on LEED, see www.usgbc.org.

Under the new pilot program, businesses with commercial building construction and renovation projects will be eligible to apply for awards of up to $100,000 if they meet the LEED Gold level of performance, achieve an energy performance of at least 20 percent beyond the minimum energy code, and incorporate best practices in solid waste management.

“Green buildings are a high growth area, and when Gov. Blagojevich puts his seal of approval on green building practices by announcing this program, it helps make the industry real and moves us another big step forward,” said Lois Vitt Sale of Phoe-nix Architects and the chair of the Chi-cago Chapter of the U.S. Green Building Council. “This funding will be very helpful to move more green building projects for-ward.”

Green design incorporates design prac-tices that significantly reduce or eliminate the negative impact of buildings on the en-vironment and the building occupants.

Funding for the program is made available from two sources. Half of the funding is a grant from the Illinois Clean Energy Com-munity Foundation; the other half comes from the Illinois Solid Waste Management Fund as administered by DCEO. Because

the program brings benefits in both energy conservation and solid waste reduction, the program is funded through both sources.

“The Illinois Clean Energy Commu-nity Foundation has had a very successful program for the past five years to support the design and commissioning of LEED projects to not-for-profits and government agencies. The Foundation is very pleased now to help Gov. Blagojevich make fund-ing available to the private sector,” said Phil Novak, chair of the Foundation. “With the new DCEO program and the Foundation program, funding for LEED projects will be available to all sectors as an incentive to develop state-of-the-art green buildings.”

Prior Foundation grants have resulted in 60 successful green schools, college build-ings, museums and affordable housing models in communities across Illinois.

I would also like to take this opportunity for anyone interested in the Opportunity Returns program or seeking business assis-tance to contact me at 312.636.0739 or e-mail me directly at Ed.Piatt@illinois.gov.

Until next month, see you around the county…

Edward Piatt is NE senior account manager for the Illinois Department of Commerce & Economic Opportunity, covering Kankakee, Grundy and

southern Cook counties.

Iroquois County: Paul Faraci, east-central manager 217.278.5851E-mail: Paul.Faraci@Illinois.gov

Will County: Beth May, NE senior account manager 815.721.3543E-mail: Beth.May@illinois.gov

Around the County with the State of Illinois | by edward s. Piatt

opportunity returns:

DCEo’s “Green” Grants

Community service is essential to the progress of our neighborhoods. I believe it is important that we teach the significance of community service to children at an early age to help foster a genuine love and concern for the advancement of their communities. That is why I established my Community Service Scholarship, which provides finan-cial assistance to community-minded high school seniors.

It is important that I not only encourage community service but that I am also an ex-ample. Each year, I donate a portion of my legislative salary to provide a scholarship to one senior in each of the high schools in my district. Since 2004, I have awarded over $19,000 in scholarships. To qualify for

the $500 scholarship, students must reside in the 79th Representative District, plan to attend an Illinois college or trade school in the fall, possess a record of community service beyond that required of their high school, and submit an essay describing how they have served their communities and how they plan to continue their efforts. I am pleased to announce that this year I was able to award $7,500 in Community Service Scholarships to local students.

This year’s scholarship recipients are as follows:

Amber Olbrot—Peotone High School

Ariana Dymerski—Marion Catholic High School

Brittanny Spangler—Manteno High School

Cameron Ohlendorf—Beecher High School

Cornell Jones—Kankakee High SchoolDane Langellier—Donovan High SchoolEric Cavender—Momence High SchoolErin Williams—Grant Park High SchoolHeather McKenna—Herscher High

SchoolJenna Simmons—St. Anne Community

High SchoolMegan Quigley – Wilmington High

School Nathan VanHoff—Kankakee Trinity

AcademyTiffany Frugia—Crete-Monee High

SchoolKatelin Wilfinger—Bishop McNamara

High School

Richard Reyes—Bradley-Bourbonnais Community High School

I am proud of these young people and their commitment to our community. They are shining examples of our bright future and I hope their efforts encourage other students to become more involved in their schools and communities.

I would also like to remind you that I have moved my local district office to:

Heritage Executive Centre 200 E. Court St., Suite 710 Kankakee, IL. 60901Phone: 815.939.1983 Fax: 815.939.0081E-mail: lisadugan@sbcglobal.net Please feel free to contact me anytime I

can be of service.

Lisa Dugan, state representa-tive, 79th district.

From the Desk of Representative Dugan | by lisa Dugan

Community Service Scholarship Recipients

There are many reasons why you might want to place a value on your business. Per-haps you’re thinking about taking on a part-ner who will buy into the business. Before that can happen, you both need to know what the business is worth.

And you’ll certainly need a valuation or appraisal if you want to sell the business. Other reasons you might need a valuation include divorce, spin-offs, business disputes and liquidation. Or how about this: You might simply want know.

Accurately valuing a small business, however, can be complicated. Most entre-preneurs are capable of boosting the value of their businesses by 40 percent simply by paying attention to the things that make a business valuable.

Too often, business owners brush aside valuations, believing them necessary only if they decide to sell. As a result, only about one in 20 small businesses have done a for-

mal valuation, according to the National Association of Certified Valuation Ana-lysts.

You can determine the value of a busi-ness in many different ways, from quick and cheap software-based calculations you do yourself, to full-scale, certified valuations by professionals. The price range is enor-mous, from as little as $15 for the simplest software, to thousands of dollars for a detailed analysis performed by certified pros. Busi-ness brokers, hoping to sell your business, may even do them for free.

Try to match the person or method you use for a valuation with the reason you are doing it. If the valuation is for loan pur-poses, for example, look for someone who’s done small business valuations for that pur-pose.

The National Association of Certified Valuation Analysts (NACVA) offers a free service online to help you find a business valuation expert in your area. NACVA pro-vides training, certification and support for

professional valuators in cities and towns nationwide. Look for the “Find a Valuator Directory” at the Web site, www.nacva.com.

PriceYourBusiness.com offers simple small business valuation software you can access online 24/7. Results are quick and available anytime.

To learn more about valuing your small business, contact SCORE “Counselors to America’s Small Business.” SCORE is a nonprofit organization of more than 10,500 volunteer business counselors who provide free, confidential business counseling and training workshops to small business own-ers. Call 1.800.634.0245 for the SCORE chapter nearest you, or find a counselor on-line at www.score.org.

Michael Holtzman is chairman of the Kankakee Valley Chapter of SCORE.

Put a Value on Your Business

Ask SCORE | by Michael Holtzman

Manpower Releases Third Quarter Employment outlook Survey Results

Kankakee County employers expect to hire at a respectable pace during the third quarter of 2008, according to the Manpow-er Employment Outlook Survey. From July to September, 20 percent of the companies interviewed plan to hire more employees, while none expect to reduce their payrolls, according to Manpower spokesperson Beth Brosseau. Another 80 percent expect to maintain their current staff levels.

“Employer sentiment about hiring ap-pears to be less encouraging than in the second quarter of 2008 when 30 percent of companies interviewed intended to add employees, and none planned to reduce staff levels,” said Brosseau. “Hiring activity is expected to be stronger than one year ago when 13 percent of companies surveyed planned to increase staff levels and 3 per-cent expected to cut payrolls.”

For the coming quarter, job prospects appear best in Construction, Non-Du-rable Goods Manufacturing, Transporta-tion/Public Utilities and Wholesale/Retail Trade. Hiring in Durable Goods Manu-facturing, Finance/Insurance/Real Estate, Education, Services and Public Adminis-tration is expected to remain unchanged.

Nationally, U.S. employers are project-ing a slight decline in hiring for Quarter 3 2008, according to the seasonally adjusted survey results. Of the 14,000 U.S. employ-ers surveyed, 26 percent expect to increase their workforces during the July-Septem-ber period, while 10 percent expect to scale back their payrolls for a net employment outlook of 16 percent (seasonally adjusted 12 percent). Fifty-eight percent expect no change in the hiring pace, and 6 percent are undecided about their hiring plans.

Beth Brosseau is branch manager of Manpower’s Bourbonnais office.

submitted by Beth Brosseau

Employment Outlook Survey Summary Of Results For The State Of Illinois3rd Quarter - 2008 (July/August/September)The following table shows the percentage of employers in the state of ILLINOIS who plan to change or maintain the size of their workforce during the indicated time period.

NET iNCREASE/ iNCREASE No CHANGE DECREASE DoN’T KNoW DECREASE

AURORA 23% 70% 7% 0% 16%

BLOOMINGTON 20% 57% 20% 3% 0%

CARBONDALE/MARION 20% 57% 20% 3% 0%

CHAMPAIGN AREA (GREATER) 19% 77% 0% 4% 19%

CHICAGO-CITY 30% 44% 26% 0% 4%

CHICAGO METRO AREA 26% 48% 23% 3% 3%

CHICAGO-NORTH SUBURBAN AREA 33% 20% 37% 10% -4%

CHICAGO-NORTHWEST SUBURBAN AREA 8% 65% 27% 0% -19%

CHICAGO-SOUTHWEST SUBURBAN AREA 27% 43% 13% 17% 14%

CHICAGO-WEST SUBURBAN AREA 37% 63% 0% 0% 37%

CHICAGO SOUTH 27% 43% 13% 17% 14%

CHICAGO-O’HARE 3% 90% 7% 0% -4%

DANVILLE 57% 23% 10% 10% 47%

DE KALB/SYCAMORE AREA 30% 63% 7% 0% 23%

DECATUR 20% 77% 3% 0% 17%

EDGAR COUNTY 17% 73% 3% 7% 14%

ELGIN 23% 63% 7% 7% 16%

ILLINOIS QUAD CITIES 27% 66% 7% 0% 20%

ILLINOIS VALLEY 17% 63% 3% 17% 14%

JOLIET 50% 40% 10% 0% 40%

KANKAKEE COUNTY 20% 80% 0% 0% 20%

LAKE COUNTY AREA 23% 77% 0% 0% 23%

LIVINGSTON COUNTY AREA 10% 87% 3% 0% 7%

MC HENRY COUNTY AREA 30% 70% 0% 0% 30%

NORTHBROOK 33% 20% 37% 10% -4%

OAKBROOK 37% 63% 0% 0% 37%

PEORIA 27% 70% 3% 0% 24%

QUINCY 30% 63% 7% 0% 23%

ROCKFORD 30% 57% 13% 0% 17%

SCHAUMBURG 14% 38% 48% 0% -34%

SPRINGFIELD AREA 27% 46% 7% 20% 20%

STATE AVERAGE: ILLINOIS 26% 60% 11% 3% 15%

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A Possible and Sustainable Future

We are very fortunate in our region be-cause much of the growth is yet to come. We can watch it happen, or we can push or drive development and growth in a way that will make this area economically thriving while still maintaining its natural appeal.

As energy costs rise and concerns about environmental degradation increase, we need to either adjust our ways of doing business or find new approaches. One new approach has been called sustainable devel-opment. The guiding principles of sustain-able development are as useful in this region as they are throughout the whole Chicago regional area. In this area, as in all areas of education and training, Kankakee Com-munity College is ready to assist residents, businesses and corporations.

Because the term ‘sustainability’ is some-what new, it may need some definition. Sustainability is a term used by colleges, universities, government agencies and many corporations to encompass energy conser-vation, alternative energy, environmental issues and almost everything commonly called “going green.”

Sustainable development is an approach that recognizes the need for strong and con-tinuous economic growth and development while respecting the needs of future genera-tions. In its simplest description, it means designing houses, growing businesses, and establishing policies and practices with the needs of future generations in mind. It means minimizing waste, efficiently us-ing energy, and, wherever possible, reusing materials or using renewable resources. Sus-tainable development may also mean a new entrepreneurialism.

At Kankakee Community College, we intend to be both an example for sustainabil-ity and going green and a partner to assist others. The college will continue to promote sustainability and sustainable development in three ways: first, by being a model of sus-tainability on our campus and in our facili-ties through energy conservation, recycling, and environmentally-friendly practices; second, by creating resources to assist resi-dents, small businesses, and corporations in understanding the latest technology for energy efficiency and in using all available incentives for alternative energy and energy conservation; and third, by offering educa-tional programs and training to produce the workforce to move the new energy economy forward.

Walking the Walk: Sustainability at KCC

The college started down this road with a number of small steps that go back over five years. Our faculty and students have carried

out pilot projects with solar energy and new electronic and biofuel technology. For one project, the students constructed a working electric vehicle. In our newest facility, the Arts and Science building, we received grant funds to create a solar array using photovol-taic cells that are integrated into a large glass structure on the south side of the building The documentation of this project is tracked and recorded on a website at http://www.sunnyportal.com/Templates/PublicPage-Overv iew.aspx?plant=e38eeed6-f986-4157-8b13-07c2686f9fbb&splang=en-us.

Two years ago, we conducted an energy audit of the college facilities and have be-gun a multi-year process of making energy efficiency changes throughout the campus. For two years now the college has hosted a Sustainability Week bringing together area residents and students with KCC fac-ulty and students to look at all aspects of sustainability. Local, regional and state pre-senters joined our faculty in discussions of corporate actions to the science of climate.

Because sustainability is very much about the future, students have a natural inter-est, and last year our Business Club created a process to expand the college’s recycling system.

The college is now completing the reno-vation of a 30,000 square foot area that will house our health careers programs. An ap-plication seeking certification at the silver level in Leadership in Energy and Environ-mental Design (LEED) to the US Green Build Association was part of this project

from its inception.These first steps and pilot projects have

given way to our current approach of plan-ning and systematic commitment. The col-lege’s most ambitious hopes are now being set forth in a long-term sustainability plan. The plan will have measurable outcomes for annual, multi-year and long range goals to move the campus facilities and its program offerings towards sustainability. While the plan is still in draft form, our intention is to

have the entire document reviewed college-wide and approved this fall by our Board of Trustees, after which our college sustain-ability committee will then move this plan forward and continue to find new and cre-ative ways to conserve energy.

Our final sustainability plan will assur-edly include a process to audit our green-house gas emissions and then take steps to gradually reduce those emissions as close to zero as possible over a time frame that may extend as long as 15 to 20 years. A side ef-fect of reducing our greenhouse gasses and institutional carbon footprint will be greater energy efficiency. Our intention is to reduce our energy cost and redirect those savings to programs and instruction.

As one of our speakers for Sustainability Week pointed out, the first thing you want to do is reduce your own personal usage as much as possible. Second, you want to reuse as much as possible, and then third, whatever you cannot reuse, you should try to recycle.

While being carbon-free may sound like an ambitious goal, there are already col-leges and universities that are making great strides and a few have plans to be carbon neutral within 10 years. The good thing about being powered by alternative sources is that the savings are long term. Solar ar-rays that have been put in place 30 years ago have shown minimal need for maintenance while providing a continuous supply of elec-tricity over that cycle.

Replacing traditional sources of electric-ity with solar makes sense for institutions that expect to be in the same place for quite a few years. One strategy we have discussed would be to have our students install solar panels each year as part of a program on re-newable energy.

KCC Sustainability Center: Resources for the Region

While taking care of our own house is important, more important is our mission to serve the needs of our customers, the district residents, through education, train-ing and services. We have expressed this for over a decade by stating that our mission is “enhancing the quality of life through learning.”

By this fall, Kankakee Community Col-lege will be starting a Sustainability Center that will provide resources and information on energy conservation, energy incentives and alternative energy options for local ho-meowners, builders, small businesses and corporations within the region. Through seminars, workshops and individual con-sultations, the center staff will demon-strate how energy efficiency can mean dol-lars saved. For those who wonder whether wind power or solar energy could be use-ful at their home or business, this will be one place to get answers. For someone who

by Dr. Jerry Weber, B2B illinois correspondent

KCC glazed the South wall of its new greenhouse with building-integrated photovoltaics panels from Atlantis Solar. The greenhouse is located at the far West end of KCC’s Fine Arts and Applied Technology Building.

Cor Hershbach, Deputy Consul General from The Netherlands, and Barry Matchett, from the Environmental Law and Policy Cen-ter, were the featured speakers at Kankakee Community College’s Sustainability Week in late April. Hershbach discussed how the Netherlands became a leader, by necessity, in the reduction of landfill waste and Match-ett focused on the current environmental policies in Illinois, along with environmental legislation currently in Springfield.

Continued on page 39

COVER STORY

It seems one cannot pick up a single publication these days without see-ing numerous references to “go-ing green.” A hot concept that has

practically spawned its own business sector, the green scene and its related media buzz-words, nonetheless, cause some skeptics to groan, “Are we talking about this again? How does this aff ect me?” Regardless of one’s personal views on climate change and related subjects, sustainable business prac-tices are proving benefi cial to corporate im-age as well as the bottom line.

As forecasted in a benchmark 2006 re-port entitled “Green Perspective from Cor-porate America," green and green build-ing are emerging as a prominent corporate trend. Th e study, commissioned by Siemens Building Technologies and Siemens USA, found that a majority of large U.S. corpora-tions are embracing green as a part of the foundation of their corporate philosophy. Among those polled, 40 percent consid-ered green and green building to be of high importance to their organization, while almost 60 percent agreed that green and green building would lower operating costs. And, three-quarters of the survey’s respon-dents cited the escalating cost of energy as a key driver of interest in green and green building.

A Good NeighborTesco Corp. is one of the foremost super-

market powers in the business world today. In 2006, however, Tesco disclosed plans to improve its image, due to growing public concern over its methods of doing business. Specifi cally, Tesco wanted to be seen as more “neighborhood friendly.” Revamping operations in order to conduct business with greater regard for the environment would be a means to that end.

Today, Tesco aims to conserve energy, encourage healthier living among consumers and support local providers of pro-duce to stimulate the local econ-omy. CEO Sir Terry Leahy re-cently was quoted in UK-based Th e Guardian, say-ing that he made these modifi ca-

tions as “the result of changing attitudes among shoppers, who want businesses to be responsible, fair and honest, and good neighbors.” Tesco is fi nding that it is not enough to care for its own interests; public

sentiments dictate that businesses become more socially aware. In an eff ort to meet that demand, Tesco has established a £100 million fund (equivalent to US$200 mil-lion) earmarked for its stores’ green conver-sion.

Tesco’s multifaceted green plan is ambi-tious. Direct investment includes the incor-poration of wind turbines, solar panels and geothermal power. Th e company also hopes to introduce gasifi cation, which produces energy from waste material. Additionally, Tesco also has converted all of its bags to degradable material to prevent landfi ll waste and pollution. Attendant initiatives include a commitment to clearer food label-ing practices to encourage consumer health. Tesco campaigns for increased physical activity for both proprietors and custom-ers. It also has invested in both advertise-ments and the localization of its stores to promote running, bicycling and walking. Finally, Tesco is seeing a benefi t in blend-ing with the surrounding community. Th is is achieved by designing stores that comple-ment, not compete with, the style and de-sign of the neighborhood. Th ey have even coordinated truck schedules and customer orders to reduce home deliveries and the traffi c congestion.

Showcase of Green innovationWal-Mart is also renovating its stores

with green-geared innovation. In 2005, the corporation set a goal to improve effi ciency in its existing stores by 20 percent by the year 2009. To put this in perspective, Wal-Mart currently operates 3,900 stores in the United States alone, with 2,700 operating stores abroad. Th e corporation’s green ini-tiative is focused on three key sustainabil-ity goals for change:n Achieving a level of 100 percent renew-

able energyn Attaining a level of zero percent waste

outputn Producing products that are both sus-

tainable and aff ordable

In order to meet these goals, Wal-Mart has opened several prototype “high effi -ciency” (HE) stores. Th e Western climate-specifi c HE.5 is the latest prototype. Ac-cording to spokesperson Kory Lundberg, the site “features advancements in heating, cooling, refrigeration and lighting to con-serve energy and reduce greenhouse gas emission.” Th e clincher: It reportedly uses 45 percent less energy than the baseline Wal-Mart super center.

What makes this prototype unique is the way it adapts to a particular climate. Introduced in March 2008 in Las Vegas,

It seems one cannot pick up a single publication these days without see-ing numerous references to “go-ing green.” A hot concept that has

practically spawned its own business sector, the green scene and its related media buzz-words, nonetheless, cause some skeptics to groan, “Are we talking about this again? How does this aff ect me?” Regardless of one’s personal views on climate change and related subjects, sustainable business prac-tices are proving benefi cial to corporate im-age as well as the bottom line.

As forecasted in a benchmark 2006 re-port entitled “Green Perspective from Cor-porate America," green and green build-ing are emerging as a prominent corporate trend. Th e study, commissioned by Siemens Building Technologies and Siemens USA, found that a majority of large U.S. corpora-tions are embracing green as a part of the foundation of their corporate philosophy. Among those polled, 40 percent consid-ered green and green building to be of high importance to their organization, while

SeeingGreen

building.

A Good NeighborTesco Corp. is one of the foremost super-

market powers in the business world today. In 2006, however, Tesco disclosed plans to improve its image, due to growing public concern over its methods of doing business. Specifi cally, Tesco wanted to be seen as more “neighborhood friendly.” Revamping operations in order to conduct business with greater regard for the environment would be

Sustainability Practices That Can Boost Your Bottom Line

by Lisa Wogan, B2B Illinois correspondent

British retail giant tesCo offers green Clubcard Points to its customers who reuse bags rather than taking new ones.

the store incorporates evaporative cooling and radiant flooring techniques, utilizing the natural surroundings to regulate the internal environment, conserving energy and resources. The evaporative cooling pro-cess first pumps water into rooftop cool-ing structures, then cycles it to the ground floor. The cooled and circulated water is said to provide climate control on par with tradi-tional cooling systems.

Other ecologically-minded technolo-gies incorporated into the prototype stores include white roofs, daylight harvesting mechanisms, motion-sensitive light emit-ting diodes (LEDs) in grocery and jewelry cases, and efficient bathroom fixtures. The corporation also uses recycled construction materials, requiring as much as 20 percent fly ash or 25 percent slag in its cement mix-es. The steel used for structural building is

reportedly 90 percent recycled content, pro-tecting the environment through the use of by-products rather than raw materials. Not only is this building method environmen-tally friendly, but it is often economically practical as well. The cement/fly ash com-position uses fewer natural resources and ages better than traditional options, requir-ing less frequent replacement.

While Wal-Mart is making significant ecological advancements, its HE stores are still only prototypes. The corporation maintains a green orientation through its HE stores by researching new meth-ods of conservation, assessing the data to see what works and what does not, and using that informa-tion to make its business more environmentally friendly. The result is “a win-win situation,” explains Lundberg. “It’s environ-mentally responsible and lowers operating costs. Lesser costs are then passed on to customers.”

Advancing Green Mideast Reconstruction

Green technologies are expanding well beyond our borders. Virginia-based Geo-Building Technologies is utilizing green technology in order to improve the con-struction industry in Afghanistan as well as in other developing countries. The firm has created a self-powered system known as “The GreenMachine,” which produces

composite, exact tongue-and-groove, condensed earth blocks known as TerraBricks. Com-posed of subsoil and small amounts of ei-ther cement or lime, these blocks do not require mortar and their production cost is said to be half that of tra-ditional kiln-fired bricks. The innovation has proven to be a sound source of efficiency considering the production, installation and maintenance costs of other building materi-als. And, the bricks’ largely carbon-neutral composition adds to their earth-friendly image.

GBT’s TerraBricks have found numer-ous applications in Afghanistan, includ-ing a Kabul housing complex comprising a gymnasium, an orphanage and a vocational training institute. American University of Afghanistan Vice Chairman and building

contractor Frederic S. Berger has comment-ed that “The TerraBrick concept will not only allow rapid development of urgently needed, high quality residential facilities for our faculty and staff, but also reflects the long-term environmental responsibil-ity the university must communicate to its students.”

Yukiko Omura, executive vice president of the World Bank Multilateral Invest-ment Guarantee Agency adds, “Attracting foreign direct investment is critical to the reconstruction efforts and sustainable long-term economic growth of Afghanistan.”

Local Green outlook A recent open house hosted by Kanka-

kee-based Connected Community high-lighted the green movement. A few in attendance shared their, sometimes humor-ous, thoughts on the history of the green concept. One speaker, for instance, recalled the presidency of Jimmy Carter, who advo-cated driving no faster than 50 mph as well as reducing total vehicles on the road, in an effort to create safer travel and lower emis-sion output. Another admitted that, in her youth, “they talked about recycling, but we never did it.” Yet, most of the businesspeo-ple at the event expressed a genuine inter-est in understanding how preserving their

natural surroundings and saving money can go hand in hand.

Connected Community specializes in custom design and construction of home entertainment systems. Founder Ron Ro-mano calls conservation the motivating fac-tor in how he conducts his business. “It’s in the little things,” explains Romano, “trying to consolidate and route vehicles to be more fuel efficient, consecutively, instead of many little runs.

“We take what we can and make it as eco-friendly as possible so as to be respon-sible in our sales and as a company.” This is

Continued on next page

gBt’s greenMachine producing terraBricks.

Wal-Mart’s He.5 prototype store in las vegas, nevada.

energy-conserving electronics, like these offered by Connected Community, can be integrated into homes and businesses to control

lighting, temperature, humidity and more.

evidenced in Romano’s practice of recycling wire as well as in his company’s specialized lighting, heating and air control systems. Green concepts are also employed in the offi ce. Th e company’s personal lighting re-portedly has been decreased by 6 percent, performing effi ciently at an undetectable lower level, thereby conserving energy.

Connected Community uses Crestron

Electronics as its primary product provider. Founded 40 years ago, Crestron is a lead-ing proponent of control system design. Its control systems are said to signifi cantly al-ter the way electronics perform, integrating sub-system control and scheduling seam-lessly into the design of any building. Issues of ambient light levels, season, time, occu-pancy, temperature and humidity are coor-

dinated into a single device, meeting com-fort requirements while conserving time and energy. Th is technology also provides for remote access and control, allowing an individual to return to a lighted home with the click of a remote control.

“From lighting and shading control to heating and air conditioning control, we’re [showing] just how much electronics can

have a very positive eff ect on the environ-ment,” says Connected Community partner Amanda Romano. She explains that the fi rm does not use “going green” as a mere marketing ploy. Connected Community seeks to provide real benefi t to the region; that is part of how the business thrives.

Commitment to open SpaceRhapsody Cove is a new housing develop-

ment located at the northeast corner of 6000 N. and 4150 W. Roads, adjacent to both Bourbonnais and Manteno. Here, develop-ers aim to provide the best of both worlds—nature and community. Th e site is fi ve to 10 minutes from the Kankakee State Park, the post offi ce, the newly built Jewel store, I-57, Olivet Nazarene University, and countless restaurants, churches and shopping venues. At the heart of Rhapsody Cove, however, is its connection to the landscape.

Cove developers Bill Bonner and Mark Johnson told B2B Illinois that they aspire to design and engineer “one of the most beautiful, functional and sellable land plans.” Th e development consists of 243

COVER STORY Continued from page 11

During an april presentation for the Will economic network, legat architects President/Ceo Patrick Brosnan stated that one of the most effective ways for municipalities to address green development

is to adopt mixed-use developmental planning into their communities’ comprehensive plan.

Green Guide for Business OwnersSource: U.S. Small Business Administration

Adopting environmentally friendly and energy-effi cient business practices can benefi t business owners looking to control costs, attract customers and become socially re-sponsible. Following are steps that may be taken to implement an effective environ-mental strategy in order to become energy effi cient, compliant with environmental regulations and a recognized “green business.”

n Step 1: Comply with Environmental RegulationsGreen businesses should comply with all relevant environmental regulations. Compliance not only protects the environment, it protects businesses from government fi nes and legal action.

n Step 2: Develop an Environmental Management PlanRunning a green business means creating an environ-mentally friendly, energy-effi cient workplace. A sound environmental plan can help minimize a company’s eco-footprint and encourage green business practices throughout the organization.

n Step 3: Build GreenThose opening businesses in new or remodeled buildings may consider building green and installing energy-effi cient heating and air conditioning systems, appliances, equipment and lighting.

n Step 4: Buy Green ProductsConsider buying green products that are made from post-consumer, recycled materials as well as those that are bio-based, non-toxic, energy-effi cient rated products, such as those with the ENERGY STAR® logo. Consider renewable and recyclable options in addition to locally-produced variations.

n Step 5: Adopt Energy-Effi cient PracticesThe prudent and conservative use of energy, says the U.S. Small Business Admin-istration, is a proven way to cut costs, increase profi tability and create shareholder value. Given the potentially high returns and minimal risk, implementing energy-ef-fi ciency practices is at the core of most environmental management strategies. An energy audit is recommended in order to identify energy-saving options for those opening a home-based business or moving into an existing commercial building.

n Step 6: Reduce, Reuse, Recycle WastesMost businesses can save a substantial amount of money by reducing waste. In addition to lower removal costs, waste-reduction measures help cut costs on raw materials, offi ce supplies and equipment. Streamlining operations to reduce waste may also enhance a company’s overall effi ciency, productivity and public image.

Operational procedures may include the use of post-consumer, recycled prod-ucts; elimination of excessive product packaging materials; optimizing the

use of paper products; and participating in recycling programs.

n Step 7: Conserve WaterBy implementing a water effi ciency program, businesses can not only help conserve a precious resource, but also cut costs associ-

ated with buying, heating, treating and disposing of it. An initial water audit may be conducted by a local water agency. Thereafter, business owners may choose to conserve water by upgrad-

ing to newer technologies and using water-saving equipment utilities. A related initiative involves minimizing discharges to sewer/wastewater systems.

n Step 8: Prevent Pollution All businesses pay to handle waste, regardless of the type or volume. Companies actually pay twice for what they use—once when they

purchase raw materials and then when they rid themselves of any by-products. Re-ducing waste and fi nding new uses for by-products will save money and improve the environment.

n Step 9: Create a Green Marketing StrategyThose starting a green business should properly market themselves. Adding “green” claims and eco-labels to a marketing strategy will enhance brand im-age and secure market share among the growing number of environmentally concerned consumers.

n Step 10: Join industry Partnership and Stewardship Programs The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) sponsors a number of industry partnership and stewardship programs that aim to reduce the impact

of industrial activities on the environment. These partnerships can be a way for companies to forge relationships with other green business owners, as well as build a brand that is credible.

mental strategy in order to become energy effi cient, compliant with environmental

Green businesses should comply with all relevant environmental regulations. Compliance not only protects the environment, it

footprint and encourage green business practices throughout

Those opening businesses in new or remodeled buildings may consider building green and installing energy-effi cient heating and air conditioning systems, appliances, equipment and lighting.

Consider buying green products that are made from post-consumer, recycled materials as well as those that are bio-based, non-toxic, energy-effi cient rated products, such as those with the ENERGY STAR® logo. Consider renewable and recyclable options in addition to locally-produced variations.

The prudent and conservative use of energy, says the U.S. Small Business Admin-istration, is a proven way to cut costs, increase profi tability and create shareholder value. Given the potentially high returns and minimal risk, implementing energy-ef-fi ciency practices is at the core of most environmental management strategies. An

ucts; elimination of excessive product packaging materials; optimizing the use of paper products; and participating in recycling programs.

n Step 7: Conserve WaterBy implementing a water effi ciency program, businesses can not only help conserve a precious resource, but also cut costs associ-

ated with buying, heating, treating and disposing of it. An initial water audit may be conducted by a local water agency. Thereafter, business owners may choose to conserve water by upgrad-

ing to newer technologies and using water-saving equipment utilities. A related initiative involves minimizing discharges to sewer/wastewater systems.

n Step 8: Prevent Pollution All businesses pay to handle waste, regardless of the type or volume. Companies actually pay twice for what they use—once when they

purchase raw materials and then when they rid themselves of any by-products. Re-ducing waste and fi nding new uses for by-products will save money and improve the environment.

n Step 9: Create a Green Marketing StrategyThose starting a green business should properly market themselves. Adding “green” claims and eco-labels to a marketing strategy will enhance brand im-age and secure market share among the growing number of environmentally concerned consumers.

n Step 10: Join industry Partnership and Stewardship Programs The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) sponsors a number of industry partnership and stewardship programs that aim to reduce the impact

of industrial activities on the environment. These partnerships can be a way for companies to forge relationships with other green business owners, as well as build

acres, enough space to ac-commodate 107 single-acre home development sites along with 153 acres earmarked for fishing and boating lakes, wild-life and pure open space. The balance is to be reserved for future expansion.

Bonner and Johnson were par-ticular in hiring design profession-als for the Cove project. They say that only the best conservation devel-opers, wetland and prairie experts, and specialized contracting architects were consulted.

“Rhapsody Cove is a lot more involved than the final profit margin,” notes Bonner. “It is about the heritage of our country and the preservation of our land.” By promot-ing the green development, Rhapsody Cove not only accomplishes its primary goal of preservation, restoration, enhancement and stewardship of Illinois’ native prairies and wetlands for future generations. It also achieves what developers view as a better way of conducting business, one that ben-efits both the proprietors and the surround-ing community.

Seeking Energy AlternativesThough geothermal technologies have

been around since the 1970s, explains Bill Batkiewicz of K a n k a k e e ’ s Home Appli-ance, they are seeing increased use today as peo-ple seek reliable energy alterna-tives. The appeal is twofold—the fact that geo-thermal reduces reliance on fos-sil fuels and its overall energy cost savings, which Batkiewicz calls “pretty dramatic.” He tells of one residential cus-tomer from Peotone who, after installing a geothermal system, has seen his total

energy costs re-duced to an average

of $100 per month.Unlike changing air tempera-

tures, ground temperatures four feet to six feet below the earth's surface remain rela-tively moderate and consistent all year. That is because the earth absorbs 47 percent of all the heat energy that reaches its surface from the sun. Geothermal technologies es-sentially tap the energy stored in the earth, and according to industry representatives, totally eliminate the reliance on fossil fu-els. Geothermal systems are said to save an estimated 30 percent to 70 percent on users’ monthly utility bills as well.

Home Appliance carries EnerTech’s G e o C om for t systems. Com-pany literature claims that a single piece of equipment has the ability to heat and cool a home, while providing some or all of its hot water as well. B a t k i e w i c z notes that the heat extracted from the house in the summer can be put to

use in fueling the air conditioning system. He adds that geothermal units can com-pletely replace or merely supplement tradi-tional heating/cooling systems.

Local applications

of the GeoComfort system include the City of

Kankakee’s Willow Street Ar-mory building, which houses fire de-

partment officials. The site also serves as a public exhibit of the technology. Home Ap-pliance also will install a geothermal system in an earth home application in the Minne Monesse area.

Green is here to stay, at least for the

foreseeable future. And, going forward, a company’s ability to harness the potential of the green movement will likely contribute to its overall success. Legat Architects, a presenter at a recent Will County Economic Network luncheon said it quite succinctly: “Our businesses, prospects and clients are learning about sustainability.”

“Are you prepared?”

Olivet Nazarene University intern Ashley DeArmond contributed to this feature.

“rhapsody Cove is a lot more involved than the final profit margin; it is about

the heritage of our country and the preservation of our land.”

—Bill Bonner, developer, rhapsody Cove

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geothermal heat pumps use the stable temperatures of the ground as a heat source to warm buildings in winters and as a

heat sink to cool them in summer. these diagrams demonstrate the several ways that geothermal energy can be accessed and

piped into a residence.

Wal-Mart illinois Embraces Local Green Vendors

Wal-Mart Illinois is calling for local vendors to supply sustainable products and services to Wal-Mart stores across the state and in Illinois. The program was announced in April at the Greater Northwest Chicago Development Corporation Annual Meet-ing & Environmental Panel.

Whether it’s selling products made from recycled materials or using energy-efficient technologies, Wal-Mart is searching for more ways to enhance its dedication to en-vironmental stewardship. Some examples of vendors’ “green” products and services could include:n A farmer who sells organic goodsn A company that pressure-washes side-

walks using technology that captures the water for reuse

n A landscaper who uses innovative tech-niques to conserve water

n A recycling company that collects paint, aerosol cans, old electronics, or other

items“Wal-Mart has made strides to imple-

ment environmentally friendly products and practices in our stores, and we want to work with more local companies to take sustain-ability to the next level,” said Todd Libbra, Wal-Mart Regional General Manager. “Our call to vendors will not only help us support our commitment to protecting the earth, but also support our local businesses and economies.”

Wal-Mart already has identified and is working with local Chicagoland vendors and looks forward to expanding those re-lationships.

How the process works:

n A vendor contacts his or her local Wal-Mart store manager to set up a meeting

n The vendor meets with the store manager and/or market manager to pitch his or her product or service

n If the Wal-Mart managers approve the

vendor’s proposal, they provide it to the corporate Wal-Mart office

n The corporate office reviews the proposal and makes the final decision

n If approved, the vendor provides his or her products and services during a 6-12 month trial period; vendors may continue to sell their goods past this time if suc-cessful.

Building GreenWal-Mart also is stepping up their com-

mitment to green building technologies. In January, the retail giant opened their new High-Efficiency prototype (HE.2) store in Romeoville, Ill. Designed to significantly reduce greenhouse gas emissions and use 25 percent less energy than a typical Wal-Mart Supercenter, the Romeoville HE.2 Super-center is the first of four expected to open this year.

The HE.2 will use many of the energy improvements from the first generation High-Efficiency (HE.1) series as well as introduce new and improved technologies, such as a state-of-the art secondary loop re-frigeration system.

“We’ve taken the most efficient prototype in the retail industry and made it even bet-ter by incorporating some of the most inno-vative products in building today,” said Eric Zorn, president, Wal-Mart Realty. “We hope to continue making our stores even more efficient and sharing our learnings with the world, as we work toward a more sustainable future for our company and our customers.”

The 5 percent improvement in energy ef-ficiency over the HE.1 stores comes from

a streamlined design of the water-source heating, cooling and refrigeration system, coupled with the new secondary refrigera-tion loop. This is the first time secondary loop technology has been paired with a water-source system. The store components include:n 100 percent integrated water-source for-

mat heating, cooling and refrigeration system, where water is used to heat and cool the building

n State-of-the-art secondary refrigeration loop that reduces refrigerant by 90 per-cent

n Motion-activated light-emitting diodes (LEDs) in refrigerated and freezer cases, plus additional glass doors on deli and dairy cases

n Optimized pump package that is 50 per-cent smaller than the HE.1 store's and uses even less copper piping

n Industry-leading daylight harvesting technology

n Reflective white membrane roof n Recycled construction materials such as

fly-ash, slag, integrally colored concrete floors, and plastic baseboards and chair rails

n Sensor-activated low-flow bathroom fau-cets and waterless urinals

Andrew Wheeler is the editor of B2B Illinois.

by andrew Wheeler

www.edwardjones.com Member SIPC

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Green is Everyone’s Favorite Color

The growing awareness of global warm-ing and the environmental dangers it poses have ignited action on many levels, from in-dustry regulation to community action, and from coordinated institutional response to individual initiatives. Responsible citizens of the world, be they governments, busi-nesses, or single families, are striving to go green, preserve green and restore green in our lifestyle and to our environment.

“As an educational institution, Governors State University has a responsibility to our students and the community to make our environmental impact as positive as pos-sible,” said Susan Rakstang, associate vice president for Facilities Development and Management. “We believe we have to lead by example.”

With more than 6,000 students and 900 employees, Governors State University rec-ognizes the need to be a model global citi-zen. It has been environmentally responsible for many years. A long-standing, university-wide recycling program elicits the partici-pation and support of students, faculty and staff. More than 75 tons of recyclable mate-rials are collected annually. Additionally, the

university also recycles copper, aluminum, oil, batteries, and construction materials as upgrades and renovations occur. The house-keeping staff uses earth-friendly cleansers and products throughout the facility.

In 2006, the university installed one of the largest solar-thermal systems in Illinois. The system pre-heats water for GSU's swim-ming pool and provides domestic hot water for portions of the university. Through grants from the Illinois Clean Energy Community

Foundation, the university replaced high wattage lamps with energy efficient lamps that consume 154,000 less watts per year.

“This upgrade in light fixtures represents a sizable amount of energy and financial savings,” explained Charles DeBrizzio, chief engineer at GSU. “We removed all of the old lights, broke them down into their component parts, and sold the scraps. Very little ended up in the landfill. We recycle everything we can and use recycled materi-als wherever possible. Our goal is to reduce our production of waste products and our use of energy.”

In addition to the institutional response to environmental issues, the university has also responded academically, with in-creased coursework and research on the

environment.Within the science programs, there are

numerous opportunities to study the effects of pollution; environmental chemistry, biol-ogy, physiology, and toxicology; as well as population ecology. In addition to classes, there are also many research opportunities in and around the GSU campus, using the variety of natural environments that provide an ideal laboratory. Environmental study opportunities are also offered in Michigan, Belize and China.

Public Administration and Social Sci-ences programs include a focus on urban growth and planning, with an emphasis on the environmental impact. Within the Col-lege of Health Professions, courses and re-search opportunities investigate the effects of environmental issues on health and ac-cess to healthcare. Additionally, GSU also provides environmental education opportu-nities for students learning to be teachers so they can better teach about environmental issues when they graduate.

“While these actions are very effective and we are very proud of everything we do here at GSU, we recognize that preserving and protecting the environment is a con-tinuous process,” adds Rakstang. “We are always looking to take positive steps toward energy conservation.”

Lindsay Gladstone is the assistant coordi-nator of Public Affairs for Governors State University.

by lindsay gladstone

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Thank you to everyone who submitted questions for me to answer in my column this month! Here is what was on your minds, along with my responses.

Q: Getting out of the house in the morning on time (and intact) is a chal-lenge! I can never find what I need. Any suggestions?

A: Organize your “landing/launching pad”—the space in your home where every-thing gets thrown when you “land” at home and later “launch” yourself into the world. Put up hooks for keys, purses, umbrellas, backpacks and coats; provide racks or bins for shoes; hang slots for incoming/outgoing paperwork; add a mirror for final appear-ance checks; and keep a basket or tote there for things to take with you when you leave.

Q: I work out of my car a lot and it’s a disaster. I lost some mail the other day when I opened the door and it blew away down the street. Yikes! What can I do?

A: Treat your car like any other “office” space, creating zones and containerizing where necessary. There are many organiz-ing products made specifically for vehicles: portable hanging file bins, back-of-the seat hanging organizers and passenger seat mini-desks are a few examples. Accessibil-ity is key—keep safety while driving in the forefront when choosing these products. Portability may also be essential if you fre-quently alternate between working in your car and a stationary office.

Q: I hate my closet! Getting ready for work in the morning is no fun. I can’t find matching clothes quickly and always end up frazzled. I’m tired of starting my day this way! Something needs to give!

A: Here are a few tips specific to closets that may help.

Start by sorting and purging your clothes first. Use the hanger “flip trick” to find the items you don’t ever wear. Start a season with all clothes hangers facing the same di-

rection on the hanging rod. Once you wear an item, “flip” the hanger around the other way on the rod. At the end of the season, all of the “unflipped” items are those that didn’t get worn (and probably won’t next summer, either!). Get rid of those items.

Separate casual from dress clothes. Group like clothing together: short-sleeved blouses, long-sleeved blouses, sweaters, blazers, slacks, skirts and dresses. It is also helpful within those categories to further sort by color. Hang clothes shortest to lon-gest, so that other items can be easily stored under the short-hanging items.

Containerize where appropriate. Get a belt rack or hanger and use decorative boxes or hanging organizers for items like socks, pantyhose and jewelry.

Consider redesigning your closet system to maximize the space and make things more accessible. Include in this plan good lighting, especially in the bottom of the closet where shoes usually get stored.

Q: So much of my life is disorganized that I don’t know where to start. I’m just no good at organizing, even though I des-perately see the need to change. What can

I do?A: First, know that EVERY person has

one area of his/her life that IS organized. Take some time to think about what yours is. Your recipes? Your music collection? Your car care products in the garage? Once you identify this thing, ask yourself, "why it is so?" Often times you can transfer that knowledge to other areas of your life. Start small, in a high impact area, set a timer, and see what you can accomplish in a set amount of time. Disorganization causes clutter to accumulate over time. Don’t ex-pect things to reverse overnight and enlist help if you just don’t have the focus or mo-tivation to stay with it on your own.

NEXT MONTH: Organizing Students for Back-to-School.

Karen McGregor is a professional home and business organizer and public speaker for Organize It!

Organize It! | by Karen Mcgregor

Ask The organizer

Zip-Pak Research Findingssustainability of Flexible Packaging for Deli Meat and Cereal applications

Zip-Pak, a world leader in differentiating brands with resealable packaging technolo-gy, announces its latest research findings on the relationship between flexible packaging and sustainability. The life cycle inventory (LCI), conducted by Franklin Associates, an independent third party research firm, demonstrates the smaller environmental footprint of flexible resealable packaging as compared to rigid alternatives.

The study included eight packaging systems consisting of six deli meat pack-ages and two breakfast cereal packages. The packages included both flexible packaging formats with resealable closures as well as rigid packaging formats. Key findings of the LCI include that products packaged in flexible pouches with resealable clo-sures had lower energy consumption, solid waste generation and greenhouse gas emis-

sions than the rigid systems included in the analysis. Further, although transportation energy accounted for less than 17 percent of total energy for all systems, the results show that transportation energy requirements for the reusable rigid containers are higher than those for the flexible packaging systems.

The study concluded that resealable flex-ible packaging is a more sustainable option when compared to rigid packaging. This conclusion is bolstered by the superior prod-uct-to-package ratio, lower energy foot-print, lower solid waste footprint and lower greenhouse gas emissions throughout the life-cycle of resealable flexible packages.

“Inspired by the packaging industry’s commitment to a greener future, Zip-Pak is likewise dedicated to the issue of sustain-ability and is mindful of its own environ-mental footprint. Through this research,

Zip-Pak has become a more educated re-source in sustainability so we may help our customers reduce their own environmental footprint,” says Bob Hogan, director of international sales and marketing of Zip-Pak. “The conclusions of the Franklin As-sociates study further encourage Zip-Pak to aggressively pursue future developments to help reduce the environmental footprint of packaging, including packaging that incor-porates next generation materials, films and closures.”

About Zip-PakZip-Pak, celebrating over 20 years of

resealable packaging innovations, offers seven distinct technologies that provide the framework for more than 200 patented zip-per profiles. A global leader for resealable packaging solutions, Zip-Pak is an Illinois Tool Works (ITW) Company. World head-quarters are located in Manteno, Ill., USA. Zip-Pak is a proud member of the Sustain-able Packaging Coalition.

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Arctic Snow and ice Chooses Bradley Manufacturing Location

Back Power and Brain Power: Both Jobs Need Education

At a May press conference, area econom-ic development leaders formally welcomed Arctic Snow & Ice Control to the Kanka-kee River Valley. The Economic Alliance of Kankakee County announced the intent of the Frankfort-based snowplow manufac-turer to occupy nearly 60,000 square feet

of manufacturing space in the Ken Hayes Industrial Park.

According to The Alliance, the operation is expected to produce a $4 million invest-ment at the site, and Arctic Snow and Ice will manufacture their plow on-site. Owner Randy Strait anticipates that approximately 40 new employees will be required once the operation is running at full capacity, 15 to 20 of which will be hired in the start-up phase.

“We are very pleased that Arctic Snow has chosen the Ken Hayes Industrial Park to expand its business,” remarked Econom-

ic Alliance President Mike Van Mill. “The move clearly illustrates that our community is a desirable manufacturing locale. And, considering Arctic Snow’s innovative snow plow design, the company’s growth poten-tial is truly limitless.”

Part of the manufacturing space Arctic intends on occupying is the space formerly occupied by the Three Source order fulfill-ment center, and the space formerly occu-

pied by now defunct furniture manufacturer Abitare, Inc. The Kankakee County Eco-nomic Development Association, a private economic development organization which supplies seven members to the board of the Economic Alliance of Kankakee County, manages the Ken Hayes Industrial Park.

The message at the Public Agenda for Illinois Higher Education summit held at KCC in June was loud and clear: If you build an educated workforce, businesses and industries that offer high-paying jobs will come to the state. A fact that explains the education/economic development di-lemma in Illinois: an increase in the num-ber of individuals without high school diplomas and in jobs that do not require higher education.

How can the state increase its education potential so that it is more appealing to the businesses and industries that can jumpstart its economy?

The National Center for Higher Educa-tion Management Systems is on a fact-find-ing mission to study the state’s challenges/opportunities facing higher education, workforce needs, demographic trends and funding, and to develop a plan that will allocate government resources to address these needs.

NCHEMS divided the state into 10 Eco-nomic Development Regions. Kankakee, Will and Grundy Counties are grouped in the Northeast Region.

Northeast Regionn The largest and most diverse economic

area in the staten Two levels of dramatic population

growth: •Adults,age65+ •Latinos

“The success rate of the current popu-lation faces a major challenge,” Aims McGuinness Jr., NCHEMS, said. “It has a large number of individuals entering the job market without high school diplomas who are taking lower-paying jobs. But, this is where they are staying.

“To earn a living wage in Illinois, you must have the minimum of a high school education and some college. This is not hap-pening; hence, the lack of significant busi-

nesses and industries looking for employees with higher educations. The result is lack of economic development.”

He used the following information for the Northeast Region to demonstrate his point.

Top 5 Occupations with the Most Aver-age Annual Openingsn Retail Salespersons n Laborers/Stock Movers n Cashiersn Waiters/Waitresses n Food Prep/Fast Food

But, there are sectors of higher-education employment across the state that are expe-riencing the opposite—more demand than supply.

Nursingn Secondary/Vocational Educationn Computer Engineering

n Special Educationn Computer Systems

The cost of higher education in Illinois certainly contributes to the spiral. The na-tional percentage of income needed to pay for four-year college expenses is 31 percent. In Illinois, higher education requires 35 percent of one’s income.

Nationally, students borrow $3,619 each year for college expenses. In Illinois, they borrow $3,770—almost 10 percent more annually.

McGuinness drew these conclusions.n While the Northeast Region has the fast-

est growing population in the state over-all, it is attributed to individuals without higher educations.

n The state needs to produce the educated population that business and industry are looking for today.

B2B staff report

by nancy J. ruda, B2B illinois correspondent

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Green…it’s the New Corporate Color

It doesn’t matter if you’re responsible for the heating and air conditioning system, for office supplies, for information technology, or for just getting to work on time, you’d have to be living under your desk if you haven’t heard about the importance of “going green” in the workplace. Across America, employ-ers and business owners are looking earnest-ly at the external and internal make-ups of their buildings and work sites for innovative solutions through sustainable practices.

And, it’s a commitment that everyone in the boardroom to the mailroom takes seri-ously. Guided by principles of integrity and compliance, operations are being managed with a trained eye on environmental pro-tection, social responsibility, and economi-cal soundness. In other words, protecting the environment and the health and safety of employees, customers, contractors, and the public by learning how to make green happen.

Several leaders in environmental services gathered on April 17 for a panel discussion on the business of going green. Here is a synopsis of the topics that were presented.

Tony Holub, AIA LEED AP, Demonica Del Muro Associates, LLC

“Environmental conscientiousness is not a new concept. It is simply re-understand-ing and relearning how to be good stewards of our health and of our world.”

Holub called special emphasis to the im-portance of the words “re-understanding and relearning” because while the corpo-rate world knows what it should be doing to conserve energy and to curb pollution is not necessarily what it is doing. “No mat-ter when, the focus is always on the bottom line. The difference between then and now is how safely we get there.”

He refers to today’s spreadsheet number as a “triple bottom line” or as a reinforc-ing combination of people, the planet, and prosperity that are guided and mentored by nature. The core of these three components is sustainability or finding a better way to “build green.”

In construction, he says, the key is to start early—to “think green” from the out-set. “Conservation should not be an af-terthought because the price of ‘building

green’ reduces the overall costs of employee absenteeism, maintenance, site longevity, and operations. The return on investment can be as high as 25 to 45 percent with a three- to five-year payback in increased productivity and sales.”

Buildings and construction are responsi-ble for almost half of all the greenhouse gas emissions and energy that is consumed in the U.S. each year. This figure includes the energy that is used in the production and transportation of materials to work sites and what is used to operate the building itself.

“The importance of designing sustain-able, high-performance or LEED®-based green buildings cannot be overstated in their ability to reduce overall energy use and to improve indoor air quality and comfort.”

He concluded, “The question shouldn’t be how much will it cost to build green…but how much will it cost not to build green? It’s important for builders to lead in sustain-ability—not to wait for others to act and then to follow.”

Stan Robinson, Executive Director of Environmental Services, University of Chicago Medical Center

“Waste is a measure of inefficiency. If you are not reducing, reusing, and recycling, you are operating inefficiently at all levels.”

While the University of Chicago Medi-cal Center is “at the forefront of medicine,” Robinson says that it is “at the forefront of being green” in the healthcare industry as well. In the past three years, the system has upped the amount of its recyclables from 2 to 25 percent and has targeted 40 percent as its goal.

“It’s one thing to ‘think green.’ It’s anoth-er thing to actually do it. Without a doubt, going green saves green.” Here are some of the endeavors that Robinson initiated at the medical center and in other buildings on its campus.

n Replaced chemical-heavy cleaning prod-ucts with clean-air ones wherever pos-sible. In one instance, Robinson nixed six commercial cleaning products with a sin-gle earth-friendly alternative. “The new green product is all six of the old products in one healthy cleaner. It’s an all-around winner for our patients, our workers, and the atmosphere.”

n Began buying green. “Green purchasing” means using recycled-content products, environmentally preferable products and services, bio-based products, energy- and water-efficient products, alternate-fuel vehicles, and alternatives to hazardous or toxic chemicals.

n Invested in a baler to recycle all corrugat-ed cardboard. Rather than incur the cost of disposal and the discomfort of sending its cardboard to landfills, the healthcare center is now sending $2,000 in savings per month to its bottom line thanks to corrugated recycling.

n Recycling plastics, construction prod-ucts, metals, aluminum, and electronics for scrap.

n Sending old furniture to third world countries in need

Robinson believes that companies and businesses should make sure that their com-munities and government leaders are aware of what they’re doing to protect the environ-ment. He said it shows that you care about the future and that you value their support.

“When we take care of the environment, we take care of our patients. It has been and always will be the right thing to do.”

William Haas, Energy Division Repre-sentative, Illinois Department of Com-merce and Economic Opportunity

“A holistic energy plan that identifies op-portunities for saving money should be part of every corporate strategy.”

While Illinois’ new Energy Efficiency programs were not available until June, Haas pointed out that there are plenty of steps that every business can take to become more energy efficient and to prepare for par-ticipation in the programs.

by nancy J. ruda, B2B illinois correspondent

Panelists at the “go green and How to Make it Happen” program listen to remarks from Mary Beth Hearn, 1st vice president, eDCss. From left to right: stan rob-inson, executive director of environmental services, university of Chicago Medical Center; tony Holub, aia leeD aP, Demonica Del Muro associates, llC; and William Haas, energy Division representative, illinois Department of Commerce and economic opportunity. Photo by nancy J. ruda.

n Review past energy audits.

n Assess performance with these tools.

n ComEd Building Energy Analysis Tool: ComEdCARE.com helps participants understand how they use energy to run their businesses, and it provides tips for better management usage.

n Energy Star Benchmarking and Portfolio Manager: energystar.gov/buildings

n DCEO-LEAP Program: This Depart-ment of Commerce and Economic Op-portunity program targets clients that have energy costs greater than $500,000 per year and provides rebates of 50 per-cent (up to $10,000 each) for the cost of developing an energy-efficiency action plan and for a technical assessment.

n Consult a technical expert.

n Find an “energy engineer” at energystar.gov/index.cfm or research the Smart En-ergy Design Assistance Center (SEDAC) at sedac.org.

n Learn about available energy efficiency grants from the Illinois Clean En-ergy Community Foundation at illi-noiscleanenergy.org.

n Learn about best practices.

n Building Operator Certification: boccen-tral.org

n Federal Energy Management Program: eere.energy.gov/femp

n American Council for an Energy Effi-cient Economy: aceee.org

n ComEd Energy Essentials: ComE-dCARE.com

n Smart Returns Program: A “load re-sponse” program from ComEd that pays financial incentives to business customers for reducing their electricity usage during times when ComEd’s distribution system is experiencing high levels of demand.

Label-WatchingWatch for building and maintenance

products and companies that bear these certified earth-friendly labels.

Energy StarEstablished by the Environmental Pro-

tection Agency, Energy Star products per-form as well as their traditional counterparts while using up to 75 percent less energy. Products include appliances, electronics, and light bulbs.

FSCThe FSC logo signifies that paper and

wood products (such as furniture and floor-ing) have been harvested using certified sustainable standards. It was developed by the Forest Stewardship Council.

Green Building InitiativeThe mission of the Green Building Initia-

tive is to accelerate the adoption of practices that result in energy-efficient, healthier, and environmentally sustainable buildings by promotion credible and practical green-building approaches for commercial and residential construction.

Green SealProducts like cleaners, paints, and paper

earn a Green Seal certification if they have a low impact on the environment through-out their life cycles, from manufacturing to disposal.

GreenSpec® ListedThis database includes over 2,100 green

building products, specifications, and prac-tices for use by architects and construc-tion professionals. It was developed by the editors of Environmental Building News, an independently published and advertise-ment-free newsletter.

LEED®The Leadership in Energy and Environ-

mental Design (LEED®) Green building Rating system™ is a nationally accepted benchmark for the design, construction, and operations of high-performance green buildings. LEED was developed by the U.S. Green Building Council (USGBC), a nonprofit organization working to trans-form the building industry to sustainable practices. It is the industry standard for green building specifications.

Oikos Product DirectoryThis directory is the most comprehen-

sive listing of products and services for en-ergy-efficient, environmentally responsible building construction.

Sustainable Buildings Industry CouncilSBIC members and partners share the

common goal of delivering buildings that provide long-term value and performance; that reduce operating costs; that keep oc-cupants safe, comfortable, and healthy; and that protect the natural environment.

The “Go Green and Learn How to Make It Happen” program was presented and sponsored by the Economic Development Council for the Southwest Suburbs (EDC-SS), Moraine Valley Community College, Great Lakes Bank of Choice, Workforce Development and Community Services, the Illinois Department of Commerce and Economic Opportunity, the Southwest Conference of Mayors, and the Economic Development Council for the Southwest Suburbs. More than 200 persons from a di-verse range of companies attended.

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Pay attention to

Parents’ investment Strategies

If your parents are getting older, you may have to assist them in various aspects of daily life—one of which may be their in-vestment strategies. And by being “proac-tive,” you may be able to make things much easier for Mom and Dad in their retirement years.

One of the best things you can do for your parents is to find out if they are investing in a way that’s appropriate for their situation. When many people get older, they tend to get more financially conservative, choosing investments that offer significant preser-vation of principal, such as certificates of deposit (CDs) and U.S. Treasury securi-ties. And of course, this is understandable, because your parents, like many people at their stage of life, probably don’t want to take too many financial risks. And yet, by “taking no chances” with their money, they could actually be taking on more risk than they think.

Why? Because by investing too

conservatively, they might not be able to afford the lifestyle they’ve chosen, given the importance of two factors: longevity and inflation.

Let’s consider longevity first. The aver-age 65-year-old man is expected to live 16.5 more years, while the average 65-year-old woman has 19.1 more years of life expec-tancy, according to the Social Security Ad-ministration. And these figures, as noted, are averages, which means that half of all men and half of all women can expect to live longer than 81.5 years and 84.1 years, respectively.

Consequently, your parents could easily spend two or three decades in retirement. And if they’re investing predominantly in fixed-income vehicles, their returns may not even keep up with inflation. For example, suppose your parents’ total cost of living is currently $80,000 per year. If inflation were to average 3 percent annually over the next 20 years, your parents would then need

more than $144,000 per year just to main-tain the same standard of living that they enjoy today.

So, given the possibility of a long retire-ment combined with the cumulative effects of inflation, your parents will likely need at least some growth potential in their invest-ment portfolio. A reasonable percentage of quality stocks may be able to provide them with that potential, but their mix of invest-ments really depends on their individual needs, lifestyle choices and risk tolerance.

Here’s one other investment-related ques-tion you may want to raise with your par-ents: How much should they take out each year from their 401(k) and IRA? It’s essen-tial that they neither withdraw so much that they deplete their accounts nor so little that they can’t afford the things they enjoy. Yet, because the ideal withdrawal rate depends on several factors—investment mix, risk tolerance, life expectancy, other sources of

income—it’s not always easy to determine the appropriate amount.

You might not have the expertise to help your parents address these two issues—choosing the right investments during their retirement years and taking out the right amounts from their 401(k) and IRA. And that’s why you may want to encourage your parents to work with a professional financial advisor, if they don’t already have one. At their stage of life, they really need to make the right moves.

Bob Meyers is a financial advisor with Edward Jones in Kankakee.

by Bob Meyers

When I was starting my consulting/coaching business, I struggled to call myself a consultant. Business consultants are not created equal. It seems as if everyone likes to call themselves a consultant these days. Some consultants are very good, while oth-ers just know the right things to say. If you are thinking of hiring one, I would suggest talking to them about their background and their services offered to see if it’s a great match with you and your business, and se-riously consider the amount of money they are charging. I have met really good consul-tants who do not charge an arm and a leg or insist on taking your first born child.

Quite a few years ago, when we were ex-periencing some major growing pains, we had a big consulting firm contact us. I had heard of some bigger companies in our area using this firm, so I thought I’d at least en-tertain the idea. They sent a fellow who was very bright and said things that made me feel as if he could “fix” our business. He was basically sent to analyze our business and then they would send two others to actually show us how to bring in a lot more profit. He was a great salesman. I agreed to hire this company with the knowledge that I could only fire them in the first four hours. Needless to say, we fired them within the four hour period.

My biggest lesson learned is that no one knows your business better than you do, nor

should they. You should build your busi-ness with your vision and ideas. No stranger is going to have that magic formula that would allow you to miraculously make tons of money and have the business of your dreams. It’s important to be true to your passion, to your mission, and to be aligned with your values, which is what business coaching helps you develop.

There is definitely a place for a good busi-ness consultant to help business owners/entrepreneurs get through issues they just seem unable to overcome by themselves in an efficient manner. Business consultants should have at least owned their own suc-cessful business at some point. I person-ally believe there’s more to being successful than just the mechanics of a business. It’s important to run your business well and to maintain balance in three parts: 1) physical-ly—the processes of your business, 2) emo-tionally—having your values in place, and 3) spiritually—having a vision statement.

Finally, don’t ask a banker about how to run your business, unless it relates to actual banking issues. You wouldn’t ask an accoun-tant for legal advice, and so on. You need to rely on your instincts when taking advice, and to consider the source of information, as well as the possible agenda of others.

Reneé Perry is a small business consultant and coach in Joliet.

Hiring a Business Consultant

by reneé Perry

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There is an old story about a fellow in the ancient world who, upon learning about di-amonds, sold his successful farm and spent his fortune traveling the world in search of the gems. Several years after he died, hav-ing never found the diamonds he sought; others discovered the largest diamond mine ever found in Africa—on the farm he sold to begin his quest.

Just for a moment, let’s pretend there was a special machine that took a retina scan of every employee in your business and, based on this scan, it could tell you exactly what each employee was capable of becoming in the future. You could then create a custom-ized development program that resulted in the most profitable and fulfilling use of ev-ery employee in your business. Would you use such a machine, if it were available?

Business leaders often discover an internal conflict between taking care of the immedi-ate concerns of the business and a longing to “do it right” and manage more strategically for long-term success. Beleaguered execu-tives often confess that even if they did have a perfectly clear picture of the best way to develop and manage their people, current circumstances wouldn’t allow it.

Research has revealed that mediocre su-pervisors work under the assumptions that, everyone should be able to learn how to do a job with training; and the greatest em-ployee growth is realized by focusing on the employee’s areas of weakness.

In contrast, exceptional supervisors as-sume that, everyone has unique and endur-ing talents; and, a person’s greatest potential lies in developing their areas of strength.

Great managers constantly look for ways to develop and leverage each employee’s strengths rather than getting trapped in trying to fix weaknesses.

Business leaders serious about identify-ing, developing and deploying talent under-stand that in today’s world getting the right

people doing the right things is the most important differentiator in any successful business. How they understand and manage people should come before thinking about how they will effectively compete in the marketplace. For most business leaders, this is a difficult shift in mindset to make. After all, business leaders are normally measured by annual revenue, stock value, earnings, or

the organiza-tion’s credit rating—all “hard” financial measures of success. These “hard metrics” are easy for business leaders to think they can control and manipulate through decision-making and the priori-ties they establish for their organizations. On the other hand, understanding and de-ploying talent is much more difficult and it requires more humility—it doesn’t fit the “alpha male” concept of many leaders. How can we balance the scales by creating equally compelling measurements for iden-

tifying, hiring, developing and optimizing talent?

There isn’t a retina scan that measures potential and illuminates the most effective pathway to success. But it’s getting closer. The convergence of psychometrics with job benchmarking is opening up new methods to identify deeper reservoirs of potential in people. Exceptional leaders have expe-rienced breakthroughs in performance by asking three simple questions:

n What talent patterns is this job asking for in order to achieve superior per-formance? There are specific activities,

rewards and evaluative judgment patterns that result in superior

performance for every job. By defining these in detail,

business leaders can de-velop a profound clarity

that will lead to su-perior performance. This picture of what the job wants can be used to improve the hiring process, cre-ate highly custom-ized training and development strate-

gies, and pinpoint the most important

performance manage-ment issues for continu-

ous improvement. n What natural talent

patterns does this person bring to the job and how should we lever-

age this talent? Every individual brings a unique combination of behavioral ten-dencies, motivational biases and evalua-tive judgment inclinations to their work. When these fall in relative alignment with what the job is asking for, superior performance is practically inevitable (we call them, “a natural for the position”). When there is mis-alignment between these talent patterns and what the job is asking for, it doesn’t matter what edu-cation or past experience the employee

brings, there will always be a struggle to perform at a superior level. This is the hard work of managing others—to un-derstand and leverage the strengths and to work around or neutralize the weak-nesses.

n What is the most effective way to de-velop and focus each person’s talent for success based on the alignment between the job and the person? Diagnosis is 90 percent of the cure. If business leaders can develop a laser-like focus of what a job is asking for and how natural talent patterns relate to the job, then learn how to apply this knowledge to leveraging strengths and neutralizing weaknesses, they will begin to understand that their people represent one of the greatest unde-rutilized resources in the organization.

Most leaders think they are effective at identifying opportunities. They pride them-selves in their ability to understand the dy-namics of the marketplace, to develop prod-ucts and services that create future wealth, to build a loyal customer base, and to man-age the financial statements for increased net worth and cash flow. As savvy as these leaders may be when it comes to markets, products, customers and assets, they con-tinually miss the greatest treasure of all. As a result, they forfeit their own “acres of diamonds.”

Ron Price is the founder and CEO of Price Associates, a company dedicated to helping business leaders and entrepreneurs solve problems, identify solutions and

implement change in strategy and performance. Ron is also the author of “Finding Hidden Treasures,” a series of essays with action steps to aid readers in mining their own inner talents. As the former president of the AIM Companies, Ron directed the strategic, marketing, compensation and incentive planning, as well as field training and operations.

Acres of Diamonds at Work

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Joliet area employers expect to hire at a brisk pace during the third quarter of 2008, according to the Manpower Employment Outlook Survey. Among survey partici-pants, the Joliet area employment outlook is the tenth best in the nation. From July to September, 50 percent of the companies interviewed plans to hire more employees, while 10 percent expect to reduce their pay-rolls, according to Manpower spokesperson Suzanne Cosme. Another 40 percent expect to maintain their current staff levels.

“Employer sentiment about hiring ap-pears to be more encouraging than in the second quarter of 2008 when 34 percent of companies interviewed intended to add em-ployees, and 10 percent planned to reduce staff levels,” said Cosme. “Hiring activity is expected to be stronger than one year ago when 23 percent of companies surveyed planned to increase staff levels and none ex-pected to cut payrolls.”

For the coming quarter, job prospects ap-

pear best in Durable Goods Manufacturing, Transportation/Public Utilities, Services and Public Administration. Employers in Construction plan to reduce staffing levels, while those in Non-Durable Goods Manu-facturing and Wholesale/Retail Trade voice mixed hiring intentions. Hiring in Finance/Insurance/Real Estate and Education is ex-pected to remain unchanged.

Nationally, U.S. employers are project-ing a slight decline in hiring for Quarter 3 2008, according to the seasonally adjusted survey results. Of the 14,000 U.S. employ-ers surveyed, 26 percent expect to increase their workforces during the July-September period, while 10 percent expect to scale back their payrolls for a net employment outlook of 16 percent (seasonally adjusted 12 per-cent). Fifty-eight percent expect no change in the hiring pace, and 6 percent are unde-cided about their hiring plans.

(See page 7 for a summary of all Illinois Survey Results.)

Joliet Job Market Expected to be Among Strongest in Nation

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With greater awareness to environmen-tal issues, Will County is committed to continuing the dialogue and efforts for a healthier environment throughout the year. Recently, the Will County Waste Services Division of the Land Use Department made a big difference in the environment by hosting various recycling and waste collec-tion events, along with educating hundreds of school children and members of the com-munity on how to Go Green.

Environmental Awards for Local Schools

At their recent annual Environmental Awards program, the County group hosted 35 local schools and recognized students for their contributions to the environment. Held at Billie Limacher Bicentennial Park, the students were heralded for collecting over 716 tons of paper for recycling. Former coun-ty environmental educator, Joan O’Keefe of Lockport was also honored for being Will County’s first environmental educator, as well as for her numerous contributions.

“I am so proud of what we have done in Will County to not only educate others on the importance of a healthy environment, but to actually walk the walk as well,” said Will County Executive Larry Walsh, who personally handed out the awards to the schools. “We have come a long way in the last few years when it comes to going green as a County. It is a top priority.”

Medication Take-Back Program

A healthy environment also means pro-tecting water resources, while reducing materials going into local landfills. The County’s Medication Take-Back Program is one way to stop the flushing of unwanted medications down the drain. With this new program, residents can drop-off medica-tions, personal care products and other

medical items to local pharmacies. Last year, the County established Take-Back partnerships at all four Basinger Pharmacy locations in Joliet. This month, the Waste Services group held grand-openings for five new partnerships with Doc’s Drugs in Beecher, Braidwood, Peotone, Monee and Wilmington.

“I’m so pleased that this new program is clearly making a difference—and it’s im-portant to thank both pharmacies for their interest in and dedication to the environ-ment,” said Marta Keane, Will County Recycle Program specialist. “It is estimated that over 4,600 tons of pharmaceuticals and personal care products enter the waste stream yearly—and many pharmaceuticals are making their way into the drinking wa-ter. So these partnerships are very impor-tant to have.”

Shoe Collection and Special Events

Another recent event included a county-wide shoe collection bringing in nearly 8,000 shoes for recycling or reuse. The County also held household hazardous waste (HHW) events in Romeoville and Beecher and an electronic collection event in Manhattan. Over 49,000 pounds of hazardous waste were collected at the Romeoville HHW event, nearly 300 participated at Beecher, and over 58,000 pounds of electronics were recycled from the Manhattan event.

Electronics RecyclingWill County and Waste Services staff

also continue an aggressive approach to recycling and the environment throughout the year with programs and events, includ-ing the appropriate disposal of tires, house-hold hazardous waste, books and electron-ics. In the past year, the County established partnerships with the Village of Boling-brook, Channahon, Plainfield and Troy

Townships, and Washington Township/Village of Beecher for electronics and/or traditional recycling materials. And more partnerships are being developed. Dean Olson, Waste Services manager, estimates that over $57,000 has been spent for recy-cling through these local partnerships over the past 10 months, collecting over 330,000 pounds of electronics and an estimated 98,000 lbs of other recyclables.

The County also expects to receive as much $146,000 in grants for its enforce-ment program with the Illinois Environ-mental Protection Agency (IEPA), a re-imbursement of $137,000 from the IEPA for cleanup of the Brownfield site in Crete Township, and a reimbursement grant of as much as $51,000 from the Department of Commerce and Economic Opportunity (DCEO) for the expansion of the Will County Offices recycling program. In 2007, over 22,000 tires were collected at an event with the IEPA, saving the County thou-sands of dollars.

Household Hazardous WasteOne future project that the Waste Servic-

es Division hopes to accomplish is the build-ing of a new permanent household hazard-

ous waste facility for Will County residents. Household hazardous waste includes clean-ers, chemicals, old gasoline, solvents and other potentially harmful items such as oil-based paint and batteries. The Division has had contracts with the City of Naperville for seven years to partner with the Naper-ville Fire Station HHW to dispose of haz-ardous waste for area residents, mostly from DuPage, Kane and Will County residents. The last one contract was in 2006.

“While the Naperville site is important to the proper disposal of household hazardous waste in the area, a new Will County fa-cility would be a huge benefit to even more County residents—however cost estimates aren’t in yet.” added Olson.

The proposed Will County Household Hazardous Waste site will be located near Route 52 and Laraway -Road just south of the County’s Highway Department.

upcoming EventsHHW collections are also held through-

out the County, including the one set at Jo-liet Junior College. Residents can also look forward to a Waste Tire Collection with the IEPA on September 19 and 20 in Univer-sity Park, a Book Collection on September 12, 13 and 14, at Pilcher Park in Joliet, and a Household Hazardous Waste collection event in New Lenox on September 13.

“Residents can be assured that a main focus of Will County is the environment, including recycling – and we continue to do all we can do to make life better and health-ier for them,” said Olson. “We’ve not only received great support from County Execu-tive Walsh, but by so many countywide. We are certainly proud of all we’ve done and all we hope to do.”

Lawrence Walsh is the Will County Executive.

Going Green in Will County Top Priority

by lawrence Walsh

With the help of local schoolchildren, a county-wide shoe collection effort yielded nearly 8,000 shoes.

the Medication take-Back Program, here being implemented at Doc’s Drugs in Peotone, keeps unwanted or expired medications out of our drinking water.

the village of Bolingbrook recently began its electronic recycling program with a ribbon-cutting ceremony.

Today’s business networks are compli-cated. There are data packets flying around, cables, routers, switches, and of course, the Internet. Businesses now demand more bandwidth for daily operations. To ensure even bandwidth distribution and stabilizing users, business owners need a simple tool: bandwidth management.

This is a long-run process that can help you save money, better plan for future net-work upgrades, and help determine future bandwidth needs and costs. On a wider scale, bandwidth management can help with remote locations, warehouses and of-fices anywhere in the world. In some cases, bandwidth management has saved com-panies significant dollars by determining problems, acting as a stop agent, and pro-viding resolutions based on reports and sta-tistics.

One of the key elements in maximizing

your investment in technology is by utiliz-ing your Internet broadband connection to the fullest. With the evolution of higher broadband standards, we see the need for more consumption for both data and voice information. Recently, we have found a product that is plug-and-play and desig-nates utilization of broadband evenly: the NetEqualizer.

As shown below in our network evalu-ation, the NetEqualizer NE2000 is a 1U (14 inches deep) unit that connects to your network. The basic functions are tracking bandwidth and equalizing the network so all sessions are equal, thus improving speed and efficient use of your company’s data in-frastructure.

NetEqualizer is one of the most cost-ef-fective management units on the market, and we found the unit easy to install—right out of the box. We made three setting

changes to match our network using the web (browser) interface, connected the unit, and right away traffic shaping started, about 10-minutes total setup time. The unit has two Ethernet ports as shown above, one port toward your user network, the other ports toward your broadband connection/server if applicable. A couple of simple clicks and you can see reporting live as it happens. In testing, we ran our unit for 30-days and saw our broadband reports stabilize and our us-ers receiving the same slices of broadband access. With the NetEqualizer, there is no burden of extensive policies to manage.

How the unit worksThe NetEqualizer is based in your broad-

band connection. The unit is rule based (similar to IPTables in Linux) to dynami-cally control traffic by user on the network and then fairly distribute the available band-width. Installation requires no network changes, and the unit runs in transparent mode. For you techie’s out there, you will notice the command line interface (shell) is Unix. You can also access it using an SSH

connection.The NetEqualizer is a nice tool to add

to any network of any size. Businesses can see how important the Internet is and how hungry users can be for information. In local networks, there are congestion issues and, at times, issues with the utilization of network resources. By using this unit, network ad-ministrators now have tools to manage all of these network issues. IPTables adds firewall capacities to the NetEqualizer, which is yet another option with these types of units. One last word on firewalls and protecting your network—the NetEqualizer has con-nection limits which can help protect your network from malicious activities like vi-ruses, trojan horses and worms.

unit specifics Of course, bandwidth limiting and dis-

tribution top the list of desired unit capa-bilities. The equal bandwidth distribution process includes those that are regulated for more bandwidth usage based on Host, Sub-net, MAC Address, port or VLAN.

The NetEqualizer is available in a range of configurations from 2Mbps up to 300Mbps. It provides a host of reporting features based on your needs. The reports are browser-based in real-time and can be saved and kept as log files.

More information about the NetEqual-izer can be found at http://netequalizer.com.

Wade LeBeau is the network operations director for The Daily Journal and a WiFi Kankakee, LLC board member.

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Similar to last month’s column, I’d like to focus this month’s message to those who have already launched their lean efforts in the last two years. To some people, making any forward progress with lean or moving into a more proactive mode is considered a success. To others, making small advance-ments isn’t enough, so they consider the progress as a failure.

By reducing implementation “setbacks” you will reduce the pool of naysayers.

Here’s a great example of what not to do:I was asked into a small (35 employees)

plastic injection-molding manufacturer to do some “Lean Kick-Off” work. They had been talking about lean for about four years, but never got anything going. The company is privately held. The general manager and the plant manager are brothers-in-law.

During my first meeting with the general manager, he told me that he had two priori-ties—reduce set-up time and install robots on the production lines. I asked if I could interview the employees in groups to hear what their priorities were. He agreed and I took a few hours to interview the people.

One priority that came through in each group was a revamp of their scheduling pro-cess. The line supervisors and set-up people were extremely frustrated with a schedule that changes daily, sometimes hourly. Even more frustrating to them was that the sched-ule was changed in the computer, but not all affected employees receive the changes. They spent many hours a week setting up a mold and the production run only to find out that the schedule had just been changed and they needed to change the set-up.

Another priority that came up related to materials management in a small five-per-son department. Their biggest challenge is that they run out of glue. Yes, I said glue. They use a costly glue that affixes labels extremely well, and it needs to be refriger-ated until use. Amazingly, the refrigerator is not in their department. It is in the plant manger’s office and the employees don’t like to bother him, so they wait until he is out of his office and then go in and get the glue. Sometimes they go in to get glue and they are out of stock because they didn’t tell the manager to order more the last time. They have pulled the parts, collected the labels, set the jigs, and then went to get the glue.

To get more glue takes up to five days, so they put everything back and wait for the glue to arrive.

I wanted to share this story with you be-cause having a disconnect between what management believes is important, and what employees believe to be important, is one of the top five drivers of lean implemen-tation setbacks. The top five list follows.

Lack of Management SupportIt starts at the top. If management isn’t

fully on board with lean, it will show in the areas under that person. Management needs to eat, live and breathe the lean principles and show the employees that everybody will be expected to embrace lean, be held to the same standards, and make decisions in the lean spirit.

If there is no Lean Champion in the company to help guide, train and measure, implementation will stagnate down the road because nobody is watching the prog-ress and holding people accountable.

If management doesn’t recognize efforts at all levels of the organization, or allow su-pervisors and managers to recognize people, there will be less and less effort put into lean initiatives.

Lack of Management FocusIf your management team doesn’t have

a vision or direction for the company, how can the employees move the company for-ward toward its goals? Management needs to be very clear on what is to be accom-plished and why.

Don’t create activity just for the sake of being able to say that you are “doing lean.” Have a purpose and goals. I heard of one company that was in their third year of 5S (cleaning and organizing work areas). They had no clue why they were doing 5S be-cause it wasn’t tied to their strategic busi-ness plan. In fact, they didn’t even have a business plan. They wanted to be able to say that they were “going lean” and 5S seemed like an easy place to start. That is true, but activity needs to have a purpose.

Waste reduction is a process that will positively impact the bottom line, it pro-vides a clear focus to team members, and it will send a very clear message to the em-ployees that they and their time are valuable

to the company. It also frees up their time to consider the larger change projects that management might have in mind.

Lack of Empowerment, Responsibility, Accountability, Expectations and Recognition

Alright, I know I threw many items in this group, but they are all so important and closely related. If employees are empow-ered to make decisions and changes, lean initiatives will flourish. Lean is top down in vision and direction and bottom up in changes and behaviors. It takes both to get long-term, world-class results.

However, before you can empower em-ployees, they need to know their area(s) of responsibility and how they will be held ac-countable for their decisions and action. If you allow lean to be everybody’s job implic-itly and nobody’s job explicitly, your lean initiatives will have setbacks down the road. And please don’t forget to set clear expecta-tions for people.

Last, but not least, make sure there is a recognition program in place to show your appreciation for the work that people do. People will repeat those actions that get positive attention.

Too Much at onceThe big ideas are great, but remember that

people have daily tasks and responsibilities. When companies try to do too much all at once, it’s just too much for the people to manage on top of their daily responsibili-ties. Very often the same key people become overloaded with too many projects at the same time and not enough time to get ev-erything done. This is especially common in smaller companies where the resource pool is limited. Instead, focus on smaller, key

improvements that will drive other results.

Too Much Management-Centric Focus

As we saw in the plastics company story, it is important to keep a perspective on what the employees feel is important to change. They have their challenges to overcome and are looking for somebody to help them re-solve their problems. The company could have pushed forward with robots, but they would still run out of glue—only at a faster pace potentially. Management could have continually measured and cracked down on reducing set-up times, but as long as the scheduling problem existed, set-up times would suffer. The morale of the plastics company story is to have management-cen-tric ideas (big picture, strategically-moti-vated ideas) in mind, but first address the employees’ day-to-day challenges. Employ-ees will have little to no time to devote to big projects/changes as long as their daily routines pose challenges to them.

Final Thoughts on LeanLean is 20 percent equipment and tech-

nology and 80 percent people. Getting peo-ple to change old habits, behaviors and ac-tions is not easy. Employees will be cynical, mistrusting and scared at first. That's why management needs to really step up to the plate and build trust through actions, not speech. If you can identify your “people” people, tap into them to help drive lean.

Patrick Seaton, Innovative Management Tools LLC.

Innovative Management Solutions | by Patrick seaton

going lean, Part 6:

Avoiding implementation Setbacks

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Joe Franco, Kankakee County economic alliance board chairman; Greg Leutloff, Bennett Commercial real estate; Jerry Balthazor, City of Bradley trustee; Lucas and Randy Strait, arctic snow & ice Control; state representative Lisa Dugan; Mike Van Mill, economic alli-ance president; Jeff Bennett, Bennett Commercial real estate at the Ken Hayes industrial Park in Bradley. (submitted photo)

2008 Community Foundation of Kankakee River Valley Grant recipients, from left to right: sandra Knight, success by six®; Beth Kohn, KCC Parent education Programs; amy allers, Kankakee river valley Forest Preserve District; Mary self & Josie Barnett, Bradley elementary school District Make a Difference Program; Pam Debono, Chair of the Com-munity Foundation of the Kankakee river valley; amy emerson, Child Care resource & referral; norm strasma, executive Director of the Community Foundation of the Kanka-kee river valley; Karl Kruse, riverfront trail initiative/greenways; Kathy Marquis, Kankakee school District #111 First taste Program; Cathy gagnon, Bourbonnais township Park Dis-trict. (submitted photo)

left to right: Sandy Boyer, vice-president of iroquois-Ford association of realtors; Sandy Workman, president of KCar; Connie Legris, executive offi cer for both Kankakee and iroquois associations; and Sarah Powers, president-elect of KCar, in Washington, D.C. during their visit with congressional legislators in June. (submitted photo)

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n Send B2B illinois your press releases, business briefs, event photos (with individual identifi cations), and business-related events. E-mail to pr@b2billinois.com or fax to 815.935.0192.

Going Green: these words have infiltrat-ed our culture like wildfire. Energy has been and always will be a major issue, especially when we deal with non-renewable natural resources. What is good for us? What can we do to save money? And what can we do to decrease our energy bills in our home and businesses?

With so many options, ideas, and higher costs involved, what is the right answer for you? As an energy and indoor comfort con-sultant, let me make this statement first: Our energy and gas prices will continue to rise. Our only choices today include higher efficiency systems, using renewable resourc-es and reducing usage. A natural by-prod-uct of these practices and technologies is a reduction in your costs.

Your home and business buildings are a system. Everything works together; from the basement, to the walls and windows, attic, lighting, and heating and cooling sys-tem. Most of us will start the energy saving process with an upgrade of our furnaces and air conditioners, but energy use and cost can be lowered in other areas of your “system.” Electrically, look at your lights. Changing to fluorescents and low-voltage lighting will make a big difference in electrical cost. In-stalling a programmable thermostat saves on both gas and electricity, while adding insulation or upgrading windows reduces air infiltration and keeps the drafts and the amount of energy you use inside the home instead of allowing for its escape. Sealing and insulating forced air duct work is a big energy saver. Insulating your hot water pipes, turning your hot water heater down, along with upgrading your home appliances with newer models will all make your home more efficient.

The biggest energy and money saver is avoiding energy scams. Spending money on things that don’t work is probably the biggest form of energy waste. Every energy contractor should be able to provide you with a ROI (Return on Investment).

At today’s prices of gas and electricity, purchasing new energy saving systems will give you an average ROI that surpasses any stock fund or bond on the market. So what do we look for and what should we be pur-chasing?

The answer is the highest efficient system that you can afford and that will give you the best ROI.

Heating and cooling systems allow for numerous choices. The biggest key in pur-chasing a system is getting the right size. Proper installation and making sure the

system is right for your home or business are crucial, and a wrong decision can consume more energy than what your current system uses. Go to www.energystar.gov and it will guide you through what to look for in a heating and cooling contractor.

Many homeowners are now purchasing a geo-thermal system to heat and cool their homes. These systems are use ground wa-ter or a ground loop for heating and cooling and, mainly run by electricity, these systems have a slightly higher price to install than conventional systems. However, ROI or en-ergy payback is very quick. With the new technology, these systems are gaining pop-ularity with many consumers and are being installed not only in country homes but also in urban area homes and businesses.

Solar heating is starting to make a come-back in the form of hot water heating, space heating, and in attic ventilation. Although we are not in the best climate to maximize the full potential of solar, it is still a very at-tractive supplemental system if your home or business is positioned to attract enough sunlight.

Going green and saving energy is also related to indoor air quality. Open any magazine, newspaper, or listen to a radio talk show and everyone is talking about air quality. Who do you believe? Consumers should believe in the people who deal with air filtration, air conditioning and ventila-tion every day. Quality heating and cooling contractors are experts in indoor air and are trained to give you the proper answers regarding your home’s problems. A typical home will produce about 40 pounds of dust a year and up to 72 trillion allergens will find their way into your home. Currently indoor air is 80 percent more polluted than outdoor air. We are what we breathe, so by cleaning and filtering our air and generat-ing controls over humidity, our families will stay healthier and our homes cleaner and more comfortable. For more information on indoor air qualities go to www.health-house.org or the American Lung Associa-tion at www.lungusa.org.

Going green and saving energy dollars is not always inexpensive, but it is the right thing to do. If everyone does just a little at a time, we can reduce our carbon footprint both at home and in the office.

Tom Goodberlet is president of Goodberlet Heating & Air Conditioning.

The Home Energy Tipping Point(or, How Can i save Money?)

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Hospitals, medical centers, doctor’s visits and other healthcare providers are requiring more and more use of competent Spanish interpreters (other languages are less in de-mand). These non-English speaking patients are insurance card holders, citizens and legal residents, too. Often times this patient pop-ulation are the spouses and extended family members who require a variety of services. These services range from hospital care, surgery and childbirth to treatment for oc-cupational injuries. As recent arrivals, many of these non-English speaking residents hold dangerous jobs and suffer occupational injuries to their limbs. They suffer from back problems in dispropor-tionate num-bers when compared to similar work groups in the U.S.

An inter-preter is of-ten required to help medical personnel communicate with their patients. The questions asked by the nurses and doctors require medical knowledge both in English and in Spanish. Common everyday language is used, but additional healthcare-specific vocabulary demands that the interpreter understands the subtleties in language usage. Thus the interpreter serves as a vital link between the healthcare provider and the patient.

Medical interpretation Telephone Line Services

Some medical centers opt for a telephone language service that offers a plethora of language-trained interpreters. This service provides language assistance to hospitals that have a minimal and/or occasional need for a second lan-guage interpreter. Using a sensitive speaker phone, the health care team communicates with the patient via the phone service. For minor patient services this works fine and both the medical staff and patient are usually satis-

fied. However, this type of service does have its obvi-ous drawbacks and limita-tions. The first drawback is that the tele-phone line must be made

available throughout the whole patient/doc-tor visit. Secondly, the phone interpreter cannot see or more importantly hear what is being said by secondary sources if the phone speaker is not sensitive enough to pick up other conversations that may aid the medi-cal staff. Even if the microphone is sensi-tive, the interpreter may only hear gibberish or garbled speech and not be able to inter-pret the language being spoken. Even more importantly, the phone interpreter may ignore this background “noise” altogether,

as the telephone interpreter is required to interpret only what is said directly into the microphone. As long as this is not the case, both the medical team and patient are served. However, sometimes patients may minimize their illness, making it necessary for the spouse or another family member to inform the medical staff of any other ill-nesses the patient has. This additional in-formation may be important for the medical staff to be aware of as part of the patient’s treatment.

Medical interpreter on Staff at Hospitals

Most of the major hospitals in large ur-ban centers have full-time interpreters on staff and on-call 24 hours a day, seven days a week. These hospitals usually have access to language services via phone as well and offer a variety of language services. Next to

Spanish, Polish is very popular, followed by several dialects of Chinese and eastern Eu-ropean languages. The interpreter is paged and reports to the hospital when requested. The interpreter greets that patient and in-forms him of his/her services and proceeds to interpret the whole conversation, while interacting with the patient. Doctors and nurses report feeling very comfortable with

this procedure, as the patient and fam-ily are always kept informed

and patients can add information as needed

to help the medical staff ad-dress the needs of the patient.

A competent medical interpreter can help the medical staff make a treat-

ment plan that helps the patient through this emergency and or treatment. The flow of the conversation is quick and efficient. The interpreter can help clarify any confu-sion immediately by simply saying, for ex-ample, “The patient appears to want to add something...” Physicians report that this helps them administer proper care, speeds up the process, and keeps the patient in-formed as to what’s going on.

An additional benefit of having a person conduct the interpretation is the “people interaction.” Visual contact aids the inter-pretation process and helps medical staff and patients communicate more efficiently and effectively. Interpreters are not permit-ted to help patients fill out forms directly, however. Family members can help their language-challenged family member com-plete the required forms.

Training for Medical interpreters

Several local and Chicago area colleges offer extensive oral interpretation pro-grams. All program participants must be completely bilingual in both languages. The usual length of each training program var-ies from 100 to 160 hours of direct instruc-tion. To learn more about healthcare/medi-cal interpretation training, visit your local college, or you may also contact me for more information.

Dr. Héctor D. López, BEST Solutions, Inc.

Spanish Language Training | by Dr. Héctor lópez

Medical interpretation for Health Care Providers

the interpreter greets that patient and informs him of his/her services and proceeds to

interpret the whole conversation, while interacting with the

patient.

Green Marketing:the same old Principles still apply

Marketing a business can be a challenge. How about marketing a green business? A green business is one that believes in main-taining the quality of our natural environ-ment, while also providing their products and services. When a business begins to go green, the philosophy is incorporated into their daily habits. It may start with en-couraging employees to recycle within your offi ce, using solar energy to power the top fl oor of your offi ce building, fi nding ways to reduce your carbon footprint, or even serving organic produce to your employees for breakfast or lunch. Externally, there are many eff ective practices that can help a green business utilize media to promote their brand, and their image.

Accessing the media to promote your business is best when using some funda-mental guidelines. Targeted advertising is always a great way to reach potential cus-tomers. Just make sure that the media you utilize best refl ects the demographic you are looking to address. Publicity is also a major proven method of marketing a business. As long as it is “good” press, having an article published about you and your business is a good thing. When trying to capture the at-tention of the gatekeepers, it is important to have something newsworthy. Newswor-thiness is the major determining factor in whether an editor or station manager will give your business the attention you de-sire. A good example of newsworthy information could be a green business receiving a certifi cation, and sending a press release to their local paper. Sending in a press release about your new showroom hours is a bad example of newsworthiness.

LEED (Leadership in Energy and Envi-ronmental Design) is a program created by the U.S. Green Building Council. Th eir online bro-chure reads that LEED “encourag-es and accelerates global adoption of sustainable green building and development practices”. Receiving and publicizing this certifi cation will attract the attention of other business owners and consumers who admire and search out green businesses to spend money with. As the result of a 2007 Illinois law, all state construction grants now include a require-

ment that contractors and designs be LEED certifi ed, at a minimum.

Green media is primarily based online, but many traditional print media providers utilize sustainable practices in the materials they use. Green media is focused on sus-tainable lifestyles, including what we eat, drive, wear and take when we are ill. Until people evolve from their documented pref-erence to a tactile approach in consuming the written word, rather than reading from a screen, there will always be printed books, magazines and newspapers. Interestingly, there have been rumblings about a potential “Do Not Mail” list, notably in New York, citing wasted paper and ink in landfi lls as a major reasoning behind the legislation. Di-rect marketers are quite fearful of this type of shift in policy, and are taking the legisla-tion head-on.

One of the most interesting ways of ac-cessing Internet media is the blog. Th e blog is a fairly recent creation on the Internet and is a major communication tool. A blog is in-teractive, which is ALWAYS better than static web pages. Th e blog writers also add videos, photos, links, podcasts and more. Th ese are all great ways to generate a buzz about your business. Sending a press release to one, or being interviewed by one will at-tract the attention that you are looking for.

Here’s the rub: the consumer has to be local. If the blog is national, there

are maybe only 100 individuals within your area that potentially could take advantage of what you are off ering. Th e key to all mar-keting, especially in a local mar-

ket, is reaching as many potential consumers as possible with

a recognizable and posi-tive brand. If you just invented a car that runs on water, a blog may be the way to

go. But if you are “Hometown Oil Change, Inc.” and you want to pub-licize your recla-

mation and disposal program, you should

probably focus on media that penetrates deep into the consumer segment. Sometimes “free” is good, but targeted marketing is ALWAYS best.

Johnny Coleman, II con-tributed to this article.

B2B illinois staff report

ouT & ABouT KANKAKEE COUNTY

Positive growth leadership Breakfast

the Positive growth leadership Breakfast was held on May 29, 2008 and sponsored by HBaK, KCar, Kankakee regional Chamber of Commerce, Bradley Bourbonnais regional Chamber of Commerce and Manteno Chamber of Commerce. left to right: andy Czako, sarah Powers and Cherie schmidt. (Photo by Cary turner)

sandy Workman, Melissa Cunha and sally schmidt. (Photo by Cary turner)

Bill yohnka, Connie legris and Jaclyn Dugan-roof. (Photo by Cary turner)

n Send B2B illinois your press releases, business briefs, event photos (with individual identifi cations), and business-related events. E-mail to pr@b2billinois.com or fax to

815.935.0192.

illinois Accessible Parking:let’s Make 2008 the year We Work to Make our Community More accessible

You may have heard that people with dis-abilities are the single largest minority in the United States today. According to the U.S. Bureau of Census, 51.2 million people* living in the United States report having some level of disability. These persons with disabilities would like to shop, eat, seek en-tertainment, do business and see medical professionals—all locally.

Stated simply: Your business will not be able to access the largest buying minority in the nation if they cannot access your busi-ness.

The following addresses the most com-mon questions surrounding accessible park-ing laws in Illinois:

Who is required to provide accessible parking?

Any facility offering parking for employ-ees or visitors must provide accessible park-ing spaces for people with disabilities. It is

important to note that the entire parking space must be kept clear of obstructions at all times, including ice, snow, shopping cart corrals, trash cans, seasonal garden displays and bicycle racks.

Where should accessible parking be located?

The Illinois Accessibility Code requires that accessible parking spaces serving a particular building shall be located on the shortest accessible route of travel from adja-cent parking to an accessible entrance.

What are the sizes and markings required for accessible parking spaces?

The Illinois Accessibility Code requires that each accessible space, except on street spaces, shall be 16 feet wide, with either an 8-foot or a 5-foot accessible aisle. (This means the total width of the parking place

must be 16 feet wide includ-ing the access aisle.) The ac-cess aisle can be located on either side of the vehicle portion of the parking place. The law also calls for the use of high quality yellow paint designated by the manufac-turer to be used for pavement striping. Finally, accessible parking spaces should be level with the surface slopes not exceeding 1:50 (2 percent grade) in all directions. We should also note here that the Illinois Accessibility Code prohibits the use of curb ramps that protrude into or interfere with the diagonally striped access aisle of acces-sible parking.

What are the required signs for accessible parking?

A United States Depart-ment of Transportation R7-8 and an R7-I101 ($250 fine) must be permanently mounted in the center of the 16-foot wide accessible park-ing space. The signs must be placed no more than five feet from the front of the parking space and must be high enough so that they are visible over a parked car. At minimum the bottom of the fine sign must be four feet from the pavement.

How many spaces are businesses required to provide for people with disabilities? Number of Accessible Parking Total of Parking Spaces Required by Spaces Provided Law1-25 126-50 251-75 376-100 4101-150 5151-200 6201-300 7301-400 8401-500 9501-1000 2 percent of totalOver 1000 20 plus 1 for each 100 over 1000

Medical Facilities specializing in treat-ment of persons with mobility impair-ments: 20 percent of total parking

Outpatient Medical Facilities: 10 percent of total parking

What constitutes improper use of Disabled License plates or placards?

Under Illinois law disabled license plates, disabled veterans plates, and placards are not transferable. The authorized holder must be present in the motor vehicle and must enter or exit the vehicle at the time parking privi-leges are being used. Unauthorized use of plates and/or a placard can result in a $500 fine, driver’s license suspension and suspen-sion or revocation of the plate or placard by the Illinois Secretary of State.

It’s in the best interests of each and ev-ery employer, landlord and business owner to take the time to do a self-evaluation of their parking to make certain that it is in compliance with Illinois law. Parking that is in compliance with Illinois law will help to assure that the largest minority population can gain access to your facility to do busi-ness with you.

*(See http://www.census.gov/Press-Re-lease/www/releases/archives/facts_for_fea-tures_special_editions/010102.html for more details)

Dorcilla Schoolman is operations manager for Options Center for Independent Living.

by Dorci schoolman

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Brian walks into a deli at 11:15 a.m. and orders the lunch special he heard advertised on the radio just a few moments ago. The young girl behind the counter has no idea what he’s talking about.

“We don’t have a special on the Italian Hero,” she says.

“Yes, you do,” he insists. “I just heard it on 101.3”

“Well, nobody told ME about any spe-cial!” she snaps back. “I can’t do that unless my boss tells me, and he won’t be here until 11:30.”

The advertising did its job. Brian’s there, mouth watering, money in hand. Only one thing stands between the deli owner and success: the person behind the counter.

If only someone in charge had told the young lady what was being advertised, there would be a seamless and positive experience. Instead, Brian’s probably going to leave an-gry, the young lady still doesn’t know the special, and someone else is bound to come in five minutes later and ask for the same thing.

Where’s the knowledge gap? Where does it start, and what happened along the way?

Advertising does work. It’s the commu-nication dysfunction inside a business that can kill off a great ad campaign, slowly and silently.

As an advertising rep in the Joliet area many years ago, I worked with a local fire-place and gas grill store to create a Father’s Day grill campaign. The ads were good, he ran them in several local media, and I was looking forward to hearing about the results he was bound to receive.

After the ads ran, he told me it was a flop. “I didn’t sell nearly the number of grills I had projected. Those ads you created didn’t work.” It wasn’t until days later that I learned of four separate people that had come into the store during the campaign. Three of them waited several minutes, and walked out be-cause no one had bothered to help them. The fourth left because the poor young salesper-son on the floor didn’t know anything about the products and their features.

If four people that I knew walked out without a grill (and felt like they wasted their time!), how many others had the very same experience? We’ll never know.

If only the deli and the grill store would have clued their people in as to what was on sale, how it was being advertised, and

why people should be excited about it, the ads would have paid off many times over for them.

The most important sale you’ll ever make is inside your own building. The key is know-ing what to do and how to get it done.

Selling The Inside™ is a process Andrew Corbus and I developed and detailed in our book, Reality Sells. It’s a regular system of communicating important details to your staff that goes beyond traditional training; it actually helps them to be an active part of the company’s success.

It’s important for a number of reasons:Poor service is everywhere, and training

is expensive. People are quick to say it’s the younger generation that’s at fault, but we find that the problem is often a simple lack of applied focus on the part of the business owner to excite the employee about deliver-ing value to each customer. It’s a different story when each team member knows ex-actly what each is contributing to the suc-cess of the organization.

Your staff may not see or hear the ads you run. Many business owners and managers assume that their employees read, watch and listen to the same things as their cus-tomers. The problem is that employees often

have very different lifestyles than those they serve. By making sure your people see and hear all of your advertising messages, they can deliver the promises the ads are mak-ing, whether they see them in the market-place or not.

Employees don’t like to feel stupid. In our deli example above, the girl behind the counter probably feels under-educated, out of touch and frustrated because she doesn’t know about the special of the day. Employ-ees who feel like they’re up to speed on the latest information about their work are gen-erally more satisfied, more engaged and de-liver more value to your customers.

Customer expectations are higher than ever. We are the fussiest, most demand-ing generation of consumers in history. At the same time, every business category now has several competitors fighting to be king of the hill. Service has become one of the most important differentiators in the battle for business, and having a system in place allows you to compete with much bigger players.

In a nutshell, the Selling The Inside™ system involves seven distinct steps:

n Showcasing your current advertising to your staff

n Discussing the features and benefits of the advertised products

n Giving your staff some talking points on

those productsn Reviewing the performance of the staff

since your last sessionn Rewarding that performancen Setting a new short-term goaln Conducting a brief training session on

a fundamental service skill, such as eye contact, greeting or handling upset cus-tomers.

When done properly, Selling The In-side™ delivers a higher return on invest-ment from your advertising, because it clos-es the knowledge gap between management and front-line staff, which allows everyone to serve customers best—and close more business.

In today’s challenging economic climate, it’s more important than ever.

Bill Guertin is an in-demand speaker, author, and chief enthusiasm officer (CEO) of The 800-Pound Gorilla, helping companies develop leaders in sales performance,

service excellence and creative marketing techniques. He is the co-author of “Reality Sells: How To Bring Customers Back Again and Again By Marketing Your Genuine Story.” Bill travels to deliver many work-shops, seminars, retreats and keynote presentations each year.

How’s Business? | by Bill guertin

The Most important Sale You’ll Ever Make

B2B illinois DIRECT CONNECTIONS

KANKAKEE COUNTY

Continued on page 36

aWarDs

n Steve Lemner of Lemner’s Soo Bahk Do Studio in Bradley recently was named Region Five’s presidents vi-sion team regional chairman and now oversees the Midwest region. Master instructor David Cooper, of Bourbon-nais, has been made regional treasurer, and is now also a certifi ed master in-structor.

Debbie Bond

Debbie Bond re-ceived the River-side Medical Cen-ter “Volunteer of the Year Award” at Riverside’s Volun-teer Appreciation Dinner April 29. President and CEO Phil Kambic, Vice

President for Human Resources Becky Hinrichs and Debbie’s husband, Harry Bond, presented the award. Bond has served more than 700 volunteer hours at Riverside and continues to devote her time. Her primary role is in River-side’s Central Waiting and at the Pavil-ion information desk.

n Rick Otto, sales manager for Coach House Garages of Dwight presented salesman Matt Foster with the Cop-per Award for excellence in sales.

n Manpower has been named to the second World’s Most Ethical Com-panies list by the Ethisphere Institute, a think tank dedicated to the research and promotion of profi table best prac-tices in global governance, business ethics and corporate responsibility, according to Beth Brosseau, Bourbon-nais branch manager for Manpower. Th e organization reviewed more than 10,000 companies around the world to prepare its 2008 list.

n Th e U.S. Environmental Protec-tion Agency has honored Rohm and Haas of Kankakee—a manufacturer of specialty chemicals—with an En-vironmental Performances Award, ac-cording to an EPA press release. Rohm and Haas was one of four companies to receive the award that recognizes “progress toward achieving environ-mental performance goals.” Rohm and Haas belongs to the agency’s National Environmental Performance Track. To

become a performance track member, companies must work toward reduc-ing their environmental footprint and demonstrate environmental steward-ship, according to the EPA.

Joe armenise, Jr.

Joe Armenise Jr., district sales repre-sentative, was rec-ognized with the Performance Food Group Chairman’s Award for his out-standing achieve-ments in sales with Th oms Proestler

Company, according to a company press release.

n Coach House Garages, a garage manufacturer, bestowed the Chairman’s Award on Matt Foster, Coach House of Dwight, recently. Th e achievement was based on sales volume and excel-lence in customer service in the Dwight area for the year 2007, according to a company press release.

Jody Meyer

Jody Meyer is the 2008 recipient of the Virginia M. Long Scholarship. Jody currently at-tends Kankakee Community Col-lege and works as an LPN at Provena St. Mary’s Hospi-

tal. Scholarship recipients must em-body Mrs. Long’s character qualities of integrity, knowledge, strength and compassion. Th ey must also be enrolled in the Kankakee Community College (KCC) registered nurse or LPN transi-tion program, must be returning to school for a second career in nursing, and must commit to two years of em-ployment at Provena St. Mary’s.

n Freddie Mac named HomeStar Bank a 2007 Tier One Gold Servicer. Th e Tier One Platinum & Gold re-cipients represent the top two percent of all Freddie Mac service providers. Servicers are ranked against monthly performance benchmarks for investor reporting, minimizing credit losses, and helping delinquent borrowers avoid foreclosure. HomeStar Bank is a state-chartered community bank head-quartered in Manteno, Illinois, with six offi ces in Kankakee and Will Counties

and over $1 billion in assets.

n McColly Real Estate is proud to announce that it has once again been named to RISMedia’s 20th Annual Power Broker Report & survey. Mc-Colly Real Estate ranked 87th in the nation in closed transaction sides in the Power Broker Report, which identifi es and ranks America’s largest residen-tial real estate brokerage companies by transaction sides and sales volume. McColly Real Estate was the only fi rm headquartered in Northwest Indiana to rank among the Top 100 and ranked 4th in the state of Indiana, only behind three large companies based in India-napolis. McColly’s ranking position improved from number 95 in 2006.

Business

n Th e Ashkum branch of Centrue Bank closed June 27, Th omas A. Daiber, Centrue Financial Corp., an-nounced in the company’s fi rst quarter earnings statement recently. Th e bank, located at Main Street and U.S. Route 45, is one of eight offi ces the company sold or closed by the end of June, reduc-ing the total number of bank branches to 28. Th e Ashkum branch has three employees who have been off ered posi-tions at other Centrue locations, Daiber said. Th e closest Centrue branch for Ashkum residents is in Kankakee.

n ComEd is nearing completion of more than $3.4 million in improve-ments in Bourbonnais, according to a company press release. Th e work in-cludes installation of a new 40-mega-watt transformer at the Bourbonnais substation on 6000N Road, west of U.S. Route 45. Th e new transformer will increase the available local capacity by 10 percent, or the equivalent needed to serve more than 8,000 additional residential customers.

n Printec Press, Crouse Printing and Custom Color Graphics, all commer-cial printers based in Champaign, have merged to form Premier Print Group. Th e new organization will operate as three divisions totaling more than $12 million in annual sales. Jeff Ruff ner has represented Printec Press in the Kankakee area for over a year.

n In early June, PetSmart held a grand opening celebration at its new store in the Water Tower Plaza, Route 50 North in Bourbonnais (near Mar-

shall’s). Th e store will have cats avail-able for adoption at all times.

n MainSource Bank in Kankakee has opened a fi nancial services offi ce at 1521 N. Convent St., Suite 300, Bour-bonnais. Th e offi ce will house Jerry Alessi, commercial lending; Mimi Barnes, mortgage lending; and Janet Lundy, mortgage underwriting.

n Annalee Moutrey has opened a new photo studio, Photographic Memo-ries, in Bradley. Moutrey specializes in maternity, babies, children, families, engagement, pets and special events. n Hogan Walker, a John Deere dealer with stores in Dwight, Manteno, So-monauk, Morris and Watseka, has purchased the John Deere dealership, Ehlers Lawn & Recreation, in Elburn. Th e transition date was June 10. Hogan Walker LLC was formed in December 1997 after the merger of Hogan Imple-ment Company and Walker Sales Inc. Both of the former companies were founded in 1973.

Dr. rosemary Johnsen

Dr. Rosemary Er-ickson Johnsen, as-sistant professor of English in the Col-lege of Arts and Sciences at Gover-nors State Univer-sity, was appointed recently to the Modern Language

Association’s Committee on the Status of Women in the Profession. Johnsen, of Steger, was appointed to the nine-mem-ber committee for a three-year term.

PeoPle

n Angela Haggard will chair the development committee at Provena Intergenerational Center. Th is com-mittee is responsible for all fundrais-ing activities for Provena Fortin Villa Child Care Learning Center and Provena Adult Center.

tammy lambert

Agente Staffi ng announces the ad-dition of Tammy Lambert to the or-ganization. Her ex-perience includes the areas of occupa-tional health and safety and human

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resources. Her responsibilities as an ac-count executive include working with existing client employers to meet their staffi ng and recruitment needs, as well as establishing new client employers.

n Th e medical offi ce of Dr. Misba-huddin Ahmed has met all criteria for laboratory accreditation by COLA, a national healthcare accreditation or-ganization. Accreditation is given to laboratories that apply rigid standards of quality in day-to-day operations, demonstrate continued accuracy in the performance of profi ciency testing and pass a rigorous on-site survey.

steve Freeman Marilyn graf

Cognis Corp. has named its May and June employees of the month. Steve Freeman is May employee of the month for his “strong work ethic,” ac-cording to a company press release. Marilyn Graf was named June em-ployee of the month for her “dedica-tion to controlling inventory,” accord-ing to a press release.

Monique Howery

Th e Daily Journal and the Small N e w s p a p e r Group Internet Innovations an-nounced that Mo-nique B. Howery has accepted the position of online sales consultant

for Th e Daily Journal. Her fi rst day at Th e Daily Journal was June 9.

n Th e Illinois Department of Em-ployment Security announced the addition of Evelina Tainer Loescher to the agency as the division manager for economic information and analy-sis. Th e division is responsible for the collection, analysis, compilation, pub-lication and distribution of Illinois workforce, career resource and labor market information. Loescher began her position on June 2.

n Frito-Lay North America sales representative Raymond Tovo, of Manteno, will be honored this week as one of PepsiCo’s top salesmen world-wide with induction into the compa-ny’s “President’s Ring of Honor.” Tovo was chosen from among more than 85,000 global sales reps for the honor, according to a company press release.

n Chris and Kelly Knobloch, of Herscher, have joined the American Angus Association, according to John Crouch, chief executive offi cer of the national breed registry organiza-tion in St. Joseph, Mo.

susan Fisher

Coldwell Banker Residential Bro-kerage and Mary Jane Cleeland announce the top producers for April 2008: Su-san Fisher, Mar-lena Th arnish, Michelle Roth,

Sarah Powers, Jerry Kern, Frank Tripodi, Cindy Schimmel, Randy McCurry, Tonya Woods and Sandy Lackey.

Berry McCracken

Roland Rosen-boom of Rosen-boom Realty re-cently announced the agency’s top producers for April: Berry Mc-Cracken, Mary Murphy, Pam Cordes, Rich

Hansen, Sandy Girard, Jennifer Bilthuis, Francis Ciaccio, Lil Girard, Mary Lou Knecht and Maria Pia-centi. He also recently announced the agency’s top producers for May: Berry McCracken, broker, GRI; Mary Murphy; Pam Cordes-Redding, ABR; Leah Henrichs; Betty Hofbau-er; Rich Hansen, broker, ABR; Sue Miller; Jennifer Bilthuis; Mary Lou Knecht, broker, gen. mgr; Fran Mar-tin, broker; and Stephen Schroeder. Th ese realtors are all members of either the Kankakee County Association of Realtors or the Iroquois Ford Associa-tion of Realtors, as well as the Illinois and National Associations, the North-ern MLSNI and the Kankakee Iro-quois Ford Multiple Listing Service.

n Carle Clinic in Champaign-Ur-bana named registered nurse Nikia Th omas, of Bourbonnais, an “exem-plary nurse” recently because “she manages to instill a sense of confi -dence in those who work with her,” according to a company press release.

n Claudiu Dumitrescu, Psy.D., is now providing clinical and consult-ing services in neuropsychology at Provena St. Mary’s Hospital. Dr. Dumitrescu is a fellowship-trained neuropsychologist with extensive ex-perience in assessing general medical, neurological and psychiatric disorders. He received his postdoctoral training at Northwestern University Hospital in Chicago, where he provided con-sultation to the departments of inter-nal medicine, neurology, neurosur-gery and psychiatry. Dr. Dumitrescu completed his internship at the VA Medical Center/University of Michi-gan Medical Center with an emphasis in geropsychology-neuropsychology. He fulfi lled his practicum training at the University of Chicago Hospital, specializing in pediatric/developmen-tal and adult neuropsychology.

tina Franklin

Bennett Homes announced its top producers for the month of May 2008 in the resi-dential division. Tina Franklin was the top Agent for the month with over $1.8

million in total transactions. Other top producers were Dawn Olson, Su-san Schreffl er, Debra Foulks and Andy Czako. All fi ve agents are members of the Kankakee County Association of Realtors, the National Association of Realtors, and the Illi-nois Association of Realtors.

greg leutloff

Bennett Com-mercial an-nounced its top producer for the month of May 2008 in the com-mercial division. Greg Leutloff was the top agent of the month with

over $2.6 million in transactions. Greg is a member of the Kankakee County Association of Realtors, Na-tional Association of Realtors, and

the Illinois Association of Realtors.

Frank tripodi

Coldwell Banker Residential Bro-kerage and Mary Jane Cleeland, managing broker are pleased to an-nounce that Frank Tripodi has recently re-ceived his broker-

age license after completing 75 hours of courses. Tripodi has been in real estate sales for over 16 years and is a consistent top producer.

n Jessica Houde and J. R. Deuel of the Coldwell Banker Residential Brokerage Bradley offi ce recently completed the company’s “Fast Start” program. Fast Start is a two-week program off ered by Coldwell Banker Residential Brokerage’s full-time ed-ucation department that includes ex-tensive coverage of the preparation of contracts, review of real estate law and other education that is covered in the basic license training class. Th ese two agents also completed the fi rst course toward (GRI) Graduate REALTOR Institution designation.

tristara Diaz

TrisTara Diaz of Kankakee recent-ly became an in-dependent con-sultant with Usborne Books at Home, a na-tional direct-sales company featur-ing high quality,

educational children’s books that make reading and learning FUN. As a consultant, TrisTara markets books to schools, libraries, individuals, on the web and by conducting home bookstores, as well as coordinating a variety of fundraisers.

azza tawfi k

McColly Real Estate recently recognized Azza Tawfi k of their Bourbonnais of-fi ce for having achieved top list-ing and top sales status for the months of April

and May 2008. Vern Hanvey and Bob Kuta each had over one-half mil-lion dollars in production for the

resources. Her responsibilities as an ac-count executive include working with

n Frito-Lay North America sales Frito-Lay North America sales Frito-Lay North Americarepresentative Raymond Tovo, of

nbana named registered nurse Th omasplary nurse” recently because “she manages to instill a sense of confi -

KANKAKEE COUNTY ContinueD FroM Page 34

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month of May. Th ese agents are all members of both the Kankakee-Iro-quois-Ford Multiple Listing Service and the Northern Illinois Multiple Listing Service.

n Realtor Sandy Workman, presi-dent of the Kankakee County As-sociation of Realtors, President-elect Sarah Powers, Realtor Sandy Boyer, president-elect of the Iroquois Ford Association of Realtors, and KCAR Executive Offi cer Connie Legris were among the more than 9,000 real-tors attending the National Associa-tion of Realtors’ midyear legislative meetings and trade expo in May. Th is year’s meetings marked 100 years of NAR’s presence and infl uence in the real estate industry. Th e Association was founded in May 1908. KCAR leadership visited Capitol Hill to meet with their senators and representa-tives and to press their concerns on a variety of issues aff ecting homeown-ers, potential homebuyers and real es-tate in general. Among top concerns are mortgage reform, homebuyer tax credits, aff ordable and accessible prop-erty, casualty and fl ood insurance, and small business health insurance.

Hal thinglum

Provena St. Mary’s Hospital is pleased to wel-come Hal Th in-glum as the new S p e e c h - L a n -guage Patholo-gist. He attended the University of Illinois in Urbana

Champaign and obtained his Ph.D. He received his undergraduate and graduate level degrees from Northern Michigan University in Marquette. Hal is celebrating his 36th year as a Speech-Language Pathologist.

amanda armer-irps

Speckman Real-ty, GMAC, an-nounced their top producers for the month of May: Amanda Armer-Irps, Banner: Over 2.3 million; Sandy Boyer, ABR, ASP,

RMM, QSC, Banner: Over 2.3 mil-lion; Lori Naese, GRI, QSC,

SRMM, Banner: Over 1 million; Lisa Sanford, ABR, BKR, CRS, GRI, SRMM, Banner: Over 1 mil-lion; Amanda Fedrow, ABR, GRI, SRMM; Marilyn Roy, ABR, GRI, SRMM; Tressie Clemans, ABR; Brian Hoots, BKR, ECO; Rose Mary Alberts, ABR, GRI, RMM; Keith Lewis, GRI; Dusty Contreras; and Brenda Dirks.

events

7/5/2008Member Appreciation/4th of July 1st Annual “Ice Cream Social”BBRCC Offi ce, 6 p.m. RSVP required.BBRCC: 815.932.2222

7/9/2008Chamber MeetingFirst Community Bank & Trust, 8:30 a.m.Peotone Chamber: 708.258.9450

7/15/2008Business After HoursOffi ce Depot, 5 - 8 p.m. BBRCC: 815.932.2222

7/17/2008Mayor’s Panel BreakfastQuality Inn & Suites, 8 - 9:30 a.m. Connie Legris: 815.937.5551

7/17/2008Ribbon Cutting & Business After HoursDinner by Design: 5 - 7 p.m. BBRCC: 815.932.2222

7/24/2008Business After HoursVernon & Maz, Inc., 5:30 - 7:30 p.m. BBRCC: 815.932.2222

7/28/2008Herscher Chamber MeetingHerscher Legion Community Cen-ter, 7 p.m.Herscher Chamber of Commerce: 815.426.2131

PeoPle

James glasgow

Will County State’s Attorney James Glasgow has been named State’s Attorney of the Year. He was honored in June at the orga-nization’s 12th an-nual awards din-

ner. Th is is the second time in his career as Will County’s top prosecutor that Glasgow has received the honor from the Illinois State Crime Com-mission, the fi rst time being in 1996. In naming him State’s Attorney of the Year for 2008, the Crime Commis-sion acknowledged Glasgow’s long and distinguished career, during which he has implemented initiatives to investigate, prosecute and prevent crime. Glasgow received his Juris Doctor from the Northern Illinois University Law School and has been practicing law since 1981.

Bryan Hanson

Braidwood Sta-tion site vice pres-ident Bryan Han-son was elected to the board of di-rectors of the Will County Center for Economic D e v e l o p m e n t . Th e center is a

nonprofi t organization whose purpose is to attract and retain jobs and busi-nesses in the county.

n Deon Pillard of Joliet has been hired as the new homeland secu-rity manager for Will County’s Emergency Management Agency (EMA). In this position, Pillard will be responsible for the implementa-tion, maintenance and monitoring of homeland security-related prepared-ness activities for Will County. Th e new position helps to insure that Will County is prepared for and can adequately respond to incidents of terrorism. Pillard came to EMA af-ter leading the County’s Health De-partment Emergency Preparedness and Response Program since 2002. In that position, she developed pub-lic health emergency plans which en-compassed bioterrorism preparedness

to pandemic infl uenza. Pillard holds a Bachelor of Science degree from the University of Iowa and a Master of Science degree from Northern Il-linois University. She also holds cer-tifi cates in incident management and emergency planning from the Federal Emergency Management Agency and has lectured extensively across the County and the State. n Will County Executive Larry Walsh restructured EMA last year, promoting Harold Damron, long time emergency management agency staff member, to director (October 2007). With over 23 years of emergen-cy management credentials, Damron created the Homeland Security Pro-gram. With the integration of the new Homeland Security eff orts into the mission, Damron continues to grow the agency and its services. Th e core mission of the agency is to coordinate emergency and disaster mitigation, preparedness, response and recovery eff orts of the County. Damron has a Bachelor of Arts degree from Gover-nors State University and is currently pursuing a Master of Arts degree from American Military University. He holds certifi cations as an Illinois Professional Emergency Manager, Certifi ed Floodplain Manager and Emergency Number Professional. Damron has also attended training at the Federal Emergency Management Agency’s Emergency Management Institute and was awarded the Inter-national Association of Emergency Managers’ Certifi ed Emergency Manager designation in 1993.

Dr. ellen Foster Curtis

Governors State University re-cently announced the appointment of Dr. Ellen Fos-ter Curtis as dean of the university’s College of Busi-ness and Public Administration,

eff ective July 1. Curtis most recently served as academic division head for the management division at the Penn State Great Valley School of Graduate Professional Studies. In that position, she led in the university’s ac-creditation from Th e Association for the Advancement of Collegiate

month of May. Th ese agents are all members of both the Kankakee-Iro-

SRMM, Banner: Over 1 million; Lisa Sanford, ABR, BKR, CRS,

KANKAKEE COUNTY ContinueD

PeoPle to pandemic infl uenza. Pillard holds a Bachelor of Science degree from

WILL COUNTY

Continued on page 39

Full Service Event PlanningPEGGY MAYER

1100 W. Calista, Kankakee, IL 60901ph: 815-932-7092 • fax: 815-932-7094

peggymayer@sbcglobal.net

Meetings & Events

What Do Gas Prices and Elder Care Have in Common?

I would like you to meet Fran. She is about 50 years old and has a mother who lives alone and requires moderate medical attention. Unfortunately, Fran cannot af-ford to pay for in-home nursing care.

Now I would like you to picture gas pric-es at $6 a gallon. Many people will be forced to leave their jobs to work at places closer to home. This could create major problems for employers.

What do gas prices and Fran have in common? They could both benefit from telecommuting. While that may be true, many employers are not comfortable with the telework option.

In a recent survey of 100 human resource executives conducted by the global outplacement consultan-cy Challenger, Gray & Christmas, Inc., more than 57 percent said their companies offered some type of re-lief to ease the financial burden of higher gas prices to employees. Only fourteen percent, however, said they were expanding their telecommut-ing opportunities.

“Telecommuting may be the best solution, but it is going to be a tough sell when business conditions are as weak as they are now,” said Chief Executive Officer John A. Chal-lenger.

According to WorldatWork, an associa-tion of human resource professionals, more than 28 million Americans work at least one day per month from home. They esti-mate that 100 million will be teleworking by 2010.

In spite of these numbers, however, the organization noted in a recent article posted on its website (www.workingfromanywhere.

org) that the biggest obstacle to continued expansion is that most managers have only been trained to work with employees who are physically present.

“Managers may have to learn how,” said Challenger, “because telecommuting may not only prove to be the most effective way

to attract and retain the best talent, but it may be the key to reducing our dependency on foreign oil.”

Another study by independent research-ers Kate Lister and Tom Harnish reported that 40 percent of Americans have jobs that can be done at home, yet only four percent of the workforce telecommute. If that 40 percent worked at home, they concluded, it

would save 625 million barrels of oil, reduce greenhouse gas pollution by 107 million tons of CO2, and save almost $43 billion at the pumps.

It is apparent that the positive benefits of telecommuting should be a strong incentive for employers. Perhaps rising gas prices will be the catalyst for change.

What about Fran?Surprisingly, Congress may help her.

Since the passage of the Telework En-hancement Act of 2007, Congress has been looking at all the potential benefits of tele-commuting for both workers and federal agencies.

The General Service Administration (GSA) highlighted one of those benefits in a 2006 report that linked telecommuting with dependent care.

“A key benefit commonly associated with telework,” said the report, “is its potential for assisting employees with a disabled spouse on a regular medication routine, or providing a presence for an elder. Yet, many organizations do not support the use of tele-work to assist employees with dependent care. However reasonable this exclusion may seem at face value, the reality is that it is based on out-dated opinion as opposed to empirically tested fact and practice.”

is Telecommuting a Real Solution?

Yes. The trick is knowing which jobs to convert to telecommuting and how to supervise those workers. Up until now, managers had few re-sources to turn to.

One of those resources is Debra A. Dinnocenzo’s excellent book on telecommuting called 101 Tips for Telecommuters. Dinnocenzo is presi-dent of ALLearnatives®, a company specializing in the development of resources for telecommuters, tele-managers, and other home-based workers.

Another more recent resource is coming this fall at Joliet Junior College in Joliet and Illinois Val-ley Community College in Oglesby. Both schools are offering courses to help teleworkers and telemanagers prepare for the virtual workplace. Look for them in their fall catalogs.

While the push to conserve en-ergy and the need for workers to care for a disabled or elder family member is coming together to drive business to expand tele-commuting opportunities, it is important to remember that not all jobs lend themselves to telecommuting. Some require workers to be at the job site. Nevertheless, millions of jobs can be done at home—even one or two days a week. Each business should explore the telework option to determine what is best for them.

Joe Giunta is a contract training manager for Joliet Junior College’s Corporate and Community Services division.

by Joseph P. Giunta

0630

0820

9101

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Schools of Business (AACSB), the premier accrediting agency for degree programs in business administration and accounting. Curtis’ experience also includes faculty positions at Northeastern University’s College of Business Administration and the Col-lege of Management at the University of Massachusetts Lowell, where she served concurrently as associate pro-fessor of management and director of graduate programs. Prior to joining Penn State, Curtis was a performance consultant specializing in manage-ment and leadership development for the fi nancial services, operations and systems division of Merrill Lynch. Curtis earned her bachelor’s degree in French and Germanic Studies from Indiana University, graduating Phi Beta Kappa. She holds a Master of Business Administration degree, graduating Beta Gamma Sigma, and a Doctor of Business Administration degree from the Kelley School of Business at Indiana University.

Drs. Crossan and griffi n

Paul D. Crossan, MD, and Vivian Griffi n, MD, will be joining the phy-sicians currently on staff at Provena Saint Joseph Medical Center. Dr. Crossan attended Loyola University Stritch School of Medicine and served his residency at the school’s Depart-ment of Radiation Oncology. He served elective rotations at the Uni-versity of Washington and the Puget Sound Veterans Administration Hos-pital in Prostate Brachytherapy. He also served at St. Jude’s Children’s Hospital in the Radiation Oncology Department. Dr. Crossan is a board certifi ed Radiologist and is currently involved in a research project involv-ing CT-based 3D evaluation of inter-fraction organ variation in HDR brachytherapy of the cervix. He is a member of several organizations in-cluding the American Society for Th erapeutic Radiology and Oncology, the Illinois Radiological Society and the Chicago Radiological Society.

Paul Pawlak, president and Ceo of silver Cross Hospital; 45-year service awardee Joann schi-fl er, surgery recovery room; 40-year service awardee gwen ulmer, community relations; and Mary Bakken, chief operating offi cer of silver Cross.

During National Hospital Week, Sil-ver Cross Hospital honored employ-ees who reached milestones of 5 to 45 years of service. Over 85 employees with 10 or more years were honored at a special dinner held in May. Employ-ees with fi ve years of service received a gift of their choice.

n Andrea Ramirez-Justin was re-cently promoted to vice president at Old Plank Trail Community Bank in Mokena. Justin served as the assistant vice president since joining the bank in March 2007 and has more than 25 years of banking experience. She also serves on the executive board of the Frankfort Chamber of Commerce and the ambassador board of the Cancer Support Center in Mokena.

n Bobbie Reed, “Mrs. Bobbie,” has recently retired from Bobbie Noon-an’s Child Care in Homer Glen after 27 years.

Dr. Daniel gutierrez

Daniel Gutierr-ez, M.D., an in-ternal medicine physician and for-mer medical di-rector of the Will County Commu-nity Health Cen-ter, has joined the Sanitas Medical

Group in Joliet. Partnering with Drs. Jose Penaherrera and Diana Jaime, Dr. Gutierrez is now seeing patients in the Hershman Medical Arts Building on the Silver Cross Hospital campus on Monday and Th ursday afternoons.

n McColly Real Estate recently rec-ognized sales professionals who have achieved top listing and/or sales status for the month of April 2008: Michelle Boicken—top listings and top sales, Beecher; Sharon Patrick—top list-

ing, Crete; Don-na Hanrahan—top sales, Crete; Nancy McCa-be—top listings, Shorewood; Mike Roche top sales, Shorewood; Don Moore—top list-ing, Tinley Park;

and Kelly Ryan—top sales, Tinley Park. McCOLLY Real Estate was es-tablished in 1974 and has grown to be the largest residential real estate fi rm in Northwest Indiana and the Chi-cago Southland with over 800 sales professionals.

events

7/8/2008Monthly Membership Luncheon Prairie Bluff Golf Club, Crest Hill 11:30 a.m. - 1 p.m.Romeoville Chamber: 815.886.2076

7/15/2008Business AFTER 5Back to Basics Health Center, 5 - 7 p.m.Romeoville Chamber: 815.886.2076

7/18/2008Manhattan Chamber Annual Golf OutingWoodbine Golf Course, Homer GlenManhattan Chamber: 815.478.3811

7/19/20081st Annual Romeoville Job Fair Romeoville Recreation Center, 9 a.m. - 2 p.m.Doris Mann: 815.886.7209

7/23/2008Society of Human Resource Man-agers meetingJJC Business and Technology Center, 8 - 9 a.m.Derek Wright: 815.744.0111

7/24/2008Business After HoursCity of Joliet, 5 - 7 p.m.Joliet Region Chamber: 815.727.5371

7/25/2008Annual Golf Outing to benefi t Lamb’s Fold Center for Women and ChildrenGreen Garden Country Club. 7:30 a.m. registration; 9:30 a.m. shot-gunLindsey Savant: 815.723.5262

Schools of Business (AACSB), the premier accrediting agency for degree

WILL COUNTY ContinueD

wants help calculating the pay back period for extra insulation or energy star applianc-es, we will be able to assist or show how to fi nd the answer. And, as ComEd creates its portfolio of energy conservation incentives, the center will provide resources to explain how to access these incentives.

As we develop this concept we plan to have more information on just how the cen-ter will operate and what parts will be vir-tual and what parts physical.

Educational Programs and Training to Produce a New Energy Workforce

One of the benefi ts of sustainability and alternative energy will be the increased jobs related to the new ways we produce and dis-tribute energy and bring conservation and sustainability to business practices. While we are not exactly sure what these future green jobs will look like, studies indicate that the number of workers in green energy jobs may double over our current conven-tional carbon-based systems that rely on coal, oil, and natural gas.

To provide opportunities in this emerg-ing employment market, this fall we plan to add courses to our electronics curricula that will train technicians for the new energy systems. Th ese green jobs are likely to in-volve skilled technicians who are well com-pensated. In our region and the Chicago area, there will be local employment in the installation of solar energy and both in the installation and maintenance of wind gen-erators. Likewise, the ability to do energy audits and retro commissioning of HVAC systems as well as a host of other jobs and skills are likely to emerge.

Working TogetherKCC continually strives to support eco-

nomic growth and provide education and training for area business and industry workforce needs. Th e college also stands ready to bring new technology and new ef-fi ciency to give our companies the competi-tive edge. Th ere will be a number of oppor-tunities to lower operating energy costs, as KCC itself plans to do. However, the long range opportunity of sustainable develop-ment will be to operate our economy so that we maintain the attractive features of this region for decades from now.

Jerry Weber, president, Kankakee Community College

A Possible and Sustainable Future

Continued from page 9

Michelle Boicken

BACK COVER