May 6th, 2008 04:36pm
Geri Nikolai
We all know Rockford is a great place to raise a family. It’s a generous community, a church-going community, place you can round up volunteers for a worthy cause quicker than the weather changes in April.
But, how much fun is our region? Are you, and/or your family, happy with the arts-entertainment-cultural-recreation scene in the Rock River Valley? Has that part of our lifestyle gotten better, or worse, in the past 30 years.
We know NAT went off the map but look what happened at the Coronado, and the MetroCentre, and Burpee, and Discovery Center, to name a few success stories. Or, are you not impressed?
I’m interested in your view of our after-work life in Rockford, and your attitude about the city? Optimistic? Pessimistic? Sure nothing will ever change? Convinced we’re on the brink of a renaissance?
 Please share your thoughts with me at gnikolai@rrstar.com or 815-987-1337. Leave a message if I’m not available, with your name and number, please.
Thanks.
May 6th, 2008 03:00pm
Anna Derocher
We met this afternoon to talk about the 180 Degrees campaign. We’re looking at five areas that are essential to this community’s way of life: Crime, education, local economy, government and culture/our sense of place. We kicked off the project last week online and have been posting your comments as we get them. We’re now focusing on crime.
Crime affects us all. Some directly. Some indirectly. Though the crime rate remains high, it has declined in Rockford and across the nation. Still, the perception in Rockford is that crime has spread to formerly safe neighborhoods. We would like to know what role crime has played in your life. How has crime affected you?
Write a brief essay, 500 words or less, and tell us what you think. Feel free to send photos, letters or anything else explains your situation. Please include a self-addressed, stamped envelope if you want the items returned.
Write to us at the Rockford Register Star, Rockford Crime, 99 E. State St., Rockford, IL 61104. Or e-mail us at onlinenews@rrstar.com. Please put Rockford Crime in the subject line. Also, include your full name, address and telephone number in case we have any questions. All submissions may be edited for length, accuracy and clarity and may be published or distributed in print or electronic forms.
May 6th, 2008 07:34am
Jennie Pollock
we’ve been working on a timeline of notable points in rockford history for this project, from the metrocentre opening in 1981 to the deseg case ending in 2002.
while people who have lived here a long time will remember all of them, those of us non-natives sometimes remember things from the first year we moved here.
for me it was 1995. the homicide rate was high, for sure, as gang warfare exploded. i also, oddly enough, remember serial killer ray lee stewart’s execution in 1996, waiting by the phone to hear the news.
on a happier note, i remember the coronado opening in 2001 and rockford winning the america in bloom contest in 2005.
do you have suggestions for other milestones to include?
May 5th, 2008 04:49pm
Lil Swanson
We started talking in depth this morning about the next piece of the project, a look at crime and how we got to where we are over the last three decades.
Judy Emerson has been digging into the topic for a couple of months, and we’ve outlined the main stories she’ll write. We want the online experience to be all that and a whole lot more, so tomorrow we will be plotting that strategy.
Already, we have one video in hand, with Police Chief Chet Epperson, and we will be producing many more.
What would you most like to know about crime in Rockford?
May 5th, 2008 10:06am
Anna Derocher
We’ve already gotten some response from readers who want to help turn Rockford around. Do you want to help? Find out how here.
We also asked you for your hopes and dreams for Rockford. Here’s what Terry Carl of Loves Park had to say.
May 2nd, 2008 02:10pm
Anna Derocher
We officially introduced our campaign this morning on rrstar.com. And the response (based on page views) has been strong.
The highlights for me are the video stories produced by videographer Alan Leon. There’s this one about retired police officer Sherri Glover, who was shot in her squad car while she filled out reports. And this one featuring Rockford residents Amy Hill and Willie Ashford, who have watched their west-side neighborhood deteriorate. You’ll also find links to videos of the key staffers behind this effort here.
In Sunday’s paper, look for our print coverage in the Opinions section.
May 2nd, 2008 12:38pm
chris soprych
Here the video opening that Brian Rieder, the WREX guru worked up for us. Brian was really great to work with. I hope we didn’t kill him with last minute changes. In fact, I notice one small problem. Watch the video and see if you can see it.[kml_flashembed movie=”http://www.youtube.com/v/W3ysGfPbP_M” width=”425″ height=”350″ wmode=”transparent” /]If you can’t find the defect, click on the second video which was a first attempt and the inspiration for the icon we used for the series.[kml_flashembed movie=”http://www.youtube.com/v/riEaQRRJjt0″ width=”425″ height=”350″ wmode=”transparent” /]
May 2nd, 2008 07:28am
Jennie Pollock
today, we’ve posted more than a half-dozen videos as part of this 180 degrees project to find solutions for a better rockford.
if you watched any of them, you noticed the introduction: we worked with our partners, wrex-13, to compose the images, animate the compass and choose the music. and judy emerson appeared on the air last night to introduce the project (video to come).
thanks to brian rieder, eric wilson and maggie hradecky at the tv station for their help so far.
and thanks to chris soprych and alan leon for pulling these first of many videos together.
the power of 2 is just one example of working together. to find solutions for a better rockford, which is this project’s mission, our whole community must pull together.
April 30th, 2008 08:33pm
Lil Swanson
     The last few days have been all about putting dozens of pieces in place for the project launch on the Web site and in the newspaper. We’re selecting photos, creating a map and timeline, editing stories and videos and writing headlines.
By the time we’re done, more than two dozen talented journalists will have had their hands on some piece of this project launch. It’s creative teamwork and that feels good.
April 30th, 2008 05:14pm
Chuck Sweeny
Hi, I’m Chuck Sweeny, political editor of the Rockford Register Star, or rrstar.com if you prefer. Listen up:
Rockford adapts.
The city started as a manufacturing center in the old water power district south of downtown. There, fast-running water from a mill race channeled off the Rock River turned gears attached to leather belts that ran machines, in the days before electricity.
Rockford built — and still builds — all kinds of things out of wood, metal, plastic and fiberglass.
Because manufacturing is essentially all we’ve ever done, we’ve gone through disastrous economic situations — 1893 was awful. More than a dozen furniture factories went bust. Luckily, P.A. Peterson rescued them in a co-op arrangement.
When the Depression hit in 1929, Rockford had its own shanty towns, one near Charles and 22nd Street, which an old Swede remembered when he returned to Rockford a few years back from Stockholm to relive memories of his youth here in the 1930s. Times were so bad here back then that the man’s immigrant family had to leave the Not-So-Promised Land and returned to the Old Country. They were not the only ones.
Rockford lost 10,000 people during the 30s, but the population began growing with the onset of World War II. After that war, the economy took off like gangbusters as Rockford’s dynamic companies, most of them home-owned, provided valuable products to the auto , machine tool and aviation industries. Baby Boomers, who grew up here in those prospeous times, tend to think that Rockford was always riding on easy street.
We hit a major speed bump in the early 80s, and the population declined 9,000 in that decade. But, back we came in the 90s, as manufacturers learned to work smarter and began to realize that “export” doesn’t mean sending products to Cincinnatti.
Now, Rockford is uneasy again, and once more is trying to find its place in the world. Unlike cities such as Dayton, Flint or Peoria, we’re not dependent totally on one company. But we are still largely a manufacturing center, and we’ve taken another big hit as competition from Asia has drained jobs away from us.
What’s the next Rockford going to look like? One thing I know for sure: We’ll become more and more integrated into greater Chicagoland. Don’t fret: That’s what’s going to save Rockford from the fates of isolated small cities like those in Iowa, which are dying because they’re not part of a huge, metropolitan area.
Like it or not, people no longer live in cities and towns. The majority of Americans live in large population blobs I call “megametros.” In one series on Rockford’s challenges, which I did back in the 1990s, I referred to our region as “The Chi-Waukee Metroplex.” I don’t like that monicker anymore; it’s too Cheesehead-heavy.
But hear this warning: Unless Rockford upgrades our public schools and adds significantly to our post secondary education opportunities, our importance to Chicagoland is going to be minimal and we’ll be left to be the distribution center kings and queens.
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