It was a year of tragedy and change in the Aurora area in 2019.
The mass shooting at the Henry Pratt Co. in Aurora on Feb. 15 saw a disgruntled employee fatally shoot five workers and injure five Aurora police officers and an employee in an incident that put the city in the national spotlight.
The year also saw new leaders elected in the area, continued growth in Aurora’s downtown and the Polar Vortex which put the Fox Valley for a time under its icy spell.
Here is a list of the top 10 stories of 2019 in the Aurora area, as compiled by members of The Beacon-News staff.
Pratt shooting: On Feb. 15, an employee who had just learned he was to be fired from the Henry Pratt Co. opened fire inside the warehouse, killing five employees, injuring a sixth and wounding five police officers in a shooting that rocked Aurora.
Trevor Wehner, Josh Pinkard, Russell Beyer, Clayton Parks and Vicente Juarez were killed that day.
The shooting was immediately followed by a rush of fundraisers and vigils, and the city rallied around the reminder that it was “Aurora Strong.” Families held funerals and tributes, and police officers began the process of physical therapy and recovery, all eventually returning to work.
But even as the crush of events faded and the national attention died down, much of 2019 for Aurora has been filled with the process of healing from the tragedy. It left the city and the police department forever changed.
Pitzen hoax: People in the Fox Valley stood on edge for a day this spring wondering if an Aurora boy who went missing eight years ago had resurfaced.
In early April, a 23-year-old Ohio man tried to pass himself off as Timmothy Pitzen until a DNA test revealed he was in fact someone else.
Timmothy went missing when he was 6 after his mom, Amy Fry-Pitzen, pulled him out of his kindergarten class in Aurora and took him on a mini-vacation to zoos and resorts. Three days later, her body was found in a Rockford motel room. She had committed suicide and Timmothy was gone. Left behind was a note from Fry-Pitzen that said she left Timmothy in the care of responsible adults who loved him and he would never be found.
Aurora police detectives drove to Cincinnati in April and later said they struggled to understand why the man with no obvious connection to the Pitzen family would lie and claim to be him.
Timmothy’s family continues to hold out hope that he will eventually be found and brought home.
The only positive of the hoax was that Timmothy’s name was back in the headlines for a day and the attention could bring new leads to the case, officials said.
Wayside controversy: Tensions ran high between Wayside Cross Ministries and the city of Aurora for much of 2019.
In the spring, the ministry agreed to house Thomas Kokoraleis, a convicted murderer and member of the notorious Ripper Crew, upon his release from prison. Aurora Mayor Richard Irvin blasted the move.
Months later, in June, Aurora police delivered letters notifying registered child sex offenders living at Wayside and participating in a rehabilitation program that they had to move. City officials said they had been incorrectly mapping distances, and the new system revealed the men living at the 90-year-old ministry were too close to McCarty Park, in violation of state law.
The issue dragged on for months as the men filed a lawsuit, which they later dropped, and the city re-issued notices to move in December. The men were told they had until mid-January to move out, and the issue remains ongoing.
As the sex offender issue played out, Wayside’s youth division, which is a separate program, stood poised to miss out on a city grant for the first time since the grant program was revitalized in 2018. Irvin ultimately recommended a different type of funding for Wayside’s youth program and another nonprofit.
Garfield Apartments in spotlight: At least 30 tenants lost their homes when the Garfield Apartments on Aurora’s near West Side were deemed unsafe and uninhabitable, sparking debate over affordable housing in Aurora.
The building, once a YMCA, had faced a slew of safety and code violations dating back years, the Beacon-News found. One of the two then-investors in the entity that owned the building was a company co-managed by a man convicted of federal business fraud and, separately, embezzlement who also served as a government mole in major investigations, including wearing a wire on Antoin “Tony” Rezko, who was linked to the case that felled imprisoned former governor Rod Blagojevich. The one-time property manager served time in federal prison for fraud.
The former property manager was ultimately charged with misdemeanor criminal housing management.
After they were evicted, the tenants faced challenges retrieving their belongings. Through much of the rest of 2019, many struggled to find new homes.
Opening of arts center in Aurora: The $35 million John C. Dunham Aurora Arts Center opened in June in downtown Aurora, with 38 loft apartments, with artist preference for residents; 19 classrooms; and 10 group classrooms, all contained in 25,000 square feet, and 8,000 square feet of rehearsal space for the Paramount Theatre.
It is home for 40 summer camps for children age 6 months to 19 years old during the summer, and eventually as many as 250 students at a time.
The funding for the Arts Center was a complicated mix of public and private money that created the combination of theatrical and residential space. As part of the overall deal, The Community Builders, which did much of the development and contracting work, also renovated the Coulter Building at Broadway and Downer Place, refurbishing housing for special needs individuals.
Fire guts historic Masonic Temple: In October, a massive fire struck the historic Masonic Temple at Lincoln and Benton streets on the eastern edge of downtown Aurora.
The fire destroyed the building and ended years of monetary investment by the city of Aurora in hopes of turning the building into something else and saving it for its historic value.
The lot where the building once stood is now vacant, awaiting development of some kind, some day. What was left of the building was torn down at a cost to the city of $780,000.
The columns and cornerstone of the building are elsewhere, also awaiting the possibility of being used in a redevelopment project.
The possibility exists the fire department may never know for sure how the fire started because the building was so dangerous, investigators could not immediately gain access after the fire.
When the temple building was built in 1922, it was done by an alliance of five different Masonic temples.
Aurora library moves toward becoming a district: The past year was an active one for the Aurora Public Library, culminating in a December vote by the Library Board in favor of becoming a library district.
The move would make the library a separate governmental body – no longer a direct part of the city of Aurora’s municipal government.
In January, the Aurora City Council must vote on the library becoming a district. If aldermen approve that resolution, then the Library Board will petition the 16th Circuit Court to begin the transition process of turning the library into its own governmental body.
Also at year’s end, the council increased the library’s tax levy in preparation of it becoming a new library district.
Polar vortex chills Fox Valley: Last winter was one for the record books, with very cold temperatures the norm including a few days at the end of January and early February that saw temperatures dip to historic lows.
The coldest days saw schools and many businesses closed while area residents tried to deal with the frigid temperatures.
Leadership changes: The spring election saw a number of changes to local government in the Fox Valley.
In Oswego, Troy Parlier defeated incumbent Gail Johnson in a three-way race for village president that also included Trustee Joe West.
There was also a change at the top in Yorkville, as Kendall County Board member John Purcell defeated incumbent Gary Golinski in a three-way mayoral race that also included Ald. Joe Plocher.
In Aurora, three incumbent aldermen won easy victories in the City Council election, but two new faces were elected.
Emmanuel Llamas, an attorney with Dreyer, Foote, Streit, Furgason & Slocum, an Aurora firm, won election to the 1st Ward seat being vacated by Tina Bohman.
Patty Smith, a paralegal with a long history of community involvement, won election to the 8th Ward spot that had been represented by Richard Mervine for 12 years. Mervine opted not to run again for the post.
Sherman Jenkins, at large; Carl Franco, 5th Ward; and Michael Saville, 6th Ward, won their reelection bids.
Marijuana in the spotlight: With recreational marijuana use becoming legal in Illinois beginning Jan. 1, towns around the Fox Valley debated whether to allow sales in their communities.
The Aurora City Council voted in October to allow sales. Aldermen on Aurora’s Building, Zoning and Economic Development Committee this month voted to recommend a special use and rezoning for a retail building at 740 N. Route 59 where Healthway Services, which does business as Zen Leaf, wants to open Aurora’s first recreational marijuana dispensary.
Oswego and Yorkville were among the area towns which voted to allow sales. The North Aurora Village Board approved the sale of recreational marijuana at 161 S. Lincolnway, where medical marijuana has been dispensed for a number of years.
Sugar Grove officials decided against allowing the sale of marijuana. Naperville City Council members in September voted to not allow recreational dispensaries in the city, but the issue will be put to voters in a referendum question on the March 17 primary election ballot.
