The Joy of .....

... Mail!!! The first "good news" of 2012 arrived today, when my mail carrier brought me a letter mailed on January 3. Thank goodness the proposed mail cut-backs have not started. I always like receiving mail the day after it is sent.

To the sender - - I agree with you. I'll see what I can do. I can't reach the right parties tonight, but no doubt they will be in their offices tomorrow. And these are people who answer their phones, when I call. And, not only that, they return calls!

Your strategy is solid. It will work

As to the second matter I'll combine it with other information coming to me.As you know, nothing really stays quiet for long. For example, I'm unable to guess a reason for the Sheriff's Department and the Coroner's Office to withhold all information about the two deaths on Route 176 near Island Lake last Saturday.

And remember when it took many days for the Sheriff's Department to disclose the drunk-driving wreck of an off-duty deputy in his take-home squad car?

I was telling someone today that Sheriff Nygren should have held a press conference on the Sunday of the wreck and informed the public of that wreck. It's called "owning up" and taking responsibility. That wreck, you may already know, was only a week before a deputy's birthday party at the Red Mill Tavern, where a bunch of deputies and their friends got sloshed and drove. And that was after command personnel were warned to be on their guard about anticipated excessive drinking, in view of the previous week-end's DUI wreck of the off-duty deputy.

Three supervisors got 30-day suspensions over that - just short of the discipline level that would have required reporting to the Merit Commission, where it would have become public knowledge.

There are many good deputies at the McHenry County Sheriff's Department. They want it to be a clean "ship". And they know very well what happens to the squeaky wheel.