November 25, 2007
by James Harmeing
Last week, we talked about the Cook County treasurer’s and Cook County assessor’s office Web sites. This week, I thought we could round out some of the other county offices. One of my top picks is the Cook County Sheriff Tom Dart’s Web site. I do a bit of work for the sheriff’s office, but had nothing to do with the Web sites for the office. www.cook countysheriff.org is a great place to get law enforcement information. In addition to hosting information about which inmates are incarcerated, you can find information about Cell Phones for Seniors. This program provides cell phones to senior citizens for emergency 911 calls.
Another great spot for parents on the sheriff’s Web site is the Internet Safety Page. The best advice on the page is to instruct your children never to give out personal information on the computer, such as their names, address, phone number, school names or photographs. For parents who allow older teens to access social networking sites, please warn your kids that more and more colleges and universities are monitoring online sites to get an idea of what information a prospective student is doing. One stupid picture on MySpace or Facebook may be the difference between your child getting into a school or not.
Circuit Court Clerk Dorothy Brown can be found at www.cookcountycourt.org. There is information about court records, court calls, rules that need to be followed, and jury information. By the way, according to the Web site, if you are chosen for jury duty in Cook County it is because you either have a state ID, driver’s license, automobile, or are registered to vote. These lists are combined, duplicates deleted (hopefully) and then you are selected randomly. If you serve on a jury or show up for the day, you will not be called again for a year.
Another county office that has a great Web site is Cook County itself. Check out www.CookCountyGov.com. President Todd Stroger has improved the Web site, and you can get a myriad of information on county government and links to each agency and elected official.
I have been a bike rider lately, and we needed some maps of the forest preserve district. Starting at the county Web site, I was able to find the Forest Preserve District www.fpdcc.com. This site is great, Click on Recreation, then Bicycling, and you have your choice of maps to view. We took the Tinley Creek trail to the tune of 12 miles, and I was very surprised that I wasn’t dead tired afterward.
There always is something going on at the nature centers, check them out. The fall colors may be mostly gone, but there still is great wildlife to see.
Jim Harmening is president of Computer Bits Inc., an Orland Park computer services company. Send questions to Jim in care of Mary Beth Sheehan at info@ bitsmail.com or at www.computerbits.com. Personal responses are not always possible. Questions may be used in future columns.