The Daily Herald from Chicago, Illinois • Page 269

108 Wanning trend Partly sunny and warmer with a high in the upper 20s. Partly cloudy tonight with a low around 20. Mostly cloudy and warmer Friday with a high in the upper 30s. INSIDE William Daley breezed in his Senate confirmation hearing Wednesday. Daley endorsed The Senate confirmed Andrew Cuomo as housing secretary, and Chicagoan William Daley's bid to be commerce secretary was endorsed by a Senate panel Page 15.

BUSINESS Ditka's cookin' Although he and other celebrities have had trouble operating restaurants in the past, Mike Ditka is new restaurant in downtown Chicago Section 3. CONSTABLE Scenic Cleveland Who would have thought the judges would pick Cleveland? For anything. But they did. The Rust Belt city beat some 600 entries for the best calendar Back Page. Jeff Hackett knows the pressures of being No.

1. New demands With Ed Belfour gone to San Jose, the Blackhawks are goalie Jeff Hackett's team now. With the job comes different pressures, higher expectations and tougher criticism Project targets athletic, academic facilities BY RAY MINOR Daily Herald Staff Writer Athletics and academics both will benefit from a proposed multimillion dollar remodeling plan unveiled Wednesday by North Central College. Officials at the Naperville school want to renovate the football stadium, running track and the landmark Old Main building. The school needs to repair its sports facilities because they were damaged in last summer's flood, officials say.

Storm water rushing toward the raging DuPage River ripped up the running track, forcing the school to cancel meets for this coming spring. At one poinf, water stood about five feet deep on the football field and reached a boiler room in the field house, sports information director Mike Koon said. The water weakened the stands, but the school was able to make some repairs for last year's football season. "We've had plans to upgrade the stadium for some time, but the flood really speeded things up," Koon said. "Instead of patching things, we wanted to do it right and fix everything." The school also plans to rotate a baseball field during the work, said Paul Loscheider, vice president for business afiairs.

Pending approval from the city and the school's board of trustees, construction could start this spring. The football team might need to find a temporary home for next sea- son, Loscheider said, although officials hope the new field will be ready for opening day. The 127-year-old Old Main will undergo an extensive renovation over the next year. Plans include gutting the building, remodeling every floor and adding an elevator. Old Main houses administration offices, classrooms and the school's bookstore.

Offices and classrooms temporarily will be moved to.other buildings and to a few portable offices on campus, Loscheider said. "It may be noisy and messy, but we're try to limit the inconvenience to pur students and neighbors," he said. The portable offices will be tem. See PROJECT on Page 4 Old Main, a landmark building at North Central College in Naperville, will undergo a multimillion dollar renovation beginning this spring. Construction will last more than a year.

Daily Herald Lee The rail Outer suburbs next in line as Metra eyes expansion of the future BY JON MARSHALL Daily Herald Staff Writer Suburbs around the Chicago region are waiting in line to hop on board Metre's train service. The outer reaches of the suburbs are likely to be the next destinations as Metra looks to expand its commuter-rail lines. The possibilities include small but growing towns such as Gilberts, Huntley, Elbum and Sugar Grove. But larger suburbs such as Gurnee, Hoffman Estates and Naperville also are looking for new orexpanded service. What it means is the competition over which of these communities et the next line is likely to be erce.

Metra would reach these new stops by using existing freight tracks to extend some of its current lines. "The end of our lines are no longer the end of our market," Metra spokesman Tom Miller said. But any new projects is at best five or 10 years down the line, Miller said. And how much the federal and local governments are willing to pitch in may be the deciding factor. The August opening of the North Central line between Antioch and Chicago the area's first commuter line in 68 prompted other communities to hope for rail service of their own.

"I'm sure the competition will be stiff," Gurnee Village Administrator James Hayner said Gumee and Waukegan leaders, for instance, met recently with Metra officials about adding a branch of the Milwaukee North line through their communities. Gumee even bought land at the M---. l' i ii i i intersection of Route 41 and Kilbourne Road as the spot for a potential station, Hayner said. But Gurnee and the other northern Lake County communities may have to wait in line because Metra has other lines at the top of its list. The leading possibility is adding commuter service to the Elgin, Joliet Eastern Railway running from Waukegan in an arc through the suburbs to the Indiana suburbs.

It would go through dozens of communities including Mundelein, Hawthorn Woods, Lake Zurich, Harrington, Hoffman Estates, Hanover Park, :6. Extending trie Burtington'Northem line from Aurora to Sugar Grove 7. Starting a.new.cornmuter line between Beecher and downtown Chicago 8. Extending the Southwest line from Orland Park to Manhattan. 9.

As a lower the Milwaukee District North line from. Rondout to Wadsworth Source: Metra Batavia, West Chicago and Naperville, The top options for extending current commuter lines include: the Milwaukee District West line from the Big Timber stop in Elgin about 22 miles through northern Kane and southern McHenry counties to Marengo. Potential stops include Gilberts, Huntley and Union, the Burlington Northern line from Aurora about seven miles through southern Kane County to Sugar Grove. Stops could be at Prairie Street and Orchard Road. the Union Pacific West line from Geneva about seven miles Daily Herald Graphic through central Kane County to Elburn.

Potential stops could be at Peck and La Fox roads. the Union Pacific Northwest line about 10 miles from McHenry to Richmond near the Wisconsin border. Ringwood could be a possible stop. the Southwest Service line from Orland Park about 19 miles through Will County to Manhattan. A potential stop could be at Baker Road.

Metra also is looking at connecting O'Hare International and Midway airports, adding a second set See METRA on Page 7 New chamber president targets lisle memberships BY DEBORAH PANKEY Daily Herald Staff Writer Increasing membership and providing useful programs are high on Wayne Dunham's list of priorities as he takes over as president of the Lisle Area Chamber of Commerce. Dunham, who owns a home-based marketing company, took over the president's post from Lesley Powers earlier this month. Dunham also served as chamber president in 1992. "I look at this as coming full circle from that time," Dunham said. "We've made numerous changes and those changes are now complete." Back in 1992, he said, the chamber was just beginning a staff overhaul.

Today, all the faces in the office are new. But what also happened between 1992 and 1997 was a slip in memberships. And now Dunham wants to get those numbers up again. Wayne Dunham "I'm setting a goal of 325 members," Dunham said. "We need to get new blood into the chamber." True to his marketing roots, Dunham has a gimmick of sorts for getting new members.

Existing members there are about 275 of them will be given cold hard cash for each new person they bring into the chamber. There also will be a contest to see who can sign up the most new members. While that tactic may get new members, it's quality programs and services that will keep them, Dunham said. And in that vein he has some ideas as well. "We're going to increase our cooperation with other chambers, networking with Woodridge and Downers Grove," he said.

"We can't always be talking to the same 50 or 60 people who show up to luncheons." He said chamber members are being surveyed to detennine what types of programs they Dunham isn't the onty new officer on the chamber board: Bill Valiant was elected vice president, Mike Brommer is treasurer and Bonnie Provenza returns as secretary. Lisle police track down evidence along Lenox Road after a gunman robbed the McDonald's on Maple Avenue on Wednesday. Herald Horne Gunman holds up McDonald's A gunman made off with an undetermined amount of cash Wednesday during a daytime robbery at the McDonald's on Maple Avenue and Route 53 in Lisle. At the time, there were several customers in the fast-food restaurant, at 1019 Maple but no one was injured. Lisle police Sgt.

Dennis Seccombe said. Witnesses told police the robber walked into the restaurant and waited in line at the counter around 3p.m. When it was his turn to order, the robber displayed a revolver and said, "Give me all your money." After taking the cash, the gunman ran from the store, Police described the bearded gunman as about 6 feet tall and around 25 years old. He last was seen wearing a dark brown jacket. His description does not match that of any other armed robbers in the area, Seccombe said.

Deal nets refund for frustrated AOL users BY LOWLYN RACKL Daily Herald StaBWntcr Frustrated America Online customers will get more than a busy signal from the nation's biggest computer online service. They'll be getting their money back. Under an agreement with 36 states announced Wednesday by Illinois Attorney General Jim Ryan, AOL is required to give refunds to its subscribers, make it easier to cancel the service and virtually pull the plug on advertising next month. The online service provider made an llth-hour addition to the agree- AOL, consumers both win with settlement Page 9 ment, saying it will give consumers the option of one month of free service in lieu of a refund. The company that provides a link to the Internet for some 8 million customers came under fire after its network proved incapable of handling a glut of new subscribers, who were capitalizing on AOL's new flat- rate offer of unlimited online time for $19.95 a month.

Several states threatened lawsuits found it increasingly difficult to get the online access they paid for because too many people were using AOL. "The company quickly victim of its own popularity," Rjjm said AOL Chairman Steve Caser the company had been workuigajpsa plan for refunds before the state's intervened. "We were pleased at the final hour that the attorneys general are supporting It was a concern that our members were waiting for us to respond. If there hadn't been so many states involved, we could have responded a few days ago," Case said. Refunds, which apply to all AOL customers, will be based on how much time consumers spent on-line in December and January, During either of those months, customers who used AOL less, than two hours will get a 100 percent refund, or up to $19.95 for each month.

If they used the service between two and eight hours, they will geta 50 percent refund. A 25 percent refund will be given for usage between eight and 15 hours. No refunds will be given for more than 15 hours of use a month. To be eligible for a refund, customers must contact AOL or file a complaint with the Illinois Attorney General's Office. Consumers have 120 days to apply for a refund.

AOL, based in Dulles, has 30 days to refund customers' money once a complaint is filed. In place of a refund, customers can opt for a one-month credit "It's one month, free service, no questions asked that's what they said," said Patricia Kelly, who heads the consumer protection division for Ryan's office. To get a refund, customers can call the attorney general's office hotline at (800) 386-5438 or AOL at (800) 827-6364. To get one month's should send their name, address, master account screen name and phone number to AOL Member Refunds, P.O. Box Sir 84402-0511..