Downtown Peoria fountain proposed repairs tabled due to COVID pjstar.com - get the latest breaking news, showbiz & celebrity photos, sport news & rumours, viral videos and top stories from pjstar.com Daily Mail and Mail on Sunday newspapers.
PEORIA Everyone thought COVID-19 was the cause when 23-year-old John Wlodarchak ended up in OSF HealthCare Saint Francis Medical Center in April 2020 suffering from heart failure.
Wlodarchak, who lives in Mendota, had always been healthy. Just the week before he started having flu-like symptoms after he had run four miles, something he did regularly as a former high school cross-country runner. But COVID-19 was not the cause test after test came back negative for COVID-19 and other viruses that can damage the heart.
“We may never be able to prove what happened to John. The doctors all said it looked like COVID, but who knows, we may never know. The timing was pretty ironic, that everything happened when the world was shutting down with the COVID, said John’s mother, Carol Wlodarchak, on March 24 while sitting next to her son, who was home and doing well after a heart transplant Feb. 27.
Despite challenges posed by the pandemic, Downtown Peoria will see residential growth in 2021.
Michael Freilinger, executive director and CEO of the Peoria Downtown Development Corp. (DDC), said an additional 146 housing units are expected to hit the market this year, with 120 of them located at the former Builders Warehouse location, 812 SW Washington St., that’s expected to start leasing this summer.
That will put the number of residential units in Downtown Peoria at 516 by the end of the year, said Freilinger. That’s a 138 percent increase in downtown units since Freilinger took over at the DDC six years ago.
A housing report completed last year before the coronavirus outbreak estimated demand for up to 379 additional residential units in Downtown Peoria by 2024.
WEST PEORIA Employees at Jimmy s Bar didn t know what to expect for the first pseudo-normal St. Patrick s Day festivities of the COVID-19 era.
Moments after 8 a.m., when Jimmy s doors opened to the public, one of the first customers of the day offered a clue. I just think it s a good way to start off, West Peoria resident Donnie Driscoll said. Everybody s coming back together. It s a good family day. They missed that last year, getting together with cousins, seeing their moms, grandmas. I m happy. I m ready. I m ready to go.
Driscoll, his son Riley and two friends were among about a dozen who arrived at the venerable West Peoria establishment less than an hour after sunrise Wednesday. Other West Peoria bars opened as early as 6 a.m.
Housing Opportunities Keep Growing in Downtown Peoria peoriapublicradio.org - get the latest breaking news, showbiz & celebrity photos, sport news & rumours, viral videos and top stories from peoriapublicradio.org Daily Mail and Mail on Sunday newspapers.