Will County Gazette

The Village of Tinley Park had several notable visitors and made new appointments for City positions at a recent board meeting.

During the Jan. 17 Village board meeting, Tinley Park officials highlighted two local businesses. The first was Theory Physical Therapy, owned by therapist Dena Tadros. The independent business works one-on-one with patients to treat a variety of conditions including sports injuries, joint pain, women’s health and other issues.

Tadros and her family have lived in the community for years, and she recently left her previous job to start her own business after working in therapy for over 20 years in the area. She believes each patient should have a primary physical therapist who knows their case inside and out.

The second business entity was Crumbl Cookies, a chain that opened a new location in Tinley Park. Derek Hincks operates the new location, which features a rotation of six new cookies each week topped with frosting and all types of sugar. Crumbl exclusively sells cookies made from tested flavor recipes, and are all made in that specific location.

Hincks thanked the board for the opportunity and said he is excited to do business in the area for many more years.

The board also made new appointments for City employees. First was Michael Haskins, who has served in public safety roles through fire, police, EMA and dispatching for over 20 years in the Chicago area. He has numerous training certifications and comes highly recommended. The board appointed him to the position of 911 dispatcher in the village.

The Village also appointed Dan Ritter to the position of Community Development director after his many years of dutiful service to the department.

"Thank you to the board and the mayor just for trusting me in this position," Ritter said in the meeting. "It's kind of cool being up here for the third time now in four years. So my original appointment, then planning manager, and this, you guys have given me a lot of trust to take Tinley Park in a good direction and I'm going to keep working hard, keep making sure we're headed in that right direction. So thank you to the board, the mayor, for giving me this position and giving me really the opportunity. It starts at an organizational level. Not every community can you move up within the organization, particularly in local government. So a lot of times you got to kind of jump around. I really like investing where I'm at and so it's kind of cool to be able to work hard here and be able to stay here."