The Washington County Health Department has been all over the county this week with flu clinics, not being held in the office. This morning, they will be at the Ashley Community Building from 8:30 to 10:30 in the park building and in the afternoon at the Oakdale Senior Center from 1 to 3. Flu shots will be at full strength by the time the flu season begins to peak.
The Washington County Sheriff’s Department reported an incident from September 24, involving a bicyclist and a semi. Deputies responded to a report of a hit and run traffic crash on U.S. Highway 51 south of Florida Road at approximately 5:15 AM. The crash involved a semi-truck and 56-year old Jeffery Ballantyne of Ashley, who was riding a bicycle. The semi truck sideswiped the bicyclist throwing him into the ditch causing injury which resulted in transport to the hospital. The semi-truck left the scene and no identifying information was obtained.
There was a shoplifting incident on Tuesday at Dollar General in Mount Vernon and now a Tamaroa female is in the Jefferson County Jail on $5,000 bond. According to the Mount Vernon Police report, they responded to a call that 22-year old Alecia R. Soto allegedly tried to take some items without paying for them and has been charged with Retail Theft Less Than $300.
The Ashley School Board met Monday night and Superintendent Brian Hodge tells WNSV that they had a Budget Hearing before the regular meeting, but there was no public input and the Fiscal Year 2014 Budget was later approved in the meeting. The collective bargaining with the Education Association Board was approved and it covers everyone except the bookkeeper. A partial payment on the gym roof in the amount of $73,800 was made and that leaves a balance of $92,232. Kehrr Brothers did the work. No action was taken, but the Board discussed what is available in school maintenance and energy efficiency grants for the school to pursue. Two security cameras were approved for purchase to be put in the gym. Various activities were approved of fund usage for various needs, while supplemental rules and regulations were approved for cheerleading and girls’ basketball that were not in the athletic handbook. The administration – teacher salary report was approved and will be sent to the Illinois State Board of Education, as well as it is available for the public on the school’s website. The Board agreed to the purchase of stage mats at the cost of $1,800 through Lee’s Sports. The person who mowed the grounds is injured, so the Board approved a temporary replacement for $100 per mowing for the remainder of the year. The current student enrollment is 174 students in pre-kindergarten through 8th grade. Hodge also wants to thank the Ashley Royal Neighbors for their donation of over $2,250 for the field trip transportation fund.
The Nashville City Council will meet tonight at 7 o’clock at City Hall for their 1st meeting of the month. They will discuss the retirement of Tony Smith, the Washington County Right to Life – Life Chain, what streets to close for Halloween, go over a manhole project, hire a Sewer Plant Chief Operator and go over their commitment to the Kaskaskia College Nashville Extension on Route 127 north of town, as well as other topics.
Updating a story from last month, a southern Illinois coroner says an 18-year old woman likely had an irregular heartbeat that led to her drowning last month in Rend Lake. Franklin County Coroner Marty Leffler tells KFVS-TV that those are the official findings of an autopsy on Emilie Joe Turrentine of Carmi. Authorities say she was swimming with friends September 2nd, when she slipped beneath the surface. Her body was found the next day in about 10 feet of water. Authorities don’t believe alcohol or drugs played a part in her death and don’t believe foul play was involved.
The Kaskaskia College Dairy Judging team was at the World Dairy Expo in Madison, Wisconsin this week and they came home with the grand prize. Sponsor and instructor at KC, Aaron Heinzmann says they won the National Award. He says they practiced and practiced every weekend and it paid off, issued a special thank you to all those producers that let them practice on their farms. This is just one of the many award winning agriculture programs and organizations found at Kaskaskia College.
Illinois officials say more than 231,000 people have visited the Get Covered Illinois website, many of them looking for information on new options for health insurance. The Illinois website routes people to a state Medicaid enrollment site or to a federal website depending on household income. The Medicaid side of the system appears to be working, with more than 5,000 applications submitted online. But problems with the federal website continue to stop many people in Illinois and elsewhere from setting up accounts, comparing insurance policies and enrolling for coverage under the nation’s new health care law. Consumers are turning elsewhere. The call center for Blue Cross and Blue Shield of Illinois fielded five times the number of calls it normally does on Tuesday, and its website traffic jumped 75 percent.
A southwestern Illinois judge has ordered a new murder trial for a man, ruling his trial attorneys should have been told the presiding judge and the key investigator were being investigated over drugs. Saint Clair County Circuit Judge Robert Haida on Wednesday granted 29-year old William Cosby’s request for a new trial. Jurors convicted Cosby in April of first-degree murder in last year’s shooting death of 31-year old Antwan Thomas in East Saint Louis. Cosby’s conviction came three weeks the presiding judge, Michael Cook, was charged with possessing heroin and having a gun while illegally using controlled substances. The key investigator in the Cosby case, then East Saint Louis police Detective Orlando Ward, was accused in May of cocaine-related charges. He has resigned. Cook and Ward have pleaded not guilty.
A monthly measure of the state’s financial condition looks good, but looks can be deceiving. The University of Illinois Flash Index is at 107, a high-water mark since April 2007. Flash Index author Fred Giertz says only in some ways does the economy look good. “We have good news in a sense that the Flash Index went up from 106.5 to 107,” says Giertz, an economics professor at the University of Illinois. “Almost every month, there’s obviously an asterisk … We still have a substantial unemployment problem in the United States and even more so in the state of Illinois.” At 9.2 percent, Illinois trails only Nevada. It’s like that old saying, a recession is when your neighbor loses his or her job. A depression is when you lose yours. The index uses a weighted average of corporate earnings, personal income, and consumer spending. Any number greater than 100 indicates growth.
With Illinois’ new health insurance marketplace come new opportunities – for scam artists. Illinois Attorney General Lisa Madigan is warning people shopping for health coverage on the state’s new exchange to be on the look for identity thieves and other suspicious activity. “Anytime there is a new government program that is, you know, confusing and there’s a lot of money involved, you are going to have individuals who are less than reputable who are attempting to use it to their advantage,” Madigan said. Madigan offered some tips, saying consumers should never have to pay anyone to help them with enrollment. She also warned those shopping for insurance not to give out sensitive personal or financial information, such as your Social Security number, to anyone who calls you, e-mails you, or shows up at your home. A former congressman who was in office during the last government shutdown is frustrated by what’s happening.
Glenn Poshard, the president of Southern Illinois University, was a member of Congress in the 1990s, when there were two shutdowns. He says these happen because members talk past each other. The answer? “The key is to listen to the American people. You know we’re a family for gosh sake. Sit down at the kitchen table and iron out your differences. Nobody’s going to get everything they want. Everybody’ll get a piece of the pie. Be satisfied with that. That’s called America. It’s called democracy. It means moving forward,” he said. Poshard says members of Congress now who are stuck on ideology are part of the problem; those who are willing to compromise are part of the solution. He says Congress appears to be more ideologically rigid than when he was there (1989-99), and most of the public is not that way.
The state budget – the one which was approved in May and which took effect in July – is not doing enough to make headway on any of Illinois’ financial problems, according to a review by the Civic Federation. Laurence Msall, the president of that Chicago-based nonprofit, says, “The state of Illinois is missing opportunities to stabilize its government finances. It’s missing opportunities to pay down the unpaid bills because it continues to ignore the long-term consequences of the short-term political difficulties over pension reform and fiscal stability.” The pension crisis is the subject of a conference committee, which has been meeting since July and which may or may not have a bill ready for this month’s veto session. The state faces a $100 billion unfunded pension obligation. Msall says the state has wasted the opportunities afforded by a 2 percentage point increase in the income tax, an increase which is to begin a sunset next year.
Gasoline is getting cheaper. The Triple-A Daily Fuel Gauge Report finds the Illinois average at $3.46, down from $3.76 a month ago, and from $3.93 last year at this time. “It is dropping pretty quickly, and that’s really good news for all those traveling out there. Gas prices we expect – barring anything unforeseen – we expect gas prices to continue coming down through the remainder of the year,” said Beth Mosher of the Triple-A Chicago Motor Club. Mosher says this is the time of year when the price falls, and indications are that the supply of gasoline is plentiful, so nothing will stop the price from coming down.