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dailyGAZETTE Tuesday, April 28, 2015
SERVING ROCK FALLS, STERLING AND THE SURROUNDING AREA SINCE 1854
WHITESIDE COUNTY
Development director retiring Although Steinert will continue to work on E-Zone renewal BY PAM EGGEMEIER peggemeier@saukvalley.com 800-798-4085, ext. 5570 @pam_eggemeier
MORRISON – Longtime county economic development leader Betty Steinert will retire, effective July 1. Steinert, 61, has been administrator of the enterprise zone and economic development for Whiteside County since April 1999. She started her career with the county
in 1983, as deputy recorder. She moved to the development office in 1992, and was named administrator 7 years later. Steinert said she had mixed emotions about her decision to ratchet down a hectic work schedule and find more time to just enjoy life. “The county has given me a lot of great opportunities,” Steinert said, “and I’ve loved my development job, but it’s just time to move on and do something else.”
For now anyway, “something else” will seem very familiar. She will stay on part time with the development office, mainly to work on the county’s enterprise zone retention application. “I’ve written 30-some of these types of applications with the state, and I’ve already started it,” Steinert said. “So unless someone comes in with a lot of E-Zone experience, I’ll probably finish it.” Legislation was passed in August
2012 to extend the expiration dates of the state’s 97 enterprise zones. The 30-year life span of the state’s oldest E-Zones would have come to an end last year. “Many were set to expire in 2014, but this gave them another 2 years,” Steinert said. “The first 49 up had to apply by December of last year, and ours must be in by December 2016.”
STUDENTS HELP PROVIDE SUPPORT AT DIXON CABIN
DIRECTOR CONTINUED ON A4
Betty Steinert
HEALTH & FITNESS | DIXON FAMILY YMCA
Equipment for those in wheelchairs rolled out Members invited to use strength-training gear BY CHRISTI WARREN cwarren@saukvalley.com 800-798-4085, ext. 5521 @SeaWarren
Photos by Alex T. Paschal/apaschal@saukvalley.com
ABOVE: Gary Patterson (left) and Bradley Taft, both Dixon High School seniors in the school’s building trades class, handle a tree trunk as it’s shortened by teacher Ryan Zimmerman. The class is helping bring the Old Settlers Cabin back to its original style by replacing the porch supports with the hewn tree trunks.
DIXON – The Dixon Family YMCA is the proud new parent of three pieces of strength-training gear that are – and here’s the cool part – wheelchair-accessible. They’re the first of their kind for the building and, says CEO Andy McFarlane, the first of their kind for any public health facility for miles around The Y, which bought the upper-body equipment thanks to gifts from donors, took delivery April 17. EQUIPMENT CONTINUED ON A3
RIGHT: Dixon building trades students Brice Stanley (left) and Bradley Taft screw the new porch support to the existing frame.
MORRISON CITY COUNCIL
Increase to water, sewer rates OK’d Officials: 8 percent nudge part of plan to build wastewater treatment plant BY CHRISTI WARREN cwarren@saukvalley.com 800-798-4085, ext. 5521 @SeaWarren
MORRISON – Residents will once again be seeing an increase in their water and sewer rates, after the City Council unanimously adopted an ordinance asking for just that. The rate increase comes on top of the previous hikes Morrison resi-
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dents saw in October, though the new increases, which will take effect May 1, are significantly less. In October, the council voted to increase rates by about 62 percent. At Monday night’s meeting, it voted to increase rates again, by 8 percent. City Administrator Barry Dykhuizen said it’s just the next step in paying for the new city’s new sewer plant.
INDEX
ABBY ................... A7 BUSINESS ......... A12 COMICS ............. A10
“It increases in step with the city’s conversation over the past few years to build this large facility,” he said. “So the wastewater charge is going up $2 and the water service charge is going up $4.70. That is to pay the debt on the tower project and the well, and also to cover some unexpected costs related to the breaks that we’ve had.” MORRISON CONTINUED ON A8
CROSSWORD....B11 LIFESTYLE ........... A7 LOTTERY ............. A2
NATION/WORLD .. A8 OBITUARIES ........ A4 OPINION .............. A6
Alex T. Paschal/apaschal@saukvalley.com
Dixon Family YMCA employee Erik Winters demonstrates Monday how the seat folds out from a wheelchair-accessible weight machine, one piece of the handicap-accessible equipment at the facility.
Today’s weather High 64. Low 39. More on A3.
Need work? Check out your classifieds, B6.
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