MMT_01282016

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Serving the Mt. Morris area since 1967

MT.Times MORRIS January 28, 2016 Volume 48, Number 48 - $1.00

Bowler Advances

Blues Music

Registration Time

Hawk bowler Derek Poole moves on to the Jan. 29-30 state tournament. B1

Blues musician Dennis Stukenberg will perform Feb. 9 at RRC. A9

Fall kindergarten registration begins Feb. 8 in the Oregon School District. A9

Village board mulls another semi ordinance By Vinde Wells vwells@oglecounty news.com After a lengthy discussion among board members and the public Tuesday, the Mt. Morris Village Board sent a proposed ordinance limiting semi tractor and trailer parking back to its attorney for more tweaking. Ordinance Committee Chairman Jon Murray asked for input on the proposed ordinance from board members and the

approximately 15 people in the audience. He said board members looked at Oregon’s ordinance on semi-parking and asked attorney Rob LeSage to draw up a similar one. “This is not a very complicated ordinance and not as restrictive as some,” Murray said. It simply prohibits parking semis, recreational vehicles, and other trailers on village streets, he said, but does not address parking those same Turn to A2

Mediation session set for Jan. 28 By Vinde Wells vwells@oglecounty news.com Representatives of the Oregon School Board and the Oregon Education Support Personnel Association (OESPA) will sit down with a mediator this week to try to resolve an ongoing contract dispute. School superintendent Tom Mahoney said Tuesday that a mediation session is scheduled for Jan. 28. The OESPA’s three-year contract with the school district expired June 30. Contract negotiations began May 27. Members of the OESPA did informational picketing Dec. 10 and Dec. 14 in front of the district office and at the intersection of Washington and 10th Streets in Oregon, holding signs, some of which read “fair wages & insurance.” The OESPA has more

than 100 members and represents technical department support staff, cooks and the assistant head cook, instructional aides and other aides, bus drivers and aides, nurses and aides, custodians and maintenance, and secretaries. Starting wages for support staff in the final year of their most recent contract ranged from $8.50 per hour for secretaries, aides, and cooks to $14.65 for maintenance. Mahoney said in December that the two sides have agreed not to comment publicly about the issues and negotiations except in joint statements. A joint statement issued Dec. 15 read, “Both the OESPA and the board are doing their best to arrive a fair settlement. At this time the parties have decided to use a federal mediator in hopes of moving to a contract the both the OESPA and the board can support.”

The Ogle County Board of Review denied a tax appeal Tuesday morning filed by the owners of the former Quad Graphics printing plant in Mt. Morris. Photo by Vinde Wells

Ogle Board of Review denies tax appeal on former printing plant Officials are pleased with BOR decision By Vinde Wells vwells@oglecounty news.com Officials of two affected taxing bodies voiced their approval Tuesday morning of the Ogle County Board of Review (BOR) decision to deny a tax appeal filed by the owners of a former Mt. Morris printing plant. “I wasn’t surprised,” said Scott Diehl, president of the Mt. Morris Fire Protection District Board. “I think that’s

the best decision to make right now.” Oregon School Superintendent Tom Mahoney agreed. “I’m pleased,” he said. “But as I’ve experienced with these matters, this isn’t the end of the process.” The three-member BOR upheld the assessed value of $895,912 set last fall by Mt. Morris Township Assessor Paul Peterson for one parcel of the former Quad Graphics property at 404 S. Wesley Ave. The current owners of the property, Mt. Morris Business Park LLC, Downey, California, filed an appeal of the assessment and

asked that the assessment be set at $125,000. The assessed value is onethird of the fair market value. The 2015 assessment affects taxes paid in 2016. Mahoney said the taxing bodies and owners may try to agree on a value, or the owners will appeal the BOR decision to the Illinois Property Tax Appeal Board (PTAB). Currently PTAB is preparing to hear appeals filed three years ago. Mahoney told the BOR that his attempts prior to Tuesday’s hearing to reach a settlement with Mt. Morris Business Park LLC officials were rebuffed.

Besides the fire and school districts, other affected taxing bodies include Mt. Morris Township, Ogle County, Village of Mt. Morris, Mt. Morris Public Library District, and Highland Community College District. Dan Tucker, who represented Mt. Morris Business Park LLC at the hearing, left before the BOR made its decision. Tucker said the owners were asking that the assessment be reduced back to the $125,000 set in 2013. “It’s a substantial increase [from $125,000 to $895,912],” Tucker said. Turn to A3

LSSI closes programs due to state budget woes By Kathleen Schultz Sauk Valley Media

Close-up Look Marjie Lundquist looks through a periscope as she watches her son Kyle bowl last Saturday at Don Carter Lanes during the Boys Bowling Sectional. Photo by Chris Johnson

In This Week’s Edition...

Birth, A4 Business News, B6 Church Bells, A5 Classifieds, B7-B10 College & Service, A4

Local LSSI student and family counseling services, protective care for the elderly, and an emergency program for kids going into foster care were shut down permanently last week, and the staff who ran them are being let go. Lutheran Social Services of Illinois, the state’s largest provider of social services, announced Jan. 22 that it is closing more than 30 programs serving 4,700 people statewide, and laying off 750 employees – about 43 percent of its staff – because of the state budget impasse. It’s part of the faith-based agency’s plan to “restructure its services and shore up resources for the viability

Entertainment, A6 Fines, B5 Library News, A3 Marriage Licenses, A4 Public Voice, A7

and continuation of the organization,” it said in a news release. Getting the ax locally are counseling services for children, adults and families in Dixon; schoolbased counseling services in Sterling; adult protective services and those who coordinate those cases in Sterling; the youth emergency shelter in Nachusa; and the Intouch Home Care program for seniors in Ogle County. How many people those programs serve, and how many employees will be lost, was not immediately available. The state, which has been without a budget since July, owes LSSI $6 million, and the nonprofit no longer can rely on bank credit or its

Property Transfers, B5 Sheriff’s Arrests, B3 Social News, A4 Sports, B1, B2 State’s Attorney, B5

fundraising foundation to cover its costs, President and CEO Mark Stutrud said in the release. “After seven months, we no longer can provide services for which we aren’t being paid,” he said. Even if the state were to pony up the money it owes, the programs are not coming back, at least not in the same form: LSSI is restructuring in an effort to stay afloat, the release said. “We are eliminating spending that is most linked to nonpayment of services and redesigning our administrative support around a newly restructured organization,” Stutrud said. “Our plans respond to this year’s budget impasse and

Deaths, B6 Robert L. Campshure Myrna L. Williams

Published every Thursday by Ogle County Newspapers, a division of Shaw Media • www.oglecountynews.com

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