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DIXON JUNIOR WINS Become a BBQ master SILVER MEDAL FOOD, A9, A11
VOLLEYBALL, B1
TELEGRAPH LEGRAPH Wednesday, July 8, 2015
SERVING DIXON AND THE SURROUNDING AREA SINCE 1851
DIXON | TOURISM
City exploring $3,474 question Is Reagan lifeguard statue committee a city entity? If so, litigation possible BY BRENDEN WEST bwest@saukvalley.com 800-798-4085, ext. 5529 @BWest_SVM
DIXON – City officials believe Dixon Tourism Board members were trying to act in the best interest of the community. But when the board created the Ronald Reagan Lifeguard Statue subcommittee in 2013, it might have overstepped. According to Finance Director Paula
Meyer, the city might have to pay back $3,474 the group raised through donations. Since the committee was created without council approval, there might even be legal ramifications, if it’s determined the subcommittee fundraised on the city’s behalf. “Depending on how this falls out, and whether ultimately this is a city committee, if it was, then we need to pay the money back,” Meyer said Tuesday.
She confirmed that the committee has, in fact, been running money in and out of the city budget since December 2013, or “keeping the checkbook.” Meyer said ex-Mayor Jim Burke had her create a special line item to track the subcommittee’s finances, even though there was no official city approval of the committee to begin with.
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QUESTION CONTINUED ON A2
OREGON | BLACK HAWK STATUE REPAIRS
A shot in the arm – and other spots
Once you get beyond the legal ramifications, I think you’re really talking about issues of morale and how you want to do business.
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Robert LeSage, Dixon city attorney, on whether subcommittee represented city while fundraising
ILLINOIS | BUDGET IMPASSE
No pay for state workers Ruling means no paychecks for about 65,000 BY SARA BURNETT The Associated Press
Photo courtesy of Simpson, Gumpertz & Heger Inc.
Andrzej Dajnowski, Black Hawk statue project conservator, injects a concrete repair mixture into the 105-year-old monolith July 1 at Lowden State Park near Oregon. The team should know in about 2 weeks which of the four recipes they are trying will be most effective.
Crew injects statue with concrete mixtures, seeks best repair formula BY VINDE WELLS vwells@shawmedia.com Shaw Media
OREGON – Experts said they will know in about 2 weeks whether they concocted the right mixture to repair Oregon’s most well-known landmark. Two members of the Black Hawk statue restoration team were at Lowden State Park on July 1 to inject four different
mixtures into cracks in the 105-year-old concrete monolith. Andrzej Dajnowski, from Conservation of Sculpture & Objects Studio Inc. in Forest Park, and Amy Lamb Woods, an engineer with Simpson, Gumpertz & Heger Inc. in Chicago, were looking for the most effective recipe. “We have to let them set and then look at the surface and see how they per-
formed,” Woods explained. Dajnowski, the project conservator, mixed four varieties of cement and lime in plastic containers. He then climbed the scaffolding surrounding the 50-foot statue to inject some of each mixture into the cracks using a large needle and syringe. SHOT CONTINUED ON A3
WHITESIDE COUNTY | PUBLIC INFORMATION
Official turns off Beacon, builds own site
CHICAGO – Illinois won’t be allowed to pay state workers in full during an ongoing budget impasse, a Cook County judge ruled Tuesday, potentially leaving some 65,000 employees without a paycheck and putting added pressure on lawmakers to approve a new spending plan. Judge Diane Larsen said that without a 2016 budget in place Illinois Comptroller Leslie Munger may only pay some workers who are covered under a federal labor law. Those workers would receive the federal minimum wage of $7.25 per hour plus overtime. But Munger’s attorneys and lawyers for the state’s personnel agency said it would take as long as a year to determine which employees would be paid under federal law and adjust payroll because of antiquated computer systems. NO PAY CONTINUED ON A5
HE’S A TROUPER Polo Community Theatre rehearsed for its whimsical take on Shakespearean tragedies Tuesday night. See photos on A3.
County ends affiliation with portal, which Ogle County still uses – for now BY PAM EGGEMEIER peggemeier@saukvalley.com 800-798-4085, ext. 5570 @pam_eggemeier
MORRISON – Whiteside County has dropped out of Beacon, a public information portal.
$1.00
TODAY’S EDITION: 24 PAGES 2 SECTIONS VOL. 164 ISSUE 48
The Beacon website is commonly used by the public to access county and city information, public records, and Geographical Information Systems through its portal. It is most often used for maps, and real estate and tax data.
INDEX
The county dropped Beacon because it has launched its own GIS application on the county website. County GIS Coordinator Lauren Lee said the new service, which is free, will offer more information and tools, as well as save the
ABBY ................... A8 BUSINESS ......... A12 COMICS ............. A10
CROSSWORD....B11 LIFESTYLE ........... A8 LOTTERY ............. A2
county money. “This became part of a software package we were already getting,” Lee said, “so we wanted to move in that direction.” BEACON CONTINUED ON A2
NATION/WORLD .. A7 OBITUARIES ........ A4 OPINION .............. A6
Today’s weather High 68. Low 57. More on A3.
Need work? Check out your classifieds, B5.
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