Group Allegedly Threatens Earlville Cop

Four area men are charged with threatening an Earlville officer and his family were in court yesterday.

Brian Burress of Marseilles, Robert Heckman of Sandwich and Jacob Stanford and Eric Stevens of Earlville are charged with threatening a public official, a class 3 felony. While stopping Stevens yesterday morning for an unrelated thing, the four men allegedly threatened to harm the officer’s family and burn his house down.

Bond for each is 50 thousand dollars. Stanford is the only one to post bond so far.

Princeton company announces job cuts

44 positions are being cut from a plant in Princeton. Officials at LCN say the reductions will happen next month and affect fulltime, hourly employees.
The announcement came this morning. After the cuts, the company says they’ll have 263 employees. They plan to start making the cuts on a volunteer basis.

Cooling Assistance Available

Need a little helping hand to keep your home cool?

You can now apply for summer energy assistance thru the Low-Income Home Energy Assistance Program, or LIHEAP. If eligible, utility bills are paid by the state for people with incomes of up to 150 percent of the federal poverty level.

Tri-County Opportunies Council is the LIHEAP agency for Bureau, La Salle and Putnam Counties. You can find out more information online at LIHEAP-Illinois dot-com.

New Tourism Effort In Oglesby

A former editor with the Times in Ottawa is being counted on to draw new businesses to Oglesby.

The Oglesby City Council last night appointed Becky Clinard as the city’s first-ever Economic Development-Tourism Coordinator. She was chosen from 12 applicants and three finalists. One of the finalists accepted a similar job with La Salle according to Oglesby Mayor Tony Torres.

Torres expects the job to be about 20 hours a week and be re-evaluated after a year. The pay is still to be determined by will probably be between 20 to 25 dollars an hour.

Electric Rates Going Up In Princeton

You’ll be paying a little bit more to keep the lights on in Princeton. An electric rate increased won city council approval last night. The increase raises electric bills an average of 5.9 percent per year for four years.

The increase is the city’s way of making up for the rising price they pay for electricity. The last time electric rates were increased was three years ago by three percent.