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Milwaukee Business Journal: Illinois packaging company to move to new Salem Business Park
Packaging manufacturer Vonco Products LLC plans to move its operations from Illinois to a business park that broke ground Thursday in Kenosha County.
The manufacturer would fill an 80,500-square-foot facility in the Salem Business Park that is being developed by the Kenosha Area Business Alliance, the town of Salem and Kenosha County. The company plans to move from Lake Villa, Ill., in June 2017 and have 86 jobs within three years, including those that would move from Illinois. Wisconsin Economic Development Corp. announced the move Thursday.
SJR: Springfield woman excited for new opportunities after clemency
Marcella Kincaid has lost count of all the times she’s been told by potential employers, “We really want to hire you, but …”
She knows what’s coming next without listening.
The fact that she’s owned a small business, earned her master’s degree, volunteered in her church and community, received various certifications, held steady employment and stayed out of trouble doesn’t matter.
In 1991, she was convicted of selling cocaine, a felony. Interview over.
Chicago Tribune: $116K-a-year Chicago alderman apologizes for crying poor on Cubs playoff tickets
Call it a Milly-culpa?
Northwest Side Ald. Milly Santiago offered an apology of sorts Thursday, a day after she complained about the Cubs yanking their offer of face-value World Series tickets for aldermen. The 31st Ward politician who makes $116,208 per year described herself as “a poor alderman” who can’t afford scalped tickets and said the seats weren’t in a great spot in Wrigley Field anyway.
BND: Madigan documentary streaming online this weekend
Illinois has long been ruled by one man, a Chicago Democrat who inherited the keys to the Daley machine.
Illinois House Speaker Michael Madigan has been in the Illinois House since 1971 and served as speaker since 1983, except for a two-year lapse. Nothing happens in Illinois politics without his approval, whether that be when primary elections are scheduled or whether there is a state budget for 2016, or 2017.
From 7 p.m. today through 7 p.m. Sunday, BND.com will offer online streaming of a documentary by the conservative Illinois Policy Action group on Madigan’s rise to power and hold on it. “Madigan: Power, Privilege, Politics” is an hour-long look at how Madigan came to power and the pitfalls of so much power being concentrated for so long.
Chicago Tribune: Big Soda digs in for a fight over proposed Cook County beverage tax
The war on soda, popping up in towns across the country, is escalating in Cook County.
As it has in other locales, the soda industry is digging in to fight a proposed sweetened beverage tax, which would add a penny-per-ounce to the cost of sugar- and artificially sweetened drinks if approved by Cook County commissioners next month.
And as they are in cities like San Francisco and Boulder, local officials are making the case for public health, pointing to mounting evidence linking sugar-sweetened beverages to obesity, diabetes and other health conditions. Not unlike a so-called sin tax on tobacco, increasing the cost of sugary drinks could reduce consumption — though people buying the beverages with food stamp benefits would be exempt under federal law from paying the tax.
Chicago Tribune: Half of Illinois' metro areas posted unemployment increases in September
Seven of Illinois’ 14 metro areas saw unemployment rates tick higher in September compared with the year before and six were down jobs, most concentrated downstate, according to preliminary data released Thursday by the Illinois Department of Employment Security.
The biggest jump in the unemployment rate happened in the Davenport-Moline-Rock Island metro area on the Iowa border, more commonly known as the Quad Cities, where unemployment rose to 5.9 percent in September from 5.1 percent a year before. It also lost 4,300 jobs over the year, the most of any of the metro areas.
Other parts of the state with sizable job losses and over-the-year increases in unemployment rates include Danville, where the 7.2 percent unemployment rate was the highest in the state; Peoria, where unemployment was 6.4 percent; Carbondale-Marion, 6 percent; and Bloomington, 5.1 percent.