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[APRIL 19, 2001]  The president of the Illinois State Chamber of Commerce updated local Chamber members Wednesday on issues before the state legislature that may impact local businesses.

Unemployment insurance tax relief, the state Chamber’s first priority for new legislation, has passed the Senate but faces difficulty in the House, according to Illinois Chamber President Todd Maisch. The two-bill package cuts the minimum tax rate in half and eliminates the fund-building surcharge passed in the early 1980s, when the unemployment insurance fund was in debt. Now the fund for future unemployment benefits has grown to $2.1 billion. "Sending money to a bloated trust fund is not a good idea," said Maisch, who hopes to convince the pro-organized-labor majority in the House that reinvesting in business creates jobs.

A bill requiring employers of more than 50 workers to provide insurance for mental health on the same terms as other illnesses will probably be enacted, Maisch said at the legislative breakfast sponsored by the Government/Education Committee of the Lincoln/Logan County Chamber of Commerce. Because the bill increases employers’ health insurance expenditures, the Illinois Chamber opposes it, but he said the bill as passed by the Senate has been revised to something that "the business community can live with."

The Illinois Chamber supports increased Medicaid payments to hospitals, nursing homes and other health-care providers, seeing a cost shift to private-pay customers if the government does not pay its share. Speaking at The Restaurant at the Depot Wednesday morning, Maisch said he hopes some of the many issues concerning health-care providers can be addressed outside the legislative process.

How state legislative districts are redrawn to comply with the 2000 census will influence the lawmaking process for a decade. Maisch said his description of the Illinois process for redistricting elicits disbelief from colleagues in other states. He described the process as potentially having three stages: First, lawmakers try to reach agreement. If there is a stalemate in the General Assembly, a commission evenly divided between Republicans and Democrats is appointed. If that commission also fails to reach consensus, two names are put in a hat and the party of the person whose name is pulled out gets to draw the redistricting map.

Whichever party draws the map, downstate districts will become larger and fewer because of the greater growth in Chicago and the suburbs. Maisch said that because of the population increase in McLean County, the representative and senatorial districts including Lincoln might expand in that direction.

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A law restricting telemarketing is likely to be enacted, Maisch said. The bill sets up a do-not-call list which telemarketers must consult and use to cull their lists four times per year, with a $2,500 penalty for each failure to comply.

Many of the issues addressed by the Illinois State Chamber this session were determined at an October 2000 meeting attended by more than 40 representatives of local chambers of commerce. Bobbi Abbott, executive director of the Lincoln/Logan County Chamber of Commerce, attended the meeting, along with Marty Ahrends of the Agriculture Committee and Wanda Lee Rohlfs of the Government/Education Committee.

Maisch distributed an update detailing progress on the nine issues defined by the group. They include initiatives in favor of workers’ compensation reform, revision of the program for testing Illinois students and incentives for cleanup of environmentally contaminated sites. Only the environmental clean-up bill has passed in one body, the Senate.

The state Chamber opposes extending the federal Family and Medical Leave Act to smaller businesses, increasing the minimum wage, allowing doctors to form price-fixing cartels and reinstating the Structural Work Act, which allowed injured workers to go outside the workers’ compensation system to sue third parties. All three bills are either dead or of uncertain passage. The Illinois State Chamber of Commerce also wants to repeal the Illinois Responsible Property Transfer Act for potentially contaminated land, saying the bill is obsolete.

Maisch praised the pro-business majority in the Illinois Senate, including Bob Madigan (R-Lincoln). Madigan spoke briefly, also citing redistricting and Medicaid reimbursement to hospitals and long-term care facilities as important issues. He said he has been involved in reviewing the retired teachers health insurance plan. Madigan disagreed with the perception that the General Assembly is halfway through the legislative session. Instead he likened it to being one period into a three-period hockey game. Reconciliation of House and Senate bills and redistricting still must be addressed.

[Lynn Spellman]

[MARCH 27, 2001]  ^"It could be as soon as next week." The statement made by station manager Jim Ash was in regard to the area’s new radio station, WMNW, going on the air. The local station, situated on a parcel of land on Lazy Row, rural Atlanta, is just about ready to begin a courtship of central Illinois listeners. Owned by K and M Communications out of Skokie, the new station will bring local radio back to Logan County as well as supplement existing stations in the 30-mile radius surrounding the transmitter.

Ash, a 19-year mainstay at the defunct WPRC and for the last two years at WUIS in Springfield, says that both the tower and transmitter are ready to span the airwaves on 96.3 FM. "We still need carpeting and some furniture and other items," Ash said, "but as soon as we get our hookup with our network affiliate, ABC, we will go on the air."

Ash reiterated that the station will primarily be music. "The format will be classic rock from the ’60s, ’70s and ’80s," Ash noted. "We will have news briefs from ABC and some local news as well. Primarily we are interested in delivering music and are not interested in becoming another news station." Ash was quick to point out that with a 24-hour format geared to the Logan County area, any important breaking news will receive priority. "In the event of special alerts, inclement weather bulletins or area schools or businesses closing, WMNW will drop its music to give residents the latest information as soon as possible."

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Ash stated that as the station delves into the airwaves it will determine if any fine tuning will be done to the principal format. He also stated that any businesses interested in becoming an advertiser on the station can contact him at his home at 735-4930.

[Mike Fak]

[MARCH 19, 2001]  Lincoln Christian College and Seminary recently named Katherine Heller as director of marketing for the college and seminary. She will work with the newly appointed vice president of stewardship development for LCCS, Gary Edwards, in the areas of marketing and public relations.

Heller holds a bachelor’s degree in professional writing and editing, with a specialization in organizational communications, from Youngstown State University. An Ohio native, Heller has lived and worked in Lincoln for the past year and has experience in public relations, communications and journalism. She has served as the programs and events coordinator for the Youngstown/Warren Regional Chamber of Commerce, writer and managing editor for the Lincoln Daily News, and most recently as the communications director for the Academic Development Institute in downtown Lincoln.

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In her new role, Heller says she looks forward to informing the public of the many wonderful things God is doing at and through LCCS. "LCCS is an exciting place to serve," she says. "I am thrilled to be a part of an excellent team of faculty, staff and administration."

Hailing from a small town in eastern Ohio, Heller also enjoys Lincoln’s close-knit community and considers it her second home. "Lincoln has a friendly, welcoming appeal," she explains. "It is a great place to live, work and serve."

[LCCS news release]

[MARCH 8, 2001]  Jewelry crafted by Native Americans shares shelves at The Little Indian Shop with raw materials from which it is made.

Bob and Cozette Reichle, co-owners of the shop, have many samples of stones and shells used in making Indian jewelry. Some are displayed adjacent to the corresponding jewelry; more are in a box Bob eagerly pulls out and shares with interested customers. He even has some fake turquoise made of plastic in order to demonstrate how much lighter it is than the real thing.

Besides turquoise, there are samples of black jet, Mediterranean coral, tiger’s eye, serpentine, Wyoming jade, pipestone and ironwood. Reichle can illustrate how the various colors in Zuni inlaid figurative pieces come from a myriad of shells, including purple lip, mother-of-pearl, green snail, black oyster, green and red abalone, and turtle shell. As an example of their use, cowry or spotted shell is used for the spotted hide on a pendant depicting an appaloosa horse.

Reichle is also quick to share notes and magazine articles signed by some of the artists. A favorite article features Alex Seowtewa, a widely known painter who has decorated the walls of a Zuni church with paintings of kachinas and masks. The masks appear so three-dimensional that Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis, when visiting the site, looked up the plane of the wall before she would believe nothing projected from it. Reichle has paintings by Seowtewa in his private collection.

Bob Reichle was formerly in the propane business. The couple first became interested in Indian jewelry in 1974, when Bob purchased a bracelet while vacationing at Lake of the Ozarks. The merchant told him he could meet the artist if he traveled to the reservation in the Southwest, and the Reichles set about to do just that.

They decided to stock rings for sale to Cozette’s beauty shop customers. In 1975 they made their first buying trip. The rings they brought back were snapped up quickly. Teenage girls bought them even if they did not fit their fingers, Bob Reichle said; they wore them on chains instead. On subsequent trips the couple gradually added other pieces of jewelry and decorative artifacts. Showcases were set up, and that was the beginning of The Little Indian Shop as a partner business to Cozette’s Beauty Salon, both at 519 Woodlawn Road.

Behind the jewelry counter is a row of kachinas. Reichle commented that a kachina is "not a god but awfully close; the kachinas showed the Indians how to live when they first came" to this continent. Early Morning, for example, went about waking everyone; he is always depicted with clouds, lightning and rain on his cheek.

Other kachinas displayed at the shop include Hummingbird, Longhorn, Black Whip Dancer, Ram, Hunter and Apache Spirit Dancer. In fact, all the kachinas represent dancing figures, Reichle said. Poleyesteva, the artist who made the Hummingbird kachina, told him its feathers were colored with "Indian rouge."

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Drums, ceremonial headdresses, paintings, pottery, carved figurines and assorted wall decor all are displayed at The Little Indian Shop. The men’s case contains bolos, belt buckles, watch bands, chokers, collar tips and tie bars. Women’s jewelry includes earrings, necklaces, rings, bracelets, pins, pendants and watch bracelets. There are wooden flutes and a box made of birch bark, porcupine quills and sweet grass.

A Native American jewelry-maker’s tribe can usually be discerned from the piece’s style and materials. The Navaho specialize in silver work, often incorporating turquoise. Zuni work is usually figurative and patterned of inlaid seashell and stone. The Hopi do silver overlay, in which one silver layer with cut-out patterns is soldered over another layer blackened with liver of sulfur. The Santo Domingo make heshi necklaces by stringing shells and stones together on a wire, grinding to round the segments, then transferring to string and adding silver fasteners.

Materials are sometimes imported from great distances. Reichle remarked that the Southwest Indians already had Mediterranean coral in 1540. The Spanish explorer Francisco Vasquez de Coronado brought it as a medium of exchange. The Native Americans traded produce and livestock for it, admiring how well it went with turquoise. Pipestone, from which pipes are carved, comes from an underground vein in southwest Minnesota. Reichle said the quantity of pipestone is limited.

It has been several years since the Reichles’ last buying trip, but while business was brisk they went four or five times a year. They visited the Zuni reservation south of Gallup, N.Mex.; the Navaho capital at Window Rock, Ariz.; the Santo Domingo reservation north of Albuquerque; and the Hopi in Arizona, among others.

Demand for Native American jewelry is cyclical, according to Reichle. It was high from the time the business opened until 1980, then cooled until around 1990, then picked up again. In 2000 business slacked off once more. "Every 10 years it seems like it’s a rotation," he summarized. "A new generation comes along and it’s hot again."

Hours of the shop are 8 to 5 Tuesday through Friday.

[Lynn Spellman]

[MARCH 5, 2001]  More than a year and a half after the first plans were laid, Lincoln’s major Internet provider, CCAonline, has broken ground for a new tower that will provide Lincoln with broadband-wireless Internet access. "Lincoln can now compete with surrounding larger cities such as Springfield and Peoria that have DSL and cable modems," says Curt Schleich, webmaster and co-owner of CCA Wireless.

This new wireless service will offer high-speed Internet service at reasonable prices that businesses and individuals can afford. While the service is new to the public, the technology has been around since the ’60s. It was previously used only by the military. Wireless solves the "last mile" communications problems that occur between house and main source, as in between house and local Internet server.

Why wireless?

The consideration to add wireless began more than two years ago when Computer Consulting Associates owners Jim Youngquist and Curt Schleich began researching for an improved means to provide better quality high-speed Internet access. Without the use of big company equipment, our area telephone lines cannot support DSL or cable modems that are used by other larger communities.

Where do you go to buy a tower and what tower do you choose?

CCA investigated "getting an antenna into the air using downtown buildings or current towers," informs Schleich, but those choices proved to be either quality or cost-prohibitive, or lacked a place for nearby equipment storage. It was soon recognized that a tower was the only option.

The quest for a tower source was the first step. After some searching a company was located that had been building towers since 1949. Plans were drawn up and engineer approved. All was falling in line with the timing of the city building code and special use applications. Then a sad thing happened. One of the partners in the tower company died suddenly. The company was shutting down. After a new search was begun, it took many months to find another provider at a much higher cost. Then there would be the special application for engineering approval, more time and fees again. Just as another company that could do the job was found, CCA received word that the original tower company was resuming business with a new assistant. The original plans, already drawn up with engineering approval, could be used.

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Dotting their i’s and crossing their t’s

In the meantime, there was also some time involved in getting approval from the city to erect the tower. Soon, CCA was approved as one of several tower sites under the city’s new Telecommunications Tower Ordinance. CCA is open to adding other antennas for other businesses. At this time the tower will sport two antennas. One will be for CCA Wireless and they have one renter, Illinois Paging, scheduled to go up later. Currently, there is room for one more antenna on this facility.

Schleich is excited about bringing this new technology to Lincoln. Because it is new technology he could not say just how many users the wireless will be able to support on the first antenna. As with their online business, he plans to "closely monitor equipment for bandwidth and how much the service is used."

When asked about what this project has cost besides a lot of patience and planning, Schleich responds, "By the time we’re all done it will have cost between $20,000 and $25, 000."

You can log on to www.ccaonline.com for more information about wireless technology. Schleich says you can also find cost and sign-up information. There are already about 70 sign-ups on the waiting list. The sign-ups will be notified via e-mail when the tower is up and service has been initialized. Then "sign-ups will be contacted in turn for site evaluation and equipment setup," he says.

Welcome to the 21^st century, Lincoln!

[Jan Youngquist]

Announcements

The Chamber Report

Networking social event for chamber members and POTENTIAL members.

April 25 — Franchising seminar

"Business Start-Up Workshop" for anyone with an interest in owning a franchise business. Call for details.

April 26 — Office professionals luncheon

Always a sold-out event, this luncheon brings bosses and office professionals together for lively entertainment, a generous buffet lunch, free office product samples and door prizes!

June 8 — Chamber roundup golf tournament, auction and dinner

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The Chamber of Commerce is a catalyst for community progress, bringing business and professional people together to work for the common good of Lincoln and Logan County.

Lincoln/Logan County Chamber of Commerce

303 S. Kickapoo St., Lincoln

(217) 735-2385

Fax (217) 735-9205

www.lincolnillinois.com

chamber@lincolnillinois.com

[Provided by Bobbi Abbott, executive director of Lincoln/Logan County Chamber of Commerce]

Honors & Awards

[APRIL 19, 2001]  Congratulations to James Rusk, who has been named Abraham Lincoln Memorial Hospital April Employee of the Month. He has worked in the dietary department at ALMH since 1998.

Rusk’s nominators state that he "is very compassionate with the patients and their needs. He’s willing to lend a hand without even asking for his help—he just jumps right in. James does a great job and you can always count on him to follow up on things."

Rusk was born and raised in Bloomington and currently resides in Lincoln. He enjoys spending time with his family, and he also enjoys cooking.

[ALMH news release]

Main Street Corner News

Job Hunt

Now Lincolndailynews.com makes it easy to look for a job in the Logan County area
with our new Job Hunt feature in the Business section.

Employers, you can list available jobs by e-mailing ldn@lincolndailynews.com. Each job listing costs $10 the first week, $20 for eight days to three months. There is a limit of 75 words per announcement.

Help Wanted:  Part-time night time supervisor at Lincoln Public Library

Work Schedule:  Week one:  Monday-Thursday 3-8 p.m., Friday 12-6 p.m., Saturday 8:30 a.m.-3 p.m.

                           Week two:  Monday-Thursday 3-8 p.m.

Hourly rate is based on experience and qualifications.  A basic knowledge of computers is required.

Contact Richard Sumrall at 732-8878, or applications are available at 725 Pekin St.

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