News Progress

Photo by Crystal Reed
Robert Buck, 78, of Findlay, celebrated his retirement after 40+ years of service as a firefighter at the Findlay American Legion. He is pictured with several plaques and a house resolution that was presented to him by State Representative Brad Halbrook.

•August 25 2021•
Robert Buck, 78, of Findlay celebrated his retirement from the fire service on Saturday at the Findlay American Legion. The day was made even more special with a visit from State Representative Brad Halbrook who presented a resolution from the Illinois House of Representatives in recognition of Buck’s years of service.
Buck began his service with the Shelby Fire District in 1980 and became in EMT in 1984 and worked on the Township Aid Ambulance for the Iroquois Memorial Hospital. He later became an EMT Intermediate and Firefighter 2. Buck served as the President of the Eastern Illinois Regional Fire Aid from 1988-1992. Read More

•August 18, 2021•
by Ariana Cherry
NP Writer

Concerned parents, guardians and members of the ALAH school district community filed into the high school gym Thursday, August 11, to voice their concerns about the recent mask mandate that Governor Pritzker has put into place. At the time of the public meeting, the school had voted on a safe return to school plan, citing that “masks were recommended for those who were not vaccinated,” but they wouldn’t be checking vaccination statuses, etc. The district wanted to focus more on being educators and not allowing the pandemic to get in the way. Although, with the rising cases of the new Delta variant, many of us are feeling “deja-vu”, and it seems as if we are on replay from last year as mandates and mitigations come back into our lives once again. Read More

•August 11, 2021•
By Crystal Reed
NP Writer

During Monday’s meeting, the City Council unanimously approved an amendment to the personnel policy for city of Sullivan employees. The amendment says that an employee shall receive 40 hours of vacation on his first day of employment for use in the following year. The resolution took effect immediately and applies retroactively to any active full-time employee who is currently in his first year of employment.
In addition, the resolution says that an employee shall be allowed to carry any unused vacation hours credited to him on his first day of employment for his second year of employment. Thereafter, any vacation time credited to an employee may not be carried over year to year, a year being defined as an employee’s anniversary date to anniversary date.
Upon termination or resignation, employees shall receive compensation for all earned but unused vacation at the employee’s regular straight-time hourly rate as of the employee’s date of termination. The final compensation of a separated employee shall be paid in full on his next regularly scheduled payday. Upon retirement any unused accrued vacation days, as of an employee’s last physical day of work, will be used to extend out his date of retirement. The balance of unused vacation hours will be treated as a salary/hourly payment to the employee, which simply pushes back his retirement and final paycheck to a later date. Read More