Victor Yehling

An Internet virus was used to steal more than $30,000 from a fund that pays Dixon Rural Fire Protection District pensions, Dixon police told saukvalley.com, and they have traced the virus to a person in Massachusetts,

If you’ve been worried about foam and a red cast in some of the branches of the Kishwaukee and Rock Rivers,you can relax.

It is not, according to the Illinois EPA, due to some unreported industrial or agricultural release. The EPA says investigations have determined that these are rare but natural occurrences. In this case, weather and water conditions in northwestern Illinois have been just right to promote growth of a particular type of algae.

Republicans in the redrawn 90th Illinois House District are attempting to prevent Thomas Boken Jr. of DeKalb from appearing on the November ballot to oppose Tom Demmer of Dixon for retiring state Rep. Jerry Mitchell’s seat.

The BMO Harris Bank location in South Beloit will be among the 24 bank branches to be closed in October as part of merger activities with Wisconsin banking company Marshall & Ilsley Corp.

The South Beloit branch was acquired in 2010 when Rockford-based AMcore bank was closed by regulators and the assets sold to Chicago-based BMO Harris.

A southern Illinois priest is being ousted for improvising part of his services.

Bishop Edward Braxton of the Belleville Diocese has told the Rev. Bill Rowe he's now considered retired and must leave the rectory at St. Mary Parish in Mount Carmel on July 10.

Rowe's long-stated practice of changing portions of the liturgy to make them easier to understand didn't become public until February. That came after church leaders in Rome revamped the liturgy to be based on earlier Latin versions.