Sunday, January 10, 2016

Tricia Smith’s stand on wind turbines

Shellfish decision: Rare mussel holds up repairs to Newburg Road bridge in Belvidere

Ben Stanley
Staff writer

Posted Jan. 7, 2016 at 4:52 PM
Updated Jan 7, 2016 at 7:35 PM

BELVIDERE — For the second time since 2013, a rare mollusk has delayed bridge repairs in Boone County.
The Belvidere Public Works Department's plan to repair concrete, add guard rails and replace expansion joints on the Newburg Road bridge 5 miles west of downtown will have to wait until 2017 while the Illinois Department of Natural Resources determines whether a colony of black sandshell mussels need to be removed from the Kishwaukee River.
"It’s just a delay," said Public Works Director Brent Anderson. "That whole process has to take place during the summer months … so we’re going to lose this construction season."
Anderson estimated the repairs will cost $500,000.
Black sandshell mussels are classified by the DNR as a threatened species in Illinois rivers. Native mussels like the black sandshell are natural water filters for river systems, filtering out diatoms and green algae. Their shells and even their waste are vital to river ecosystems.
"It affects water clarity when they die," said mussel expert Lisie Kitchel, a DNR conservation biologist. "These guys are really the kidneys, or filters, of the whole river system."
Mussels, particularly black sandshells, are very sensitive to water quality. They are one of the first species to go when rivers become polluted and one of the last to return when water quality improves.
Kitchel said the black sandshell population in northern Illinois is rebounding, but slowly.
"The fish come back first, then the insects ... and eventually the crayfish and last are the mussels," Kitchel said. "For rare species it takes longer to recover."
Kitchel said that until mussel populations rebound, a river system hasn’t returned to full health.
This isn't the first time a rare mussel has halted bridge repairs. In February 2012, a portion of a beam on the Orth Road bridge in Timberlane collapsed. While local officials intended to repair the bridge in 2013, the project was delayed for more than a year while state officials searched a small creek beneath the bridge for spike mussels.

Ben Stanley: 815-987-1369; bstanley@rrstar.com; @ben_j_stanley

ABOVE IS FROM:  http://www.rrstar.com/article/20160107/NEWS/160109678/0/SEARCH

New Boone County Animal Services building eyes summer completion

By Adam Poulisse
Staff writer

Posted Jan. 10, 2016 at 7:00 AM
Updated at 8:23 PM

BELVIDERE — The new Boone County Animal Services building is expected to be completed by August, but it could happen sooner if weather permits.
Rockford Structures of Machesney Park will oversee the project. The company submitted the lowest of five bids, which were received since Dec. 2.
The building, which will be behind Heritage Woods of Belvidere off Squaw Prairie Road and McKinley Avenue, will cost about $1 million. That will cover the building, architect fees, water and sewer connections, furniture, equipment and a parking lot.
"Everything else is falling into place," County Administrator Ken Terrinoni said during Thursday's Health & Human Services Committee meeting. "They're out there staking the property. Now the weather's caught up to them, however."
Rockford Structures has a tentative mid-March groundbreaking date, or sooner if the ground thaws. It will accompany a groundbreaking ceremony.
In November 2014, 63 percent of voters approved a referendum to raise $800,000 through a property tax increase to pay for the building. The increase will last three years.
"This is a big thing for our county," committee member Cathy Ward said. "We've worked at this for years."
Funds are about $250,000 short. A $5 add-on dog tag fee, which started about two years ago, only generated $70,000 a year. The general fund will cover the difference, then the dog tag fee will repay the general fund over time, Terrinoni said.
The Animal Services building on Appleton Road is likely to be sold; the county hopes to get close to the original purchase price of $650,000, Terrinoni said. It's only 1,200 square feet; the new building will be about double that.

"It gives more working room," said Roger Tresemer, Boone County Animal Services operations supervisor. "This is a better housing area for the dogs and other animals we keep. It's much easier to sanitize, better ventilation, and it will be (a) better working environment for our staff."

In November, Animal Services received 20 dogs, three cats, a domesticated rabbit and one raccoon, according to a report Tresemer gave at Thursday's meeting. Twelve of the dogs were reclaimed, two were adopted, one was sent to rescue and four were euthanized. One dog is in a foster home. One of the cats was reclaimed and the other two were euthanized "for humane purposes due to health."

Adam Poulisse: 815-987-1344

ABOVE IS FROM:  http://www.rrstar.com/news/20160108/new-boone-county-animal-services-building-eyes-summer-completion

Mexico: Drug lord located thanks to interview with Sean Penn

 

 

CITY (AP) — The recapture of drug lord Joaquin "El Chapo" Guzman took a surprise, Hollywood twist when a Mexican official said security forces located the whereabouts of the world's most-wanted trafficker thanks to a secret interview with U.S. actor Sean Penn.

 

Penn's interview with Guzman, who has twice escaped from Mexican maximum security prisons, appeared late Saturday on the website of Rolling Stone magazine. It was purportedly held at an undisclosed hideout in Mexico in late 2015, several months before Guzman's recapture Friday in Los Mochis, Sinaloa, after six months on the run.

In the interview, Guzman defends his work at the head of the world's biggest drug trafficking organization. When asked if he is to blame for high addiction rates, he responds: "No, that is false, because the day I don't exist, it's not going to decrease in any way at all. Drug trafficking? That's false."

In the article, Penn describes the elaborate security measures he took ahead of the clandestine meeting. But apparently they were not enough.

A Mexican federal law enforcement official, speaking on condition of anonymity because he was not permitted to comment on the issue, told the Associated Press it was the Penn interview that led authorities to Guzman in a rural part of Durango state in October.

Authorities decided not to open fire on Guzman at the time because he was with two women and child. He was able to escape, but they were able to later track him to a house in Los Mochis where Mexican marines nabbed him after a shootout that left five people dead.

The official said the meeting between Penn and Guzman was held in Tamazula, a community in Durango state that neighbors Sinaloa, home of Guzman's drug cartel.

On Friday, Mexican Attorney General Arely Gomez said that Guzman's contact with actors and producers for a possible biopic helped give law enforcement a new lead on tracking and capturing the world's most notorious drug kingpin.

In the Rolling Stone article, Penn wrote that Guzman was interested in having a movie filmed on his life. He said Guzman wanted Mexican actress Kate del Castillo, who facilitated the meeting between the men, involved in the project.

"He was interested in seeing the story of his life told on film, but would entrust its telling only to Kate," wrote Penn, who appears in a photo posted with the interview shaking hands with Guzman whose face is uncovered.

There was no immediate response from Penn's representatives to the Mexican official's comments.

View gallery

FILE - In this Oct. 8, 2015 file photo, Sean Penn speaks …

FILE - In this Oct. 8, 2015 file photo, Sean Penn speaks during a forum with young entrepreneurs dur …

Earlier Saturday, a federal law enforcement official said that Mexico is willing to extradite Guzman to the United States, a sharp reversal from the official position after his last capture in 2014.

"Mexico is ready. There are plans to cooperate with the U.S.," said the Mexican official, who spoke on condition anonymity because he wasn't authorized to comment.

But he cautioned that there could be a lengthy wait before U.S. prosecutors can get their hands on Guzman, the most-wanted trafficker who was recaptured Friday after six months on the run: "You have to go through the judicial process, and the defense has its elements too."

Top officials in the party of President Enrique Pena Nieto also floated the idea of extradition, which they had flatly ruled out before Guzman's embarrassing escape from Mexico's top maximum security prison on July 11 — his second from a Mexican prison.

But even if Mexican officials agree, Guzman's attorney Juan Pablo Badillo told the Milenio newspaper that the defense already has filed six motions to challenge extradition requests.

Joaquin "El Chapo" Guzman is made to face …

Joaquin "El Chapo" Guzman is made to face the press as he is escorted to a helicopter in h …

"They can challenge the judge, challenge the probable cause, challenge the procedure," said Juan Masini, former U.S. Department of Justice attache at the U.S. Embassy in Mexico. "That's why it can take a long time. They won't challenge everything at once ... they can drip, drip, milk it that way."

Following his capture, the head of the powerful Sinaloa Cartel was brought to Mexico City's airport, frog-marched to a helicopter before news media, and flown back to the same prison he'd fled.

There were immediately calls for his quick extradition, just as there were after the February 2014 capture of Guzman, who faces drug-trafficking charges in several U.S. states. At the time, Mexico's government insisted it could handle the man who had already broken out of one maximum-security prison, saying he must pay his debt to Mexican society first.

Then-Attorney General Jesus Murillo Karam said the extradition would happen only after he finished his sentence in Mexico in "300 or 400 years."

Then Guzman escaped on July 11 under the noses of guards and prison officials at Mexico's most secure lock-up, slipping out an elaborate tunnel that showed the depth of the country's corruption while thoroughly embarrassing Pena Nieto's administration.

 

Mexican drug lord Joaquin "El Chapo" Guzman, …

Mexican drug lord Joaquin "El Chapo" Guzman, right, is escorted by soldiers and marines to

He also escaped a different maximum-security facility in 2001 while serving a 20-year sentence. Lore says he hid in a laundry cart, though many dispute that version. He spent 13 years on the lam.

Gomez said that one of Guzman's key tunnel builders led officials to the neighborhood in Los Mochis, where authorities had been watching for a month. The team noticed a lot of activity at the house Wednesday and the arrival of a car early Thursday morning. Authorities were able to determine that Guzman was inside the house, she said.

The marines were met with gunfire as they closed in.

Gomez said Guzman and his security chief, Ivan Gastelum, a.k.a "El Cholo Ivan," were able to flee via storm drains and escape through a manhole cover to the street, where they commandeered getaway cars. Marines climbed into the drains in pursuit. They closed in on the two men based on reports of stolen vehicles and they were arrested on the highway.

What happens now is crucial for Guzman, whose cartel smuggles multi-ton shipments of cocaine and marijuana as well as manufacturing and transporting methamphetamines and heroin, mostly to the U.S.

View gallery

Mexican drug lord Joaquin "El Chapo" Guzman …

Mexican drug lord Joaquin "El Chapo" Guzman is loaded into a marine helicopter at a federa …

According to a statement from the Mexican Attorney General's office, the U.S. filed extradition requests June 25, while Guzman was in custody, and another Sep. 3, after he escaped. The Mexican government determined they were valid within the extradition treaty and sent them to a panel of federal judges, who gave orders for detention on July 29 and Sept. 8, after Guzman had escaped.

Those orders were not for extradition but just for Guzman to begin the extradition hearing process. Now that he is recapture, Mexico has to start processing the extradition requests anew, according to the law.

The quickest he could be extradited would be six months, said a federal official who spoke on condition of anonymity, but it's not likely because lawyers file appeals. He said that they are usually turned down, but each one means a judge has to schedule a hearing.

"That can take weeks or months , and that delays the extradition," he said. "We've had cases that take six years."

Above is from:  http://news.yahoo.com/mexico-drug-lord-located-thanks-055848071.html#

Sean Penn Secretly Interviewed ‘El Chapo,’ Mexican Drug Lord

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Story below is from:  http://www.nytimes.com/2016/01/10/world/americas/el-chapo-mexican-drug-lord-interview-with-sean-penn.html?emc=edit_na_20160109&nlid=53444314&ref=cta&_r=0

 

Sean Penn Secretly Interviewed ‘El Chapo,’ Mexican Drug Lord

By RAVI SOMAIYAJAN. 9, 2016

 

The actor Sean Penn, left, and the drug lord Joaquín Guzmán Loera in a photo taken for interview authentication purposes. Credit Rolling Stone

 

Joaquín Guzmán Loera, the Mexican drug lord known as El Chapo, started out in business not long after turning 6, selling oranges and soft drinks. By 15, he said in an interview conducted in a jungle clearing by the actor and director Sean Penn for Rolling Stone magazine, he had begun to grow marijuana and poppies because there was no other way for his impoverished family to survive. 

Now, unapologetically, he said: “I supply more heroin, methamphetamine, cocaine and marijuana than anybody else in the world. I have a fleet of submarines, airplanes, trucks and boats.” 

Though his fortune, estimated at $1 billion, has come with a trail of blood, he does not consider himself a violent man. “Look, all I do is defend myself, nothing more,” he told Mr. Penn. “But do I start trouble? Never.”

 

The seven hours Mr. Guzmán spent with Mr. Penn, and the follow-up interviews by phone and video — which began in October while he was on the run — marked another surreal turn in his long-running effort to evade the Mexican and American authorities. Mr. Guzmán, one of the world’s most wanted fugitives, who had twice escaped jail, was captured in his home state of Sinaloa in northwest Mexico on Friday after a gun battle with the authorities.

Photo

Kate del Castillo and Sean Penn conducted the interview. Credit Left, Barry King/FilmMagic; Frazer Harrison/Getty Images

Mr. Guzmán’s comments also mark a stark admission that he has operated a drug empire. Interviewed by a group of reporters in 1993 after a previous arrest, he denied that he engaged in drug dealing. “I’m a farmer,” he said, listing his produce as corn and beans. He denied that he used weapons or had significant funds.

The interview with Mr. Penn, believed to be the first Mr. Guzmán has given in decades, was published online Saturday night, along with a video portion of the interview.

The interviews were held in a jungle clearing atop a mountain at an undisclosed location in Mexico. Surrounded by more than 100 cartel troops, and wearing a silk shirt and pressed black jeans, Mr. Guzmán sat down to dinner with Mr. Penn and Kate del Castillo, a Mexican actress who once played a drug kingpin in the soap opera “La Reina del Sur,” according to Rolling Stone. 

 

Even though Mexican troops attacked his hide-out in the days after the meeting, necessitating a narrow escape, Mr. Guzmán continued the interview by BlackBerry Messenger and in a video delivered by courier to the pair later. 

The story provides new details on his dramatic escape from prison last summer, when he disappeared through a hole in his shower into a mile-long tunnel that some engineers estimated took more than a year and at least $1 million to build. The engineers, Mr. Penn wrote, had been flown to Germany for specialized training. A motorcycle on rails inside the tunnel had been modified to run in the low-oxygen environment, deep underground. 

Mr. Penn’s account is likely to deepen the concern among the Mexican authorities already embarrassed by Mr. Guzmán’s multiple escapes, the months required to find him again and his status for some as something of a folk hero. Mr. Penn describes being waved through a military road checkpoint on his way to meet Mr. Guzmán, which Mr. Penn suggested was because the soldiers recognized Mr. Guzmán’s son. Mr. Penn said he was also told, during a leg of the journey taken in a small plane equipped with a scrambling device for ground radar only, that the cartel was informed by an insider when the military deployed a high-altitude surveillance plane that might have spotted their movements. 

 

In the end, the Mexican authorities said Friday night that Mr. Guzmán had been caught partly because he had been planning a movie about his life, and had contacted actors and producers, which had helped the authorities to track him down. Mr. Penn’s story says Mr. Guzmán, inundated with Hollywood offers while in prison, had indeed elected to make his own movie. Ms. del Castillo, whom he contacted through his lawyer after she posted supportive messages on Twitter, was the only person he trusted to shepherd the project, the story says. Mr. Penn heard about the connection with Ms. del Castillo through a mutual acquaintance, and asked if he might do an interview. 

It is not clear whether the contacts described in the story are the ones that led to Mr. Guzmán’s arrest. Mr. Penn wrote that he had gone to great lengths to maintain security while arranging to meet Mr. Guzmán. He described labeling cheap “burner” phones, “one per contact, one per day, destroy, burn, buy, balancing levels of encryption, mirroring through Blackphones, anonymous email addresses, unsent messages accessed in draft form.” Nevertheless, he wrote, “There is no question in my mind but that DEA and the Mexican government are tracking our movements,” referring to the United States Drug Enforcement Administration. A Mexican government official, speaking on the condition of anonymity to describe confidential matters, said the authorities were aware of the meeting with Mr. Penn.

Diane Hendricks: ABC Supply Company, Beloit, WI

 

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Diane Hendricks

Born
1947
Wisconsin, US

Residence
Afton, Wisconsin, US

Nationality
American

Occupation
Co-founder and chairman, ABC Supply

Net worth
$3.7 billion (February 2015)[1]

Spouse(s)
Ken Hendricks (deceased)

Children
7

Diane Hendricks (born 1947) is an American businesswoman, film producer and philanthropist from Wisconsin.[2] She is the widow of businessman Ken Hendricks.[2][1]

Contents

[hide

Early life[edit]

She was born in 1947,[3] the daughter of a Wisconsin dairy farmer, and was already divorced from her first husband when she met Ken Hendricks in 1975.[1]

Career[edit]

When they met, she was selling custom-built homes and Ken was a roofing contractor. They married and became business partners. In 1982, they took a loan to establish ABC Supply.[1]

Diane Hendricks owns the Hendricks Holding Company and owns and serves as chairperson of ABC Supply Co., Inc.[2][4][5][6] She is worth US$4.8 billion, making her the richest woman in Wisconsin.[4][5][7] She is #2 on the Forbes list of richest self-made women. [8]

Philanthropy[edit]

She is a donor to WisconsinEye and co-chair of Rock County 5.0.[2][5] She has served on the boards of Stateline Boys & Girls Club, and the Beloit Hospital.[7] She currently serves on the boards of the Beloit Foundation, WisconsinEye, Forward Janesville, Kandu Industries, Blackhawk Bank, the Hendricks Family Foundation, and Beloit College.[2]

Hollywood producer[edit]

She has produced movies, including The Stoning of Soraya M., about an execution in an Iranian village, and An American Carol.[5][9][10][11][12]

Political donations[edit]

She donated $500,000 to Governor Scott Walker's recall campaign and was his biggest donor in 2012.[4] She also supports Paul Ryan.[5] In 2014, she donated $1 million to the Freedom Partners Action Fund, a pro-Republican Super PAC created by the Koch Brothers.[13] In 2015, she gave $5 million to a PAC associated with presidential candidate Scott Walker.[14]

Personal life[edit]

She has seven children and lives in Afton, Wisconsin.[1]

See also[edit]

References[edit]

  1. ^ Jump up to: a b c d e "Diane Hendricks". Forbes. Retrieved 24 February 2015.
  2. ^ Jump up to: a b c d e Hendricks Holding
  3. Jump up ^ "Diane Hendricks Net Worth". The Richest. Retrieved 24 February 2015.
  4. ^ Jump up to: a b c Cary Spivak, Beloit billionaire pays zero in 2010 state income tax bill, Milwaukee Journal Sentinel, May 30, 2012
  5. ^ Jump up to: a b c d e Rick Romell, Widow a power in Beloit, beyond, Milwaukee Journal Sentinel, December 25, 2010
  6. Jump up ^ Ten Questions For Diane Hendricks, Forbes, 11.04.10
  7. ^ Jump up to: a b Forbes Diane Hendricks
  8. Jump up ^ http://www.forbes.com/profile/diane-hendricks/
  9. Jump up ^ "Diane Hendricks Producer". Internet Movie Database. Retrieved February 23, 2015.
  10. Jump up ^ http://www.beloitdailynews.com/news/top_news/hollywood-comes-to-beloit/article_1a5ca92a-e4ec-5338-9068-fac90be1403c.html Beloit Daily News
  11. Jump up ^ http://www.nytimes.com/movies/movie/455322/The-Stoning-of-Soraya-M-/details New York Times
  12. Jump up ^ http://variety.com/2008/film/reviews/an-american-carol-1200471853/ Variety
  13. Jump up ^ Vogel, Kenneth (October 14, 2014). "Koch donors uncloaked". Politico. Retrieved October 14, 2014.
  14. Jump up ^ "Presidential; donors".

External links[edit]

 

 

Milwaukee Magazine

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Who is Diane Hendricks?

The billionaire Walker's speaking to in the "divide and conquer" video, and much more.


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Matt Hrodey Matt HrodeyMay 11, 2012

She’s one of two donors who dropped $500,000 on Walker earlier this year. As such, she holds the state record for the largest donation ever given to a gubernatorial candidate. (The other $500,000 came from Texas conservative funder Bob Perry.)  She owns the Beloit-based ABC Supply Co., a wholesale roofing and siding supplier with 400+ locations around the country. She ranks 188th on the Forbes 400, with an estimated net worth of $2.8 billion. She has seven children, many of whom work for ABC Supply, and oversees a couple dozen more companies under Hendricks Holding Co. She’s the widow of Ken Hendricks, whom became her business partner soon after they started dating; they founded ABC Supply in 1982. She had grown up on a dairy farm, and he was a roofing contractor. On their first date, Ken asked to eat the rest of another customer’s sandwich, according to Inc. magazine. The writer of said profile, which ran in 2006, says Diane offered some of her leftover pizza to another group of diners (three strangers) while meeting with her during her reporting. Diane is frugal.

In 2007, Ken died after falling from a roof at a construction site, but Diane’s star has only continued to rise. Like Ken, whom Tommy Thompson called one of America’s “finest sons,” Diane has contributed heavily to Republican candidates. She’s also funded the Beloit International Film Festival, bankrolled some feature-length films with conservative messages, invested heavily in downtown Beloit, and sits on the Republican National Committee. When George W. and Laura Bush made an unannounced visit to Wisconsin in late 2010, they parked their jet in ABC Supply’s private hangar, lunched with Diane and met some of the company’s employees. (News accounts speculated the visit had something to do with Diane’s support for the George W. Bush Institute think tank.) And she attended the Koch Brothers’ Summer Seminar, a hot ticket for Republican high-rollers, in 2011 – a few months after running into newly-inaugurated Gov. Scott Walker in Janesville.

As coincidence would have it, a documentary filmmaker, Brad Lichtenstein, had a camera running nearby and captured this exchange, as most everyone has read by now …

“Any chance we’ll ever get to be a completely red state and work on these unions?” Hendricks asks, after greeting Walker with a hug.

“Oh yeah,” he says.

“… and become a right-to-work?”

“In fact, the … “

“What can we do to help you?”

“Well, we’re going to start in a couple weeks with our budget adjustment bill. The first step is we’re going to deal with collective bargaining for all public employee unions.”

“Right.”

“Because [indecipherable, has been widely interpreted as ‘you’ but could also be ‘use’] divide and conquer.”

A month later, Walker’s administration introduced the contentious Budget Repair Bill that eventually stripped public employees in the state of most of their bargaining rights, sent 14 Senate Democrats running for the hills, brought a small world of protesters down on the State Capitol, etc.