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Saturday-Sunday, July 6-7, 2013
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RETIREES WEIGH IN ON STATE STALEMATE
Pension waiting game
Nude photos lead to arrest Police say man blackmailed victim By JILLIAN DUCHNOWSKI jduchnowski@shawmedia.com
Photos by Rob Winner – rwinner@shawmedia.com
ABOVE: Linda Chapman of DeKalb is a retired teacher who is anxiously watching the state to see how it enacts pension reform. Chapman taught at Burlington Central High School. BELOW: Chapman snuggles her cat at her DeKalb home. “I am just hoping they’ll be able to meet ... and hammer out a compromise to S.B. 2404,” she said, referring to a reform bill proposed by Senate President John Cullerton.
Many view possible reforms as unfair attack on earned benefits Voice your opinion When will Illinois take any action on its pension problem? Vote online at Daily-Chronicle.com.
What’s next The Illinois House and Senate are scheduled to convene in regular session Tuesday.
By DAVID THOMAS dthomas@shawmedia.com DeKALB – Linda Chapman only can hold her breath as she watches state lawmakers debate the future of the state’s five different pension systems. For the past few weeks, a select group of lawmakers from the House and Senate have discussed compromises to tackle pension reform before Tuesday’s deadline. The conference committee was formed after lawmakers failed to pass pension reform during the spring session. House Speaker Michael Madigan and Senate President John Cullerton, both Chicago Democrats, pushed their own solution to the state’s pension problem through their respective chambers, but both Senate Bill 1 and Senate Bill 2404
failed to gain traction in the other chamber. For Chapman, a DeKalb resident who taught at Burlington Central High School, she’d take the Cullerton plan over Madigan’s, which she described as penalizing teachers
for being teachers. According to the Better Government Association’s pension database, Chapman makes at least $89,000 a year through her pension before federal taxes and other deductions. “I am just hoping they’ll
be able to meet ... and hammer out a compromise to S.B. 2404,” Chapman said. “We saw that as a way to preserve our pensions, while at the same time, have some give and take on both sides.” Tuesday is the deadline Gov. Pat Quinn gave to lawmakers to pass some measure of pension reform. Both the House and Senate are scheduled to convene in regular session that day, but the leader of the conference committee said he does not think they’ll be ready. But pension reform won’t be the only thing grabbing lawmakers’ attention. They also will vote to confirm or override Quinn’s changes to a concealed-carry bill that passed out of both chambers
DeKALB – A Streamwood man Wednesday anticipated meeting a DeKalb woman in a Schnucks parking lot for a nude photography shoot. Instead, Victor Sandoval, 21, of the 600 block of Lincolnwood Drive, met DeKalb police. He was charged with intimidation, stalking, harassment by electronic communication and illegal posting on an Internet site. Victor If convicted Sandoval, of the most se- 21, of Streamrious charge, wood, was intimidation, charged after, he could be senpolice say, he tenced up to 10 tried to blackyears in prison. T h e c a s e mail a DeKalb began in Feb- woman for r u a r y w h e n nude photos. the victim sent nude photographs of herself to an acquaintance on Facebook, only to learn later that the acquaintance’s Facebook account had been hijacked and the photographs actually had gone to a stranger, police said. Sandoval posted the photographs, along with the victim’s name, employer and school, on a pornographic Internet site, police said. Sandoval threatened to post more nude photographs of her if she didn’t pay him $150 or agree to meet him to take more nude photos. The $150 was the amount the pornographic site charged to remove photographs, police said. The woman agreed to meet Sandoval for the nude shoot Wednesday in the parking lot at Schnucks, 975 S. Annie Glidden Road. He said he’d be wearing a mask, black shirt and blue
See PENSIONS, page A9 See ARREST, page A9
Economy adds 195,000 jobs Unemployment rate stays at 7.6 percent By CHRISTOPHER S. RUGABER The Associated Press WASHINGTON – U.S. employers are sending a message of confidence in the economy – hiring more workers, raising pay and making the job market appear strong enough for the Federal Reserve to slow its bond purchases as early as September. The economy gained a robust 195,000 jobs in June and many
Wages going up Solid hiring in the private sector is lifting wages, even in some lower-paying industries. Average hourly pay for retail employees, for example, rose 6 cents in June to $16.64, and is up nearly 2 percent in the past year.
more in April and May than previously thought. The unemployment rate remained 7.6 percent in June because more people started looking for jobs – a healthy sign – and some didn’t find them. The gov-
ernment doesn’t count people as unemployed unless they’re looking for work. The Labor Department’s report Friday pointed to a U.S. job market that’s showing surprising resilience in the face of tax increases, federal spending cuts and economic weakness overseas. Employers have added an average 202,000 jobs for the past six months, up from 180,000 in the previous six. The job growth is being fueled in part by consumer spending and the housing recovery.
See JOBS, page A9
AP file photo
A job seeker gets her resume critiqued June 24 at a career fair in King of Prussia, Pa. U.S. employers added 195,000 jobs in June, and many more in April and May than previously thought.
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