One of Jacksonville’s long-term care facilities has new ownership.

The Journal Courier reports that Lavender Ridge in Jacksonville was part of a $6.7 million purchase by StoneBridge Senior Living. The purchase also included locations in Effingham, Mt. Vernon, and Olney.

According to the report, StoneBridge now owns 22 properties across Missouri, Arkansas, and now Illinois.

StoneBridge is a family-owned company started more than 50 years ago by Gloria Lierman, who was a nurse. The St. Louis-based business is not expected to alter services at their Jacksonville location.

The Pike County Sheriff’s Department arrested one woman yesterday on drug charges.

At 8:28 last night, Pike County Sheriff’s Deputies executed a court-authorized search warrant at a residence in the 200 block of West Fourth Street in Baylis.

According to a press release from Pike County Sheriff David Greenwood, subsequent to an investigation, over 50 grams of a substance containing methamphetamine, methamphetamine-related drug paraphernalia, and hypodermic syringes were located and seized.

35 year old Laura J. Syrcle was arrested as a result of the search warrant and has subsequently been charged with unlawful possession of methamphetamine, unlawful possession of drug paraphernalia, unlawful possession of hypodermic syringes, and three other outstanding Pike County warrants for drug charges and theft.

Syrcle is currently lodged at the Pike County Jail.

The Jacksonville Police Department is seeking the public’s help in solving a vandalism case.

According to police reports, unknown individuals damaged several windows on the north side of a business located in the 200 block of South Mauvaisterre around 8:30 in the evening on Sunday.

The police are asking if anyone has any information about the incident to submit a tip to the Morgan Scott Cass Crimestoppers by going online to their website and clicking on the leave a tip button on the home page or by calling 217-243-7300.

Tips may also be submitted via the Crime Stoppers mobile app or via text message. Text your tip to the number 274637. The first word of the text tip must be “payout.”

Remember if your tip leads to an arrest, you may be eligible for a cash reward.

The Illinois Department of Public Health announced updated consumption advisories today for fish caught in Illinois waters.

These changes are the result of continued sampling by the Illinois Fish Contaminant

Monitoring Program.

IDPH issued 7 new site-specific methylmercury advisories adding the White Hall Reservoir to the list. A statewide methylmercury advisory remains in place for all Illinois waters.

The statewide advisory cautions sensitive populations, namely pregnant women and young children, to eat no more than one meal per week of predatory fish, unless more restrictive site-specific advisories are in place due to elevated methylmercury levels.

For pregnant women, methylmercury exposure can cause impaired neurological development in babies.

For more information, fish advisories can be viewed on the IDPH fish advisories website.

Action Brown County announced the winner last night of its business competition at Brown County High School.

Five businesses and the public gathered in the high school auditorium. The businesses gave their final public pitch for their business in hopes of winning $20,000 in seed money to start their business.

WGEM reports that Alana Boylen and her Green Flamingo Grill restaurant were chosen as the winners.

The concept consists of a bar & grill location that family and friends “can enjoy a beer and burger” while catching sports on television. The pitch says that the restaurant will specialize in burgers including a “unique hand patty smash burger.”

The first of its kind “Shark Tank” style competition and sponsored in part by the Tracy Family Foundation, started on April 13^th with 17 businesses. Action Brown County hoped the competition will help the local economy through new business interests in the Brown County community.

Illinois Attorney General Kwame Raoul announced yesterday that Illinois consumers will soon receive payments as part of a $43 million settlement with manufacturers of cathode ray tubes.

The payments are part of settlements Raoul’s office has reached with international electronics companies Hitachi, LG, Philips, Samsung, Toshiba and Panasonic to resolve a 2012 lawsuit that alleged a conspiracy to illegally fix the prices of CRTs in televisions and monitors. The price-fixing conspiracy increased the costs of products containing CRTs, causing Illinois consumers to pay significantly more than they would have if prices had been set through normal competition.

Illinois consumers and businesses submitted approximately 8,000 valid claims for more than 1 million CRT monitors and televisions purchased during the relevant period in 2018. Claimants can expect to recover approximately $14 per CRT television and $42 per CRT monitor. Every claimant will recover a minimum of $20.

Settlement checks will be mailed during the third quarter of 2022. Raoul urges individuals and businesses that receive checks to cash them promptly, as the checks will expire 90 days after issuance.

Additional information related to the settlement can be found at www.illinoiscrtsettlement.com.

Lincoln Square will soon have a new addition to the healthcare community in Jacksonville.

Memorial Health has announced that they will be occupying the former location of Perkins & Lincoln Gardens on the northwest corner of the square with a brand new Memorial Care offering.

Travis Dowell, Memorial Medical Group President and CEO says it’s expected to open next year: “The location being known as Memorial Care is expected to open in February 2023. Right now, we are in the early stages of construction. This will be our seventh urgent care that we have within our system. We have 4 urgent care locations in Sangamon County – 3 in Springfield and 1 in Chatham. We have two urgent care locations in Macon County – both in the Decatur area.”

Dowell says the facility will provide convenient, urgent care for local residents: “Like any urgent care facility, we will be providing convenient care for patients that have minor injuries and illnesses that you wouldn’t necessarily take to the Emergency Room. You don’t need an appointment just like any other urgent care. You can just come to the location and check in. However, if you want to utilize our Memorial mobile app, you can actually get in line prior to arrival. The name of the feature is On My Way, which is available in the Memorial Health app.”

Dowell says that the urgent care facility will accept all types of insurance.

Dowell says the facility will house all new staff that will include nurse practitioners, clinical staff, non-clinical staff, as well as lab and x-ray technicians. The building will encompass 8 exam rooms plus a procedure room.

Like all other Memorial urgent care facilities, the new location will operate 8AM to 8PM seven days a week.

Dowell says the urgent care facility will create a continuation of service from the primary care that Jacksonville Memorial Hospital and its primary care physicians provide: “We just feel like we would like to improve access to healthcare in the Jacksonville community. We have a really strong Primary Care presence in Jacksonville, and this will be a compliment and an extension of that primary care access. I think this will really be well received and high quality. It will avoid that trip to the Emergency Department because we prefer to have our patients and/or our colleagues to be getting this type of care in non-emergency type settings.”

Dowell says that there is opportunity for more urgent care in the Jacksonville area after hearing about the need for more access from patients and Memorial colleagues in the Jacksonville area. He hopes people choose the location when it comes to their non-emergency healthcare needs when it opens next year.

Members of WLDS/WEAI and Country Financial presented checks from proceeds of the annual basketball All Star Classic to New Directions Warming & Cooling Center and Camp Courage today at the Cass-Morgan Farm Bureau Office.

WLDS/WEAI’s Gary Scott says that the All Star Classic is rebuilding: “We gave each of the organizations checks for $400. That puts into well above $20,000 in the total time that we’ve had the All Star game. This year was down a little bit, but we had to bounce through a couple of years of no All Star game. We are rebuilding and hope to give more next year.”

Sarah Robinson of New Directions says that the proceeds will help keep their doors open: “This support is amazing. It’s exactly what we need to keep our doors open and to stay in operation. The community has been great. This is how we do it. We are still operating at half capacity at the shelter because of Covid. We have a max capacity of 10, but we average about 7 people a night. We are waiting on CDC guidelines for homeless shelters to be updated, but so far they have not changed. We are still doing social distancing and masks indoors regardless of vaccination status.”

John Hunter of Camp Courage says numbers have been down the last few years, but the donation helps provide campers a memorable experience: “This donation means the world for us so we can continue our program that we’ve had for the last 46 years. It’s an opportunity to get out and have a good time at the camp. We try to cap the number of campers at 35. That’s about the maximum we can handle with the bed situation, with everything that we have, and the counselor situation. Attendance has been a little down the last few years.”

Also on hand to present the checks from the All Star Game were WLDS/WEAI’s Mark Whalen and Country Financial Agent Lucas Turner.

The Village of South Jacksonville Police Department has a new squad car.

The design was made by one of the department’s new officers.

Anley Gerdes started with the police department full time back in February after being a member of West Central Illinois Joint Dispatch.

Gerdes says that the design came together around a black, blue, and white design with the department’s badge on the brand new squad car: “I liked the white squad car that we had with the blue lines, but I like traditional black and white squad cars. It’s just what I enjoy, so I tried to design this one that was different from Jacksonville. We try to distinguish ourselves from Jacksonville. We train together and do a bunch of things together. We work great together, but I kind of wanted us to have a squad car that set us apart from their whole fleet so that it kind of stands out a little bit more down here. The community is really enjoying it. They really like what it looks like. Everyone is stopping me on calls and paying compliments to it.”

Gerdes says the new career switch has come with some adjustment. She says going from the very scripted aspect of being a dispatcher to becoming an officer has brought new enjoyment and challenges: “I miss dispatch dearly. I loved it down there. I loved answering the calls, but it’s a lot different to be out in the field actually responding and getting the ends of calls instead of just the beginning. This is what is happening and then that’s all you get to hear about it while you’re a dispatcher. Knowing how it turns out or how you can follow up on a call and help someone even more has been really cool. I’m a little bit harder on the dispatchers than most people are because I know how what they are supposed to be doing and how it’s supposed to be done. The dispatchers do a fantastic job. I do like the new career switch and being able to be out and helping people instead of just being the voice for them.”

Gerdes says she really enjoyed working on the design for the squad car and is glad that it has attracted positive attention throughout the South Jacksonville community.

A Springfield man will now represent himself in a November 2021 carjacking and home invasion case in Adams County Court.

Muddy River News reports that 35 year old Bradley Yohn was granted the ability to proceed pro se by Judge Roger Thomson today in Adams County Circuit Court. Yohn had previously asked Judge Amy Lannerd to dismiss Public Defender John Citro as counsel back on April 19^th, and again asked visiting Judge Michael Atterberry on April 29^th.

Thomson began proceedings today asking Yohn if he had mended his relationship with Citro since his pleas to defend himself were entered into the court record. Yohn said no and that the wished to proceed representing himself. Thomson asked Citro the same question and he agreed that the relationship between him and Yohn had been irretrievably broken. Citro was then dismissed from the courtroom.

Yohn was then admonished on his charges stemming from two different dates.

Assistant State’s Attorney Josh Jones was then instructed to produce discovery of evidence to Yohn this week. Yohn claimed to the court that he didn’t feel safe in Jones’ presence, citing previous alleged incidents of assault by officers of the Adams County Jail. Judge Thomson denied Yohn’s request for a surveillance room for a meeting with Jones.

According to Muddy River News, Yohn spoke to his father at the backroom as he was leaving the hearing, asking him to contact the Illinois Supreme Court

A trial is scheduled to begin June 21st, with a pretrial hearing set for next Wednesday.