The Jacksonville Fire and Rescue squad’s long wait for updated equipment ended recently amid continuing supply chain issues.

The Fire Department’s new rescue truck was delivered earlier this month after an approximately 18-month lead time from the factory. The new truck from Alexis Fire Equipment went into service the first week of October.

Jacksonville Fire Chief Doug Sills says they were lucky when the order was actually jumped ahead in line when another department backed out of an order for the same chassis Jacksonville needed. Otherwise, the new rescue unit would not have been delivered until sometime early next year.

He says the ongoing issues with the supply chain for fire equipment mean departments need to be more proactive in planning. “Right now they are about three years out on ladder trucks, at least at the time we ordered our new ladder they were three years behind. Right now on apparatus trucks, they are running about forty-one months out. So there is really having to be some long-range planning for apparatus replacement currently.”

Last year the Jacksonville City Council approved the purchase of a new ladder platform truck to replace the current ladder which Sills says is approximately 22 years old. The supply chain issues caused the ladder to be ordered a full three years ahead of time.

Sills says delivery on that vehicle has an even longer lead-out time than the fire rescue truck. He says his department has been planning ahead for some time now on rotating equipment in and out of service.

“We’re kinda set for a bit right now with the ladder truck due in 2025. Depending on if the supply chain issues straighten out or if things get somewhat better, we’re not due to replace another piece of equipment probably until 2029. We’ve tried to get into where we’re leapfrogging our apparatus where we’re not having to make a purchase every two years or three years. But trying to leapfrog that out every five years to where we replace the rolling stock.”

Sills says a lot of thought went into the new fire rescue truck with increased visibility for both the operators and the public to conform with updated regulations. It also has a greater separation of equipment so medical and firefighting gear can be stored separately and out of the crew cab in order to separate any cross-contamination from a fire or medical emergency.

The delay in its arrival did come at a cost to the department after the old fire rescue truck sustained a catastrophic failure on the way to a fire prevention event at a local school in October of last year.

“While we were waiting for the new unit to be built, the older rescue unit had a mechanical breakdown in which it ran away with itself and blew the motor up in it. But because it was our only unit and we couldn’t get moved to a higher priority in the manufacturing with Alexis, we had to spend about twenty thousand dollars in having a new motor put in that unit to keep running it until this unit was made available.”

Sills says the funds spent for the new motor are not going to waste however, as the old unit is staying in the fleet, it will be re-purposed as a backup to the new rescue unit, and more directly will be outfitted with their technical rescue equipment.

The truck will then be paired with the department’s tech-rescue trailer as a full tech-rescue response vehicle.

The Illinois College Fine Arts Series turns spooky tomorrow night as everyone is invited to take a Halloween-themed walk around campus.

Tales at Twilight returns to the historic I.C. campus after taking a few years off due to Covid. Fine Arts Series Board Member Garret Allman says Tales at Twilight is a family event featuring three master storytellers who will share spooky tales for kids of all ages.

The best known of the storytellers will be Mike Anderson, who is well known in this area as being a fantastic storyteller, and two of his friends, Dan Keding from Champaign-Urbanna and Sherty Norfolk from St. Louis who are both master storytellers with international reputations and awards. Three super people.”

Allman says the audience will be divided into thirds as each storyteller will tell a spooky story in a different location on the campus. “The locations will be outdoors, and it looks like it should be excellent weather for it. They will be on the steps of Rammelkamp Chapel, the steps of Tanner Hall, and down on the college seal in the center of the campus.

The storytelling starts at six-thirty and we’re asking people to arrive closer to six o’clock. We will have donuts and cider for everyone before it starts. Come to the center of the patio in front of Baxter Hall which is right in the center of the campus. If you’re not sure where that is, just come to the center of the quad and look to the south and you’ll see people there.”

Admission is $5.00 for adults and all children can attend for free. Allman says there are alternate indoor sites on campus in the event of bad weather. He says people are encouraged to wear their Halloween costumes however it’s not required.

Attendees can park in either the large parking lot near the McGaw Fine Arts Center accessible by Lockwood Street, or on the east side of the campus off Park Street next to the octagonal house.

Tales at Twilight featuring I.C. alumni Mike Anderson along with Dan Keding and Sherry Norfolk kicks off at 6:30 tomorrow night.

Support continues to build for those injured in a two-vehicle crash in Greene County Tuesday.

Four people were injured in the head-on crash on US 67 north of White Hall during the morning commute Tuesday. Three of the injured were students at North Greene with the other a North Greene staff member. All four were transported by ambulance to area hospitals.

GoFundMe campaign pages have now been set up for those injured in the crash. One for sisters 16-year-old Madelynn Wahl and 14-year-old Alivia Wahl, and another campaign for Courtney Bull and her first-grade daughter Emma.

The GoFundMe campaigns were started by Kate Sitton who says in the posting that with two children in the hospital, she is certain Madelynn and Alivia’s mother will not be working during this time.

Sitton is also lifelong friends with Courtney Bull whose daughter Emma has since been transferred to a St. Louis area hospital for care of her serious injuries.

The campaigns each have a goal of raising $10,000 and Sitton is now asking the community to assist in donating. She says all proceeds from each campaign will go to the families for whatever needs they may have including medical expenses.

You can find the Madelynn and Alivia campaign here.

Courtney and Emma Bull’s campaign can be found here.

Deer hunters can again pick up their harvest pins at city hall this year.

Jacksonville Mayor Andy Ezard announced today that the Mayor’s Office, located in the Jacksonville Municipal Building at 200 West Douglas Avenue, has received the 2023 deer harvest pins from the Illinois Department of Natural Resources.

Ezard says his office will once again distribute the pins during the 2023 archery, youth, muzzleloader, and firearm seasons.

The pins are free of charge and may be picked up at the Municipal Building / Mayor’s Office during normal business hours: Monday through Friday, 8:00 to 4:30.

Identification is not required. Anyone with questions may call Mayor Ezard at 217-479-4610.

An area food pantry is in need of assistance as the need for food assistance continues to grow.

The Jacksonville Salvation Army’s Client Choice Food Pantry’s shelves are looking more like Mother Hubbard’s Cupboard according to Salvation Army Captain Chris Clarke. He says the need in the Jacksonville and Morgan County area has grown exponentially in the last couple of years.

“Over the last two years, we’ve seen an over seven hundred percent increase in the number of people coming to us for food. We have several food programs including our Client Choice Pantry, commodities, and various other programs. But even more so in these last few months, we’re seeing more new people than ever before.

In the past few months, we’ve been adding about one hundred new families and these are people who have never come through the doors of the Salvation Army for any need at all. And now they’re coming to us for food, with the rising cost of food in our area, people who are on tight budgets, especially seniors.”

Clarke says in fact about half of the people coming to the Salvation Army with food needs are seniors who are on fixed incomes and very tight budgets.

The Client Choice Food Pantry is still a relatively new program at the Jacksonville Salvation Army. Clarke says up until two years ago, they still had weekly food box distributions, but now clients can come in five days a week and select what they need instead of picking up a prepacked box.

He says the increasing need in the area means they are in desperate need of donations, especially for specific popular items. “We’ve been able to access donations from other areas. We’re driving as far as Peoria to pick up donations on a weekly basis just to try to cover that need. In fact, we gave out over eight hundred thousand pounds of food so far in 2023 and over forty-three thousand people have shopped in the food pantry. Obviously, that’s duplicating because people are able to come in multiple times throughout the year.

But as that need increases, so does the need for food. The food we are really struggling to keep in stock is like side dish items that people can have with their meals. The canned goods, the box mashed potatoes, the pasta. Those types of things are what is extremely low now in our food pantry.”

Clarke says they also work with a number of Central Illinois food banks and are able to purchase food for sometimes as little as 19 cents per pound, so monetary donations can go a long way toward helping those with food instability in the area.

The Jacksonville Salvation Army’s Client Choice Food Pantry can still be found inside the citadel located at 331 West Douglas Avenue. Clarke says supply chain issues combined with the holiday seasonal needs means they will have to wait until after the first of the year before moving to the new location on the former MacMurray College campus.

To make a donation or to find out more information on the Client Choice Food Pantry, call the Jacksonville Salvation Army at 217-245-7124, or stop into the citadel on West Douglas Avenue.

An area school district has been awarded a sizable grant from the Tracy Family Foundation.

Meredosia-Chambersberg science teacher Robin Varner told the school board last week that they had received $20,000 in grant funding from the Tracy Family Foundation to continue work at the Meredosia National Wildlife Refuge.

The refuge, which was established in 1973, has been the recent focus of Varner’s eighth-grade science class after a pilot program began in May of last year to get students out of the classroom and into a more hands-on working setting.

Varner says it was a long process to apply and qualify for the grant, but the results will benefit not just students at Meredosia-Chambersburg, but the community as a whole.

“The proceeds will be used to build picnic tables, a pavilion, finish the flower bed, finish the pathways, the information kiosk, plant fruit trees, and a whole slew of things to make it not just an outdoor classroom for our students, but it can also be available for community use. If the Girl Scouts or Boy Scouts want to have a place to have an outdoor gathering. If somebody in the community wants to have a birthday party, there’s going to be grills there for anybody who wants to make use of that.

The Fish and Wildlife Service, they can hold classes there. The whole point is for it to be usable in a wide range of things to connect to the community, and to the school, as well as give our kids those same skills. Those life skills, the career skills, the ability to be proud of something we are doing in class and be proud of their community. There’s a lot going on there.”

Last year the class built raised beds that are now home to native flowers that are studied at the refuge. Varner says the school administration and the school district have taken notice of all the hard work put into the project by the students.

“I couldn’t ask for better support. Making our schedule this year was challenging and they made sure I had a time frame available to take the kids. They provide transportation without question twice a week for me to take the kids there.

They are very excited and have even talked about our students using the design from the reserve to build flower boxes for the school. We’ve seen a lot of positive interaction between the two and they seemed very interested in it at the board meeting the other night.”

Varner says the Village of Meredosia has also taken notice of the project and has approached the school district to possibly have the classes build similar raised flower beds for use throughout town

The dangers of anhydrous ammonia leaks were the focus of a joint training held at the Morgan County Fairgrounds Monday.

Members of the Jacksonville Fire Department, and Springfield Fire Department’s HazMat Team spent the day working together on scenarios practicing skills on how to properly deal with anhydrous ammonia leaks.

Jacksonville Fire Department Chief Doug Sills says, the training exercise has been in the works for about a year and helps in his department’s tech rescue operations status. “We’re only allowed to operate to a certain level. We’re an operations-level department.

There is quite the possibility that an incident would escalate beyond our level, so it’s good to get Springfield Fire over here because they are a technician level and see how we can mesh the two together for a typical operation where we would both be involved. So we know what to set up, what to expect, and how our operations can support their operations once they get on scene.”

Brice McCormick with the Springfield Fire Department HazMat response team says the Springfield Fire Department serves as the regional response team at the technician level and the joint training was a great opportunity for both departments, not just to practice their skills, but also in getting to know each other.

“The number one goal, which was met when we first got here, was the crews that operate on the same shift schedule would meet each other, know each other, and have an understanding of what capabilities they can expect and what they shouldn’t expect coming when Springfield arrives on scene with Jacksonville and when Jacksonville calls Springfield to come in.

So there’s that mutual understanding, and that people aren’t meeting each other for the first time on an emergency scene when it’s chaotic, probably in the middle of the night and the weather is never great. So today was wonderful. Beautiful weather, there’s no pressure, everybody got to spend the day together and get to meet each other and build a good working relationship.”

The training was timely following the deadly crash on Highway 40 near Teutoplolis, in which a tanker carrying 7,500 gallons of anhydrous ammonia was ruptured killing five people.

Jacksonville/Morgan County ESDA Director Phil McCarty says from his office’s perspective, the joint training was vital for knowing the resources neighboring communities have and what to expect should an emergency occur.

“The industry is safe. I really do believe this industry is safe with the hundreds of thousands of gallons that are transported through our communities every day. You know, we have to be prepared for all the hazards and this goes a long way to help that.”

Prarieland FS provided a truck and trailer combination which served as the training scenario in which an operator had become incapacitated due to a leak in the tank.

Also involved in the operation was the Growmark anhydrous display bottle, which is a full semi-trailer tank with cutaways inside so that first responders can see up close how the system works and properly handle an emergency.

Whalen Trucking of Waverly also brought two semi-tanks to the training so crews could learn the different types of control systems they could run into.

The training also gave the Jacksonville Police Department’s aerial drone team the opportunity to get some flight time in on their new drone and show how it can be used to help firefighters during different fire or emergency situations by having an eye and thermal camera in the sky.

As the summer and fall seasons continue to wind down, the City of Jacksonville is reminding the public that activity at the lake will soon wind down as well.

Jacksonville Lakes Superintendent Bret Gilbreth is reminding the public that the lake will be closed to camping and fishing for the season this Thursday, October 19^th.

Walking will continue to be permitted from the boat launch parking area to Gate 1 but all areas cabled and gated will be off-limits due to the hunting seasons.

Gilbreth says anyone with questions or concerns can contact his office by calling 217-479-4644.

The 2024 camping season opens on April 1^st, and the fishing season opens approximately March 1^st.

Gilbreth says the fishing season opening date is dependent on the weather at that time.

The Jacksonville and South Jacksonville Fire Departments along with Jacksonville Police and LifeStar EMS responded to a call of a structure fire at approximately 6:00 pm Monday at 434 Sherman Street.

Jacksonville Fire Department Captain Mike Hoppers said there was light smoke showing from the home when crews arrived on the scene. Upon an exterior search, they located fire on the backside of the house.

Hopper says at first they thought it was a fire in a clothes dryer but it turned out to be from a wood-burning stove which then caught the interior wall on fire.

Hopper says they were able to extinguish the fire relatively quickly. No one was in the house when crews arrived on scene. Hopper says there was nothing suspicious about the fire. The outside wall was heavily damaged by fire and overhaul efforts to make sure the fire was out. Hopper says an initial estimate of damage was roughly $2,000.

Fire crews were on scene for approximately one hour.