Tazewell County News Briefs

Chronicle Media

A new sign marks the Fourth Street entrance of the renovated Pekin Public Library. In the first year following the renovations, numbers show a hike in services, although adult usage is down.

CENTRAL ILLINOIS

Health network adds two more hospitals

OSF HealthCare will add two more hospitals to its network by taking over hospitals in Urbana and Danville.

Presence Covenant Medical Center in Urbana and Presence United Samaritans Medical Center in Danville will be part of the Peoria-based health care organization. The two organizations will seek regulatory approval, which is expected to be completed by the close of the first quarter of 2018.

Presence Covenant Medical Center has 206 beds and more than 700 employees. Presence United Samaritans Medical Center has 174 beds and more than 550 employees.

The additions will bring OSF’s hospital count to 13, 12 of which are in Illinois.

COUNTY

Photography workshop open to youth and mentors

University of Illinois Extension, Fulton-Mason-Peoria-Tazewell Unit is offering a photography workshop Aug. 26 at the Tazewell County office in Pekin. The workshop is split into two sessions, and participants may select to attend one or both. 

The workshop is geared toward a youth audience, ages 8 to 18. The youth are encouraged to bring an adult mentor who will learn alongside of them

Session 1 is scheduled for 9 a.m. to noon. It will cover basics such as composition, lighting, and perspective. The participants will be given challenges to practice their newly learned skills during the session. Session 2 will be held from 1 to 4 p.m. for participants who are using a DSLR type camera. Students will learn how to manually change camera settings and how that can improve their photos.

Registration can be completed online at go.illinois.edu/photoworkshop. Registration fee for each session is $15 per youth; mentors are free. Youth currently in 4-H receive a $5 discount. Workshop space is limited and registration deadline is Aug. 21. For more information, email Anita Wilkinson at aswilkin@illinois.edu or call (309) 347-6614. 

PEKIN

Library sees increase in use in some areas

In the first year following the renovation of the Pekin Public Library, the numbers show a hike in services, although adult usage is down slightly.

Customer use of the library’s collection of books, e-books, magazines, periodicals and computers are up by 1.8 percent overall in comparison to the last full year the library was in the building before the renovation. That year ended in 2014.

Compared to that time period, adult reading activities are down 4 percent. However, families are coming to the library more. The circulation of children’s materials was up 17.2 percent, or by 93,109 items, over 2014′s number of 79,415.

In 2014 and 2015, the library added two new additions to the facility and renovated the old sections of the existing building at a cost of $6.4 million. It reopened in 2016. Perhaps those improvements are the reason the library has seen an increase in patron visits, an estimate of 5,000 more than before the renovations. Library officials say more people are attending programs, checking out materials and using library computers.

MORTON

Time to enter Pumpkin Festival parade

Kickoff of the 2017 Pumpkin Festival Parade is a month away, but the deadline to participate in it is Aug. 20. The theme for this year’s festival is “Das Pumpkin.” All units must be registered in order to march in the parade, which will be help at 10:30 a.m. Sept. 16. The parade will begin at Lincoln School, corner of East Jefferson and Nebraska, and head west on Jefferson Street for 1.5 miles.

There is a suggested donation fee to enter the parade to help cover the cost of the parade operations. Entries may compete for prizes. Grand prize float winner receives $500. First-place commercial and non-commercial floats will receive $200 each.

Email mkull@mortonillinois.org to request a parade entry form, call (309) 263-2491 or go to mortonpumpkinfestival.org.

 

 

–Tazewell County News Briefs–