Sep 25, 2015 - states that still maintain them, and provide an exclamation point for breathtaking changes in the nation'
PEORIA MAYOR JIM ARDIS NOT TRYING FOR STATE SENATE SEAT; MAY RUN FOR A FOURTH TERM. B1
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CATERPILLAR PLANS TO SLASH 10,000 JOBS GLOBALLY, SAVE $1.5 BILLION BY 2018
Caterpillar still plans Downtown project
“
Because Peoria is our global headquarters and we have the largest concentration of employees in Illinois, the impact here will be significant. Peoria has been Caterpillar’s home for 90 years, and we know this is especially difficult and hard for our local employees, families and communities.”
But ‘now is not the time to start’ construction of new headquarters BY NICK VLAHOS AND CHRIS KAERGARD
DOUG OBERHELMAN
OF THE JOURNAL STAR
PEORIA — Caterpillar Inc. stated it still plans to construct a world headquarters campus in Downtown Peoria. In light of the announcement Thursday about impending, sizable layoffs, when that construction might happen is uncertain. “They’ve always said when the economy is in the right position and the company is in the right position, they’re starting the project,” Peoria City Manager Patrick Urich said. “I think everyone should take them at their word.” As many as 10,000 Caterpillar jobs might be eliminated by 2018. But in announcing the reductions in force, Caterpillar also reiterated its dedication to its home city and state. Please see DOWNTOWN, Page A5
INSIDE COVERAGE PAYING THE PRICE: Phil Luciano suggests Caterpillar CEO forgo his paycheck. B1 UNION REACTION: UAW plant workers don’t expect to escape layoffs unscathed. B1 BUSINESSES WORRY: Downtown businesses brace for possible ripple effect. B3 HOUSING INDUSTRY: Central Illinois real-estate experts take a wait-and-see approach amid news of Caterpillar layoffs. B2 HISTORY OF LAYOFFS: A look at Caterpillar’s history of layoffs, in Peoria and beyond. A7 JOBS CUT IN 2015: A look at Caterpillar’s job cuts so far in 2015, plus how many jobs the company has added. A6
Caterpillar CEO, about the company’s plans for significant cost reductions and restructuring
Cuts seen as survival strategy
Peoria-area leaders admit layoffs painful, but say company’s future at stake BY NICK VLAHOS, CHRIS KAERGARD AND SCOTT HILYARD
READ ALL OF OBERHELMAN’S OP-ED IN OPINION, PAGE A4
126,800
OF THE JOURNAL STAR
PEORIA — During a pessi-
Hundreds of pilgrims killed near Muslim holy site
mistic Thursday regarding employment at Caterpillar Inc., optimism cracked some of the gloom. Granted, it was tempered. And the realities of a work force reduction that might reach 10,000 by 2018 weren’t sugarcoated. But more than one local or state official said the actions the Peoria-based construction-equipment manufacturer is taking now might secure its future. Particularly its local future. “Now, as hard as it may be, it’s better to pull back a little bit and look at the longer-term scenario,” Peoria Mayor Jim Ardis said. “I hope this is going to allow Caterpillar to remain a big player, and it will allow Cat to be the world leader in that space. This is just part of the pain that comes when the economy is in a position where it is right now.” The company announced a significant restructuring, including cutting its work force by between 4,000 and 5,000 by the end of next year. Reductions in salaried and management personnel, as well as agency or contract workers, is likely initially. Facility closures and consolidations are possible. All told, the reductions might represent 8 percent in a work force that numbers 126,800, according to Caterpillar-provided data. “The first reaction is always, ‘Oh, my gosh, this is so sad, because of all the careers that are going to be
More than 700 people are killed as two giant waves of pilgrims collide at the hajj in Saudi Arabia. A3
Please see CAT, Page A6
Total Caterpillar global work force
4,000 to 5,000 Expected layoffs by end of 2016. Bulk of layoffs expected by end of this year
10,000
Expected layoffs by 2018
31,000 Job cuts since mid-2012, not including estimated new reductions
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Caterpillar Inc. employees cross Northeast Adams Street from the company’s headquarters Thursday.
$66 billion $48 billion 27%
Decrease since 2012
2012 revenue Expected 2015 revenue adjusted after Thursday’s announcement
SOURCE: CATERPILLAR INC., JOURNAL STAR ARCHIVES
Pope Francis urges Congress to embrace immigrants
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In an address to Congress, Pope Francis urged lawmakers and America to welcome immigrants, abolish the death penalty, share the nation’s immense wealth and fight global warming. The pontiff then left for New York, the second stop on his three-city tour of the U.S. A2
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JOURNAL STAR SPECIAL REPORT West Peoria resident ALI SALEH KAHLAH AL-MARRI was arrested in 2001. He was named an ‘enemy combatant’ in 2003 and agreed to a plea deal in 2009. In a surprise move, he was released from prison Friday and quickly deported.
SENT HOME BY ANDY KRAVETZ
detail from authorities. Al-Marri had been slated to be released PEORIA Sunday and deported to Qatar as he had fter more than 13 years in local, mili- finished his 100-month sentence imposed tary and federal jails or prisons on in October 2009 for providing material supterrorism-related charges, a former port to the al-Qaida terrorism network. West Peoria resident is home in his An official with the Bureau of Prisons native Qatar, leaving a sewould not comment. A spokesman ries of short-term questions and for U.S. Immigration and Customs long-term legal ramifications in Enforcement said Saturday eve! Peorians look his wake. ning he could not provide any Ali Saleh Kahlah al-Marri, 49, back at the al-Marri additional comment by deadline was spirited out of the United case. Page A10 on the post-release deportation States on Friday, two days before ! A 13-year or any legal proceedings that may he was scheduled to be released timeline of events. have preceded it. from a maximum security prison Page A9 But the unanswered questions in Florence, Colo. run deeper than how al-Marri The move was a surprise to his attorney, came to be returned to his wife and five Andrew Savage of Charleston, S.C., who children ahead of schedule. The long-term had met with his client just one day be- legal ramifications of his groundbreaking fore, on Thursday, though Savage declined case remain fuzzy. to comment further on the unexpected release deportation until he could get more Please see AL-MARRI, Page A8 OF THE JOURNAL STAR
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Disaster agency adopts changes
PEORIA’S HUNGRY SOULS Manna From Heaven has provided food — and hope — to those in need for past decade
C
laudvina Claudin zigzags on foot through South Peoria, rain or snow or shine, for more than a mile every Tuesday. Especially in winter, the trek can be wearying, until the moment the 56-year-old steps through the door of Manna From Heaven food pantry, 607 S. Western Ave. The weathered storefront serves as an uplifting touchstone for Claudin and hundreds of others who depend on the pantry not just for food. “They’re good at helping people,” Claudin said with a serene grin. “We get everything we need here.” Besides food, that means singing, preaching, chatting — and, on Friday night, bingo, when visitors can win items like laundry detergent and hand soap. Such prizes don’t glimmer as glamorously as those on TV game shows, but household necessities carry great value when you have little or none at home. That kind of street-level service is the hallmark of Manna From Heaven, which this month celebrates a decade of helping a hardscrabble chunk of Peoria that otherwise could go hungry.
PHIL LUCIANO
Please see LUCIANO, Page A14
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PEORIA — With two major weather disasters in the past five years, Peoria County’s Emergency Management Agency is undergoing a sea change in thinking to adjust to the changing nature of disasters and emergencies. For years, EMA, formerly known as Emergency Services and Disasters Agency, or ESDA, was based in a 1950s-era bunker, where a director and an assistant ran the agency. And the way the agency operated, Peoria County officials have said, was rooted in that era’s thinking of how civil defense should operate. But over the past year, the county has taken steps to change course and to switch from a bunker-based mentality, where EMA is engaged only when there is a problem such as the Washington tornado of November 2013 or the Elmwood tornado of 2011, to a line
Please see EMA, Page A13
FRED ZWICKY/JOURNAL STAR
PURCHASE THIS PHOTO AT PJSTAR.COM
Margie Peal embraces the Rev. Willie Johnson after he brought her a hot dog at the Manna From Heaven food pantry. Peal said, “I come off and on because I know others need the help more. But, sometimes, it gets rough.” For 10 years, Manna From Heaven has managed to survive, feeding all who are hungry with no questions asked. The small operation run out of a storefront at 607 S. Western Ave. is run completely by volunteers and donations. Each Tuesday session opens with songs of praise and then a spiritual message from Johnson, who helped establish the original pantry.
FILLING A NEED: Check out a video and photo gallery from Manna From Heaven food pantry in Peoria.
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“No union is more profound than marriage, for it embodies the highest ideals of love, fidelity, devotion, sacrifice, and family. In forming a marital union, two people become something greater than once they were. As some of the petitioners in these cases demonstrate, marriage embodies a love that may endure even past death. It would misunderstand these men and women to say they disrespect the idea of marriage. Their plea is that they do respect it, respect it so deeply that they seek to find its fulfillment for themselves. Their hope is not to be condemned to live in loneliness, excluded from one of civilization’s oldest institutions. They ask for equal dignity in the eyes of the law. The Constitution grants them that right. The judgment of the Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit is reversed.
It is so ordered.” Supreme Court declares same-sex marriage a right
S
MARK SHERMAN / THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
ame-sex couples won the right to marry nationwide Friday as a divided Supreme Court handed a crowning victory to the gay rights movement, setting off a jubilant cascade of long-delayed weddings in states where they had been forbidden. “No longer may this liberty be denied,” said Justice Anthony Kennedy. The vote was narrow — 5-4 — but Kennedy’s majority opinion was clear and firm: “The court now holds that same-sex couples may exercise the fundamental right to marry.”
In praise of the decision, President Barack Obama called it “justice that arrives like a thunderbolt.” Four of the court’s justices weren’t cheering. The dissenters accused their colleagues of usurping power that belongs to the states and to voters, and short-circuiting a national debate about same-sex marriage. “This court is not a legislature. Whether same-sex marriage is a good idea should be of no concern to us,” Chief Justice John Roberts wrote in dissent. Roberts read a summary of his dissent from the bench, the first time he has done so in nearly 10 years as chief justice.
The ruling will put an end to same-sex marriage bans in the 14 states that still maintain them, and provide an exclamation point for breathtaking changes in the nation’s social norms in recent years. As recently as last October, just over one-third of the states permitted gay marriages. Kennedy’s reading of the ruling elicited tears in the courtroom, euphoria outside and the immediate issuance of marriage licenses to same-sex couples in at least eight states. In Dallas, Kenneth Denson said he and Gabriel Mendez had been legally married in 2013 in California but “we’re Texans; we want to get married in Texas.”
New members to shift dynamic of District 150 board
Please see MARRIAGE, Page A3
President ends remarks by leading crowd in ‘Amazing Grace’
BY PAM ADAMS
BY JULIE PACE
OF THE JOURNAL STAR
OF THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
PEORIA — Two members left
CHARLESTON, S.C. — After a string
DAN ADLER
ERNESTINE JACKSON
SAYING GOODBYE: Two outgoing District 150 board members offer reflection, advice. Page A8 Avenue. But all four say they want the best for District 150. !!! Dan Adler and Ernestine Jackson are about to go from change-minded outsiders to insiders on Peoria School District 150 Board of Education.
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SOUNDING OFF: Central Illinois residents react. Page A11 MARRIAGES BEGIN: Same-sex couples exchange vows on historic day. Page A11
More on the ruling, including reaction from social media. ABOVE: Carlos McKnight waves a flag in support of gay marriage outside the Supreme Court on Friday. (AP)
OBAMA REMEMBERS SOUTH CAROLINA VICTIMS WITH EULOGY, SONG
Adler, Jackson offer their views of future for district
Peoria School District 150 Board of Education last week. When the new fiscal year begins next week on July 1, two new board members take their place. The change signals a shift in the dynamics of a fairly cohesive board that weathered the backlash of its support for Superintendent Grenita Lathan and the controversial testing investigation of Charter Oak Primary School. Edited excerpts of interviews show sharp contrasts between the old and new board members of the Third District, an area roughly north of Forrest Hill
INSIDE
Please see D150, Page A8
of triumphs, President Barack Obama’s eulogy for those killed in a South Carolina church massacre was supposed to bring an extraordinary week to a somber close. But something changed. Between legislative and legal victories, Obama had spent hours privately grappling with the tragedy in this southern city, where nine people attending Bible study were killed in a racially motivated attack. Their deaths sparked vexing questions about racial divisions, gun violence and the way America grapples with its own difficult history. At first, the president had
planned to largely focus his remarks on remembering Rev. Clementa Pinckney, the slain pastor of Emanuel African Methodist Episcopal Church, and the eight other victims. But that’s not what happened. Maybe Obama was buoyed by a week that brought about the validation of his sweeping health care law, a win on trade and the Supreme Court’s affirmation of gay marriage across the country. Maybe he was driven by the fearlessness he says he now feels as he heads down the final stretch of his presidency. As Obama took the stage to address the crowd of more than 5,500 packed into a basketball arena, he did speak movingly about Pinckney, a state lawmaker and popular pastor. Then the president issued a
Please see OBAMA, Page A8
Flooding forces changes to Red, White and Boom Ongoing flooding on the Illinois River has led to a slight change in the annual Red, White and Boom fireworks show next weekend. B1
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