Today's News

 The Illinois Department of Transportation will hold its next round of public information meetings on proposed improvements to U.S. Route 51 in the next two weeks.

Area meetings include:

It was more than a decade ago that Sandy Leidner, while serving as Vandalia’s mayor, had a vision to improve the community’s downtown business district. On Monday, we will celebrate that vision becoming a reality.

Leidner, and others, realized that Vandalia’s downtown would never be like it was prior to the introduction of large retail department stores. But she also realized that the downtown would suffer even greater damage by letting the streetscape, and the infrastructure beneath it, continue to age and deteriorate.

The receipt of federal funds that will help to deliver safe, potable water to up to 250 homes in the Vandalia Lake area was celebrated on Earth Day.

At a program held in the Lions Pavilion at the lake, Fayette Water Co. officials signed documents for a $995,000 loan and a $285,000 grant through the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s Rural Development Program.

Those federal monies, according to Fayette Water Manager Randy Wolf, will be used to fund the installation of 10 miles of water lines in the lake area.

The Fayette County Hospital District Board on Monday discussed several issues, but after meeting for more than two hours, voted to recess its meeting until May 10 to deal with two items of special interest.

On the agenda for that meeting will be further discussions about the future of the hospital’s ambulance service and a renovation project that would shut down the FCH special care unit for several days.