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VOLUME 7ISSUE 3240 Pages

Business Community IndexEaster egg hunts kept little tykes and their older siblings busy in Dixon, Rock Falls, Sterling, and at the Sugar Grove Church.See Page

C12

A Prophetstown storefront is home to Scottee Shirts and Treat Me.See Page C1

Today: 64/42For the forecast,

see Page A10

Sunny

TORNADO TOUCHDOWNS | LEE AND OGLE COUNTIES

Picking up the piecesRecovery begins, governor visits after twister tears through region

Earleen Hinton/ehinton@shawnews.com Adriana Price covers her ears from the wind Friday morning as she stands by her basement, where she and her family took ref-uge as a tornado demolished their home on East Kuehl Court, northwest of Rochelle, Thursday night.

Storm coverage■ 12 people survive a

direct hit north of Rochelle by taking shelter in a res-taurant basement. Page A3■ Workers will return to

work Monday in the Crest Foods warehouse near Ashton that suffered storm damage. Page A3■ A Sterling couple gets

up close and personal with Thursday’s tornado. Page A2■ Tornadoes touched

down in Clinton, Fulton areas, too. Page A3■ Two deaths reported in

Fairdale in DeKalb County. Page A4

BY ANDY COLBERTShaw Media

FLAGG CENTER – Flanked by local, state and national officials, Gov. Bruce Rauner stopped in Ogle County on Friday to pledge personal and state support for those who suffered property dam-age from a tornado that went through three local counties.

“It’s a severe tragedy,” Rauner said during a noon news conference in a church parking lot in Flagg Center, northwest of Rochelle.

“Our team is here to thank our first responders for their terrific service. They’ve done an outstanding job. We’re here to visit with families impacted by these severe storms.”

A powerful tornado roared through Lee, Ogle and DeKalb counties Thursday evening. Two people were killed in Fairdale, a town of about 150 people in rural DeKalb County.

Rauner vows state support during visit

RAUNER CONTINUED ON A8

Angel Sierra/asierra@saukvalley.com While Gust and Kathy James’ home in rural Ashton suffered severe damage during Thursday evening’s tornado, “we’re feel-ing very lucky,” Kathy said. “A few feet could have changed it all.”

BY ANGEL SIERRAasierra@saukvalley.com

800-798-4085, ext. 5695@_angelsierra

ASHTON – When Kathy James was 2 years old, she took shelter in the basement at her babysitter’s house, and survived a tornado that lev-eled homes and displaced several neighbors. It was an event that filled her with a quiet, unspoken fear.

That harrowing childhood experience returned Thurs-day when a tornado dropped from the sky and carved a long line of destruction across two rural Ashton properties. No one was hurt.

At 6:49 a.m. Friday, Kathy,

43, took her first photo of the aftermath, and surveyed the damage. She stood spell-bound, but was well aware of what she could expect to see.

The home just north of town on state Route 38 had its chimney stack gutted and tossed across the rear part of the house; part of it was sit-ting in the living room.

Rural Ashton family ‘very lucky’ to have survived

Online Extra

A free pizza challengeGo to saukvalley.com to read this week’s

“Grub Hub” feature on Maria’s Pizza in Dixon. In it, you’ll read about a challenge that could earn you a free pizza!

THE PEOPLE’S VOICE | DIXON MAYOR-ELECT LIANDRO ARELLANO JR.

W e’ve all given up on something at some point. A career. A col-lege major. Maybe even a per-

son. Or perhaps on something as simple as that slab of spaghetti pizza you were sure you could polish off.

I’d bet Liandro Arellano Jr. has given up on a couple of things, too. But you’d better believe it came after thorough deliberating, which yielded the calculat-ed conclusion that there was no other option.

There have been a few times in the Dixon mayor-elect’s life that it would have been quite understandable if he had given up on something.

For instance, a couple of years after going in 50/50 along with his father-in-law, Eric Forman, to buy the franchise rights to the Jimmy Johns restaurant on Galena Avenue in Dixon in 2007, Arellano faced one of those defining crossroads.

A leader who refuses to buckle under pressure

Heimerman is the Night News Editor at Sauk Valley Media.He can be reached at cheimerman@saukvalley.com or 800-798-4085, ext. 5523.

christopherHEIMERMAN

PEOPLE’S VOICE CONTINUED ON A9

Watch onlineGo to saukval-

ley.com to see a video from Friday’s cleanup in rural Ashton.

ASHTON CONTINUED ON A8

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TORNADO TOUCHDOWNS | LEE AND OGLE COUNTIES

Chris Johnson/cxjohnson@shawnews.comOgle County Sheriff Brian VanVickle (left) addresses the media Friday afternoon with James Joseph (cen-ter), director of the Illinois Emergency Management Agency, and Gov. Bruce Rauner during a news con-ference in Flagg Center, northwest of Rochelle.

Rauner’s first stop in Ogle County was at com-mand headquarters at the Flagg Center fire sta-tion, accessible only to emergency personnel. His three-vehicle cara-van then took Rauner to Rochelle High School, where he visited with Red Cross volunteers and resi-dents impacted by torna-do damage.

“We activated the state emergency response cen-ter yesterday to track the storms,” Rauner said dur-ing a news conference that was covered by CNN, TV stations from Chi-cago and Rockford, and a number of other media outlets.

“I signed a proclamation that allows us, if we need to, to visit federal gov-ernment about federal support. It will also allow us to strengthen the pro-curement process, so we can fund private resourc-es to help families.”

Rauner declared Ogle and DeKalb counties state disaster areas. That makes available a variety of state resources that will aid in recovery efforts.

Both Rauner and James Joseph, Illinois Emergen-cy Management direc-tor, praised Ogle County Sheriff Brian VanVickle for working around the clock despite losing his own home in Thursday’s storm.

Those three men stood together during the news conference.

When asked about his

emotional state, VanVick-le said, “I know it’s hard to believe, but I love my job.”

VanVickle praised the help his staff has been receiving, including 150 officers from other departments who were on hand Thursday night. He reported that 30 homes in the Rochelle area had been destroyed.

U.S. Sen. Mark Kirk, still recovering from a stroke in 2012 and using a cane to walk, also traveled to Flagg Center and prom-ised to give Rauner every-thing needed for victims of the storms.

Shortly before Rauner’s arrival, two helicopters from Air One Emergency Response Coalition land-ed on a vacant lot across from the church, ready to transport the governor and his staffers for any air surveillance needed.

“We plan to do fundrais-ing for the Red Cross, my wife and I,” Rauner said. “I met some of the fami-lies at the Red Cross and gave them hugs.”

Ogle County Board Chairman Kim Gouker took in the proceedings and was pleased not only with efforts of state and national officials, but with how the emergency was handled at the local level.

“Like Brian said, we’re a small community, and it’s a benefit to us,” Gouker said. “We were up and running last night. The highway department, health department, sher-iff and emergency man-agement all love their jobs.”

Governor: We plan to do fundraising for the Red Cross

RAUNERCONTINUED FROM A1

t

Photos by Angel Sierra/asierra@saukvalley.comKathy James picks up debris at her rural Ashton home Friday afternoon, a day after it was severely dam-aged by a tornado that rolled through Lee, Ogle and DeKalb counties. Kathy, her husband, Gust, and their three children huddled in the basement while the tornado went through their property.

The roof of a red barn was shredded like paper and blown out onto a nearby field; neighbors miles away still are find-ing pieces of it, Kathy said.

At the front of the prop-erty near the roadway, an electrical pole is frozen forward, leaning in the direction of the wind, and held up only by cables and wiring. Yellow insula-tion, metal shrapnel, and oddly shaped plastic tub-ing pepper fields as far as the eye can see.

Kathy braved the storm under a counter in the basement with her three kids and husband, Gust, after her sister, Gretchen, who lives in town, sent her a text message alerting her of the approaching storm and tornado warning.

Sirens aren’t heard that far out into the coun-try, she said.

“To be huddled in a basement – our kids are 3, 5, and 6 – that uncertainty was ter-rifying,” Kathy said. “We’re feeling very lucky. A few feet could have changed it all.”

Gust checked for damage after the winds died down Thursday night.

Surrounded by fam-ily that had spent most of the morning picking up and clearing debris, Kathy was grateful

that the house had been spared. The memorabil-ia was OK, she said, and the children’s toys and belongings were safe.

The family is thank-ful for the outpouring of support from fam-ily and strangers alike, said Gretchen, who had returned with two pizzas for lunch.

Another home just down the road at 2601 Gurler Road received similar treatment from the torna-do and howling winds.

Structural damage was apparent, said Erin Shaulis, who has lived there for 34 years.

She wasn’t home when the storm struck, but her

daughter-in-law and two children spent a night-marish 2 minutes tak-ing cover as the tornado screamed by, she said.

Her daughter-in-law still is distraught and emotionally shaken by Thursday’s storm, she said, tears welling up as she described the effects of the storm that can’t be measured or readily observed.

Erin, too, is thankful for the overwhelming posi-tivity she has seen come from the town.

Two trees behind the house were hit, as were a barn and shed that appeared to have been scraped from the foun-dation and destroyed; remains were discarded along the roadside and across several fields.

“It’s just stuff,” said Erin about the damage. “The community support has been unbelievable.”

‘That uncertainty was terrifying’ASHTON

CONTINUED FROM A1t

An electrical pole leans forward, held only by cables and wiring, in front of the home where Gust and Kathy James live in rural Ashton.

A8 • SV Weekend www.saukvalley.com Saturday, April 11, 2015