Caterpillar maintains cash dividend

Caterpillar Inc. announced Wednesday that it will maintain its quarterly cash dividend at 77 cents per share of common stock.

The company’s board of directors voted to maintain the dividend during its quarterly meeting in Peoria. The dividend will be payable Nov. 20 to stockholders of record at the close of business on Oct. 26.

The decision comes just three weeks after Caterpillar announced on Sept. 24 that plans to cut its global workforce by 10,000 people by the end of 2018, with nearly half of that being salaried and management personnel by the end of this year. The company made voluntary buyout offers to many of those personnel but has not said how many will accept.

The cuts will come on top of the 31,000 jobs the company has already trimmed since 2012 because of difficult economic conditions in parts of the world of the world where it does business and in some of its businesses, particularly in the mining industry.

Caterpillar said it also will consolidate some of its businesses and close up to 20 facilities worldwide.

Chairman and CEO Doug Oberhelman alluded to the difficulties in a statement accompanying the announcement on Wednesday.

"I am pleased to announce we are maintaining Caterpillar's dividend. Even in this challenging environment, where we are aggressively moving to reduce our cost structure to match our current business outlook, we remain committed to rewarding stockholders through the cycles. As evidence of this commitment, we have returned $3.3 billion in capital to stockholders through dividends and stock repurchases to date in 2015," Oberhelman said.

Including this announcement, Caterpillar has paid higher dividends to its stockholders for 22 consecutive years, and since 2007, the company's cash dividend has more than doubled. Caterpillar has paid a cash dividend every year since the company was formed and has paid a quarterly dividend since 1933.

Caterpillar is scheduled to release its third quarter financial report on Thursday, Oct. 22.

Caterpillar stock rose more than $1.50 in early trading on the New York Stock Exchange on Wednesday after the dividend announcement before settling back to close at $70.71 a share, up 54 cents. The stock has been mostly rising since shortly after the Sept. 24 announcement; it hit its 52-week low of $62.99 on Sept. 28. 

Playboy to undergo changes; no more nudes

Playboy Enterprises, Inc., announced Tuesday that, following last summer's highly successful relaunch of Playboy.com as a safe-for-work site, it is taking the next step in its brand evolution by making transformative changes to its flagship property,Playboymagazine. 

Playboy'seditorial team is in the midst of a top-to-bottom redesign that will be unveiled with the magazine's March 2016issue. The reimaginedPlayboymagazine will include a completely modern editorial and design approach, and, for the first time in its history, will no longer feature nudity in its pages. Playboywill continue to publish sexy, seductive pictorials of the world's most beautiful women, including its iconic Playmates, all shot by some of today's most renowned photographers. The magazine will also remain committed to its award-winning mix of long-form journalism, interviews and fiction.

"The political and sexual climate of 1953, the yearHugh HefnerintroducedPlayboyto the world, bears almost no resemblance to today," said Playboy Enterprises CEOScott Flanders. "We are more free to express ourselves politically, sexually and culturally today, and that's in large part thanks to Hef's heroic mission to expand those freedoms. We will stay true to those core values with this new vision ofPlayboy's future. Once our readers see all of the innovative changes we're making to the magazine, we're confident they will love the end product when it debuts next year."

The transformation ofPlayboymagazine is being led by the company's Chief Content Officer,Cory Jones, the creative force behind Playboy.com's relaunch; Editorial DirectorJason Buhrmester; Creative DirectorMac Lewis; andNeville Wakefield, a pastPlayboycreative contributor and "the art world's go-to guy," as described byTheNew York Times.

As part of the redesign, the magazine will feature a larger size (an increase to 9" x 11") and will be printed on heavier, higher quality paper to give the magazine a more collectible feel. More details aboutPlayboy's redesign will be announced in the coming months.

With its website, mobile app, massive social media fan base and magazine, Playboy reaches more people now than ever before in its 62 year history. Relaunched in August of 2014 as a safe-for-work site, Playboy.com immediately experienced explosive growth in its audience, averaging a 400 percent increase in monthly unique visitors. In addition, the median age of the site's visitors shrank from 47 to 30 years of age, an attractive demographic for advertisers. About a third of all visitors to Playboy.com return to the site every day.

A Literarea Review: Almost Anywhere: Road Trip Ruminations on Love, Nature, National Parks, and Nonsense

Almost Anywhere: Road Trip Ruminations on Love, Nature, National Parks, and Nonsense
By Krista Schlyer
Skyhorse Publishing

While titles of books can be ambiguous, quite often the subtitles do the heavy lifting in terms of the subject of the book. In the case of Krista Schlyer’s latest book (a memoir) entitled “Almost Anywhere,” the subtitle speaks of “Love, Nature, National Parks and Nonsense.” So let’s run those down one by one.

1) Love: The author had found the love of her life, Daniel, and the two of them, along with their best friends, lived in a lovely urban setting in Washington DC. They were just starting their life together, finding careers, and settling down. But then things took an abrupt turn.

2) Nature: This book chronicles the author’s way of dealing with what life had dealt her, turning to nature—along with her two best friends, one a “grumpy, grieving introvert” and the other a “feisty dog.” She first sought nature as a refuge and then later turned to it again as a lifetime vocation as a photographer and writer.

3) National Parks: From the Acadia National Park (Maine) and Montezuma National Wildlife Reserve (NY) to the Pisgah National Forest (NC) and Gulf Island National Sea Shore (Miss) to Big Bend National Park (Tex) and Carlsbad Caverns National Park (NM), the trio visited them all over a nearly two-year period (the number was well over a dozen national parks when I stopped counting).

4) Nonsense: While this book is poignant, heartrending and downright “heavy” at times, it’s also funny and silly in parts as these city dwellers (who already were nature lovers) explored many of America’s national parks and less-traveled lands—and had some unusual and harrowing experiences along the way.

But enough about the subtitle and whatever it was I was trying to do in the last few paragraphs; Schlyer is an award-winning conservation photographer and writer (note of disclosure: she’s also a childhood friend of this writer). But before she snapped her first professional shot or published her first book, she sold nearly everything she owned, bought a station wagon and headed out into the Great American Wild with her two best friends, Bill (the introvert) and Maggie (the feisty creature).

The reason for the journey was not just to escape from the urban morass in which they found themselves, but to find a way to heal from a great loss—the death of Daniel, the love of Krista’s life and Bill’s best friend.

The trio set off in August of 2000 to “find some distance from the turmoil of the human world and gain some connection to the world of nature.” And for nearly two years Krista, Bill and Maggie took themselves off the grid and headed out “on the road.”

I put those last three words in quotes for a reason: quite often when reading “Almost Anywhere” it sorta, kinda felt like I was reading a plausible sequel to Kerouac’s “On The Road” where Dean has died and Sal and Mary Lou (plus a dog) have set off to see America and find a way to heal. That’s about the only correlation between the two books, but it kept creeping into my mind as I read (and re-read) this memoir.

Their starting point is Michigan. From there the trio headed east to Buffalo to visit Daniel’s mother before travelling down the coast all the way to the Florida Keys then making a hard-right turn across Texas and Arizona (to visit Krista’s mother and grandmother) and California, before making another hard right and travelling up the left coast to Oregon (even visiting Mt. Hood, where Kerouac served as a fire lookout which he wrote about in “The Dharma Bums”).

The final leg of their exhausting (and healing) journey takes them through Wyoming and South Dakota before concluding their 20-month trip in Chicago, quite nearly where they started.

Over that time, they visited dozens of national parks, forests and wildlife refuges—to say it was an epic American road trip (see: Kerouac) is the understatement of the year.

While reading  “Almost Anywhere” you are engulfed by the emotions—and there are lots of ‘em—the real-life characters are going through. At the same time Schlyer deftly paints a picture of their travels, while giving you a steady dose of natural history along the way. The book is alternately sad and funny, heartbreaking and heart-warming, depressing and exhilarating—sometimes all in the same chapter.

In the end, there’s kind of a dichotomy to “Almost Anywhere.” At once, it’s a thoughtful memoir and a perfect book for anyone who has experienced tremendous loss. And yet at the same time it’s also a perfect book for anyone who loves road trip stories and reading about America’s natural wonders. And it’s that dichotomy (along with Schlyer’s natural writing style) that makes "Almost Anywhere" a great read for almost anyone.

Rauner, Democrats continue war of words

By Mark Fitton

Illinois News Network

SPRINGFIELD — The war of words over the lack of a state budget and Gov. Bruce Rauner’s “Turnaround Agenda” continued this week, though the statehouse remained largely quiet with lawmakers not scheduled to return until Oct. 20.

In a speech Wednesday and a follow-up statement on Thursday, Rauner’s message was that restrictions on collective bargaining for public employees — one of his top agenda items — aren’t that unusual and, in fact, have been previously backed by Democrats.

Democrats responded the governor might want to check the outcomes of his examples and noted those pieces of legislation were of far more limited scope than Rauner’s proposals.

“Many Democrats, including the House speaker and House majority leader as well as the Senate president and Senate majority leader, have voted in recent years to limit and remove collective bargaining requirements in an effort to save taxpayers money,” Rauner spokesman Lance Trover said in an emailed statement Thursday.

““Twice in the last four years, Illinois Democrats voted to reform collective bargaining, but now they are hiding behind it to try to force spending higher and raise taxes on the people of Illinois. The notion that collective bargaining is sacrosanct to the Democratic Party is nothing more than political gamesmanship to protect the status quo and hurt taxpayers,” Trover wrote.

Following on the governor’s speech to a business group in the Chicago suburbs, the first-term Republican’s administration cited the Pension Reform Act of 2013 and the Labor Reform Act of 2011, which drew more than 70 Democratic votes in the General Assembly, according to the governor’s office.

Democrats say those were limited-purpose bills that ultimately did not turn out as well as anyone would have liked.

“It’s pretty amazing the two bills they cite were the pension reform that was found unconstitutional  and a school reform bill aimed primarily at Chicago that ended up in a strike -- so, two pretty embarrassing examples by the governor,” said Steve Brown, spokesman for House Speaker Michael Madigan, D-Chicago.

“Again, as the speaker points out, we need to focus on the budget,” Brown said. “We need to recognize that all the disruptions we see in these recent days are the governor’s failure to put appropriation bills in place. We could avoid all this disruption,” Brown said. “Let’s focus on the budget.’”

Senate Democrats struck a similar chord, indicating they want the governor back at the table to talk about the lack of a fiscal year 2016 budget, which is more than three months overdue.

“The governor’s office is going out of their way to remind us all of the Senate (John) President’s leadership and ability to negotiate with unions and advance meaningful compromises,” said Cullerton, D-Chicago, spokeswoman Rikeesha Phelon. “The governor’s office should do the same.”

Federal indictment

Barbara Byrd-Bennett, the former chief executive of the Chicago Public Schools system, has been indicted nearly two dozen counts alleging corruption.

Zachary Fardon, U.S. States Attorney for the Northern District of Illinois, said the 23-count indictment alleges Byrd-Bennett used her position to award lucrative no-bid contracts to her former employers in exchange for bribes and kickbacks.

She is accused of steering no-bid contracts worth more than $23 million to The Supes Academy LLC and Synesi Associates LLC in exchange for promises of hundreds of thousands of dollars.

The companies agreed to conceal the kickback money by funneling it into accounts set up in the names of two of Byrd-Bennett’s relatives, according to the indictment.

Byrd-Bennett, who is also the former head of Cleveland schools system, is to be arraigned  Tuesday in Chicago.

Medical marijuana

A state advisory board has recommended eight conditions be added to the list of diseases and conditions eligible for the state’s medical marijuana pilot program.

There are currently 39 qualifying illnesses. The Medical Cannabis Advisory Board recommends adding chronic pain due to trauma, chronic pain syndrome, chronic postoperative pain, intractable pain, osteoarthritis, irritable bowel syndrome, autism, and post-traumatic stress disorder.

The approval of the state’s director of public health, Dr. Nirav Shah, would be needed to put those conditions on the pilot program list.

The Rauner administration has been reluctant to expand the list of conditions, saying the widening the list of conditions before medical marijuana begins to be dispensed would be premature. Shah last month declined a list of 11 conditions from the panel, and the governor vetoed a legislative attempt to add PTSD to the list.

State-approved dispensaries are expected to begin operating later this month or early next.

Parole board

The state’s 15-member Prisoner Review Board member is two members light after Rauner’s decision to remove one member and accept the resignation of another.

The governor on Oct. 2 removed Eric Gregg of Harrisburg from the board and announced he’d accepted the resignation of Adam Monreal of Chicago.

The governor’s office opened its own investigations of both after extensive reporting by the Belleville News-Democrat regarding questionable information on the men’s bankruptcy filings, as well as indications of outside employment, which is forbidden for members of the review board.

Members of the review board receive a state salary of about $86,000.

— Illinois News Network journalist Greg Bishop contributed to this report.