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Batavia Sun :: Business ::
Batavia Sun Business

• Cashing in on your yard to heat, cool your home
  In desperate numbness, perhaps clutching crumpled utility bills, residents fight winter and its annual wrath of snow and ice. Fueled by the often-freezing temperatures and rising costs to battle them, there are the home remedies -- plastic sealant over windows -- to help keep warm.
  
  
• Allen and Pepa Architects building in Kane
  Architect and partner Eric Pepa runs the Elgin office of Allen and Pepa. Together, the partners hope to see Kane County and the Fox River Valley develop into one of the premier regions of the country. Lane Allen's wife, Rebecca, is also a partner in the firm. She handles the communications design portion of the business.
  
  
• Next SEC boss had CBOT spat
  In picking Mary Schapiro as chairman of the Securities and Exchange Commission, President-elect Barack Obama found a nominee with a background that prepares her for leading major changes in the nation's system of market regulation. She could butt heads with the Chicago exchanges. But Schapiro's done that before and emerged unscathed.

• Union activists' message doesn't register with workers
  While placing her order at the 600 N. Clark McDonald's on Thursday afternoon, Rosa Salto was intent on educating the server about his employer. She stressed that McDonald's chief executive makes about 770 times what the cashier is making and that the corporation wanted to keep unions out of its shops.

• Feds ease credit card rules to help strapped consumers
  

  Federal regulators on Thursday adopted sweeping new rules for the credit card industry that will shield consumers from increases in interest rates on existing account balances, among other changes. The rules, which take effect in July 2010, will allow credit card companies to raise interest rates only on new credit cards and future purchases or advances, rather than on current balances.

• Delnor Hospital gives awards to top physicians
  Delnor Hospital has announced recipients of this year's Distinguished Physicians Awards. The Physician Liaison Team, which selected recipients, received nominations for 62 physicians in a variety of medical specialties.
  
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• Business Briefs: Dr. Proust earns group's award
  Art Proust, MD, FACEP, of St. Charles, recently received the International Trauma Life Support organization's 2008 ITLS Medical Director of the Year award for his commitment and outstanding efforts in medical direction of ITLS programs and leadership.
  
  
• Dem official: Obama taps Mary Schapiro to head SEC
  President-elect Barack Obama has chosen a veteran of the Securities and Exchange Commission to lead and revitalize the agency now facing growing criticism for its failure to protect investors at a time of unprecedented market turmoil. A Democratic official said Wednesday that Obama had chosen Mary Schapiro, a securities industry regulator with extensive experience in Washington, as chairwoman of the SEC. She would become the first woman to head the agency, established in the 1930s in the tumult of the Great Depression.

• Allen and Pepa Architects
  I made a dollar more than usual doing this story. And what an interesting dollar it is. Architect and professional origamist Lane Allen before my very eyes took a dollar out of his wallet and folded it into a little elephant, complete with legs, trunk and eyes. It's now displayed on my bookshelf.
• Credit card companies may adopt new rules
  Credit card companies could no longer boost interest rates on existing account balances if the Federal Reserve adopts new rules as written at a meeting set for Thursday. But as proposed, the changes also could make it harder for millions of people with bad credit to get what's known as a subprime card.

• Sears chairman's investment funds fined
  

  Investment vehicles controlled by Sears Holdings Corp. Chairman Edward S. Lampert have been ordered to pay $800,000 in civil penalties for allegedly failing to tell federal officials of plans to buy shares in auto-parts retailer AutoZone.

• Lawsuit: CN takes premature control of EJ&E
  There's a new wrinkle in the saga of Canadian National Railway Company's plan to buy the Elgin, Joliet and Eastern rail line -- one opponents of the deal hope might derail it all together. Union Pacific, the country's largest railroad, has accused CN of interfering with its track rights along the EJ&E, which runs through the western suburbs in a semicircle around Chicago.
  
  
• Radler paroled on corporate fraud conviction
  

  David Radler, the former president of Hollinger International Inc. and former publisher of the Chicago Sun-Times, has been granted parole in Canada on his corporate fraud conviction.

• Batavia Main Street
  When the weather is decent, Britta McKenna, executive director of Batavia's Main Street organization, often walks around town delivering the organization's quarterly newsletter to its 300 members.

• Could Randall Road become new urban center?
  Imagine two- and three-story buildings built right to the edge of a four-lane road with grassy medians, and an additional bus rapid transit lane to boot.

• AKF Martial Arts
  I've never been in a fist fight, I said to Craig Hutson, owner and head instructor at AKF Martial Arts Dragon Kyuki-Do. I've often wondered how I'd do. But hey, I'm not curious enough to risk getting hurt.

• batavia mayor: Business down, but city bullish
  

  BATAVIA -- "All the problems our country seems to be accruing on Wall Street have reached Wilson Street in many regards," Batavia Mayor Jeff Schielke said.

• Wall Street meets Wilson Street
  "All the problems our country seems to be accruing on Wall Street have reached Wilson Street in many regards," Batavia Mayor Jeff Schielke said. "We definitely can say that we have had some reactions."
  
  
• Long lines? Cold? Who cares? - It's time to shop
  Black Friday. For some, it's as traditional as turkey itself. And for the Kari women of Plainfield, nothing says tradition like huddling in a tent outside Best Buy in Oswego for more than 10 hours on a cold November evening.
  
  
• More Fed loans paint bleak picture of credit markets
  The Federal Reserve boosted its lending to commercial banks and investment firms over the last week, indicating that a credit crisis was still squeezing the financial system. The Fed released a report Friday saying commercial banks averaged $93.6 billion in daily borrowing for the week ending Wednesday. That was up from an average of $91.6 billion for the week ending Nov. 19.