The Associated Press

View Mean Center of U.S. Population 2010 in a larger map

It's official: The new center of the U.S. population is in Missouri, about 2.7 miles northeast of the village of Plato (see above for location).

The Census Bureau said Thursday that steady migration to the Sun Belt had pushed the site roughly 30 miles southwest of the previous location near Edgar Springs, Mo.

It is the fourth Missouri town to hold the distinction. Plato, located in Texas County, had a 2010 population of 109 people.

Illinois tax collectors have a message for residents who skirt sales taxes online and out of state: Start paying up.

The cash-strapped state will step up enforcement this year of the decades-old "use tax," which applies to many items bought online or in another state.

The state offers a guide to taxpayers who didn't keep receipts and want to pay their share. Someone making $50,000 annually, for example, would be expected to pay $27 in "use tax."

U.S. Sen. Claire McCaskill could owe a total of nearly $320,000 in overdue property taxes, interest and penalties on an airplane that has caused her political headaches.

McCaskill sent about $287,000 to St. Louis County earlier this week after acknowledging that property taxes had not been paid on a plane owned by a company in which she and her husband have an interest. But that may not be enough money.

The Occupational Safety and Health Administration is citing an Anheuser-Busch InBev can plant subsidiary in suburban St. Louis for several violations after two accidents in which employees suffered amputations.

OSHA said Wednesday that one worker at Metal Container Corp. in Arnold lost fingers in machinery. A second lost a foot in a forklift accident.

The family of a child allegedly molested by a drunken guest at the Ritz-Carlton Hotel in suburban St. Louis is suing the hotel.

The St. Louis Post-Dispatch reports the suit was filed Tuesday.