The city of Springfield has targeted May 6 as the start of work for converting traffic on a 1.6-mile stretch of Fourth Street from one-way to two-way traffic.
That will include the setup of temporary barricades to close one lane of Fourth Street from South Grand Avenue to Dodge Street, said T.J. Heavisides, the city's chief traffic engineer.
Traffic signals have already been in place, he said.
The prep work will also include restriping the street with new yellow lines, minor striping at intersections and changes in signage.
Adams Street from Sixth Street to Ninth Street will also be converted to two-way.
The work schedule is dependent on the weather, Heavisides said.
It is set to wrap up May 10, but he added that the city won't remove barriers until the signals are operative and the signage is complete.
Another change on Adams Street is that there will be reverse angle parking only on the south side of the street.
More:Mastermind of Kayport Package Express in Springfield found dead in New York City
More:One way or another: Major changes could be coming to Fourth, Adams streets
That means, Heavisides said, vehicles' doors and trunks will open to the sidewalks.
It is also designed to increase parking efficiency and reduce the risk of accidents when entering and exiting parking spaces.
The cost of the project is $4.6 million and is being coordinated by Egizii Electric. The funding comes from Rebuild Illinois through the increase of the state motor fuel tax.
Contact Steven Spearie: 217-622-1788; sspearie@sj-r.com; X, twitter.com /@StevenSpearie.
Campus police confront demonstrators.
Score improved from two years ago.PEORIA, Ill. (WMBD) -- The CEO and president of Friendship House in Peoria is being recognized by the governor for his work in the community.
Marcellus Sommerville will accept the 'Governor's Volunteer Service Award' at a ceremony on Thursday in Chicago.
"It's an honor, honestly, and it means a lot to be seen in that space and be recognized for all the good effort Peoria Friendship House does," he said.
While he is looking forward to being recognized by the governor, Sommerville said most of the credit should go to the Friendship House staff.
"It's something that was unexpected, but at the same time I always put onus on the families we serve and the community, and just my staff. I have the best staff in Peoria in terms of what we do and how we impact lives so its nice to be recognized for that," he said.
Sommerville was selected out of more than 90 nominees for the award.
image/png sommerville.png?w=900
ANDERSONVILLE — Women & Children First bookstore had its pro-Palestine window display vandalized Wednesday, and the bookstore is using the opportunity to make its support for Palestine more explicit.
Early Wednesday morning, somebody smashed a window where a Palestinian flag was on display at Women & Children First, 5233 N. Clark St., co-owner Sarah Hollenbeck said. Hollenback and co-owner Lynn Mooney rushed to the store after receiving alerts from its security system and arrived to see one of its windows shattered and police on the scene.
The popular feminist bookstore now plans to decorate the boarded-up window with a mural for Palestine to “make something beautiful out of something very ugly,” Sarah Hollenbeck said. The store put out a call seeking Palestinian artists for the planned artwork.
“We believe that all liberation struggles are connected, and we’re not going to turn our backs on this cause because we’ve experienced this act of violence,” Hollenbeck said. “We believe the systemic oppression of Palestinian people should not be normalized the way it has been for decades.”
Somebody smashed the window about 5:45 a.m. Wednesday morning, but nothing was stolen from the store, according to the Police Department. It appears someone used an object to hit the sign in the window, which called for a ceasefire in Gaza, Hollenbeck said.
“The window wasn’t just cracked or splintered; it was intentionally bashed in entirely,” Hollenbeck said. “It was obvious this was a targeted action by someone who was upset about the Palestinian flag in our window.”
Other flags displayed in the windows of Women & Children First, like the LGBTQ+ pride flag and disability justice flag, were left untouched. The bookstore routinely advocates for social justice causes and plans to add a pro-trans mural to its building in honor of late activist Elise Malary.
The bookstore’s staff collectively decided to hang the Palestinian flag in the window after multiple Jewish employees suggested showing public support for a ceasefire, Hollenbeck said.
“As an intersectional feminist bookstore, our role, in our events and curation and politics, has always been to center voices that have been silenced, marginalized and otherwise oppressed,” Hollenbeck said. “Our support of the Palestinian people is an extension of that.”
The vandalism was not surprising, Hollenbeck said. Since hanging the Palestinian flag, the booksellers have experienced an “uptick in harassment and challenging conversations” with people who are upset the bookstore is showing solidarity with Palestinians.
“Some of the conversations only become hostile, but some bear good fruit and progress toward a better understanding,” Hollenbeck said.
Raven Stubbs, a manager at Women & Children First, helped clean up the broken glass Wednesday morning. As a Jewish person, Stubbs advocated for Women & Children First to hang the Palestinian flag in the window and has defended the decision to customers who have vocally disagreed with the bookstore’s stance.
“The flag is a way to acknowledge the oppression Palestinian people are experiencing,” Stubbs said. “We’re talking about people who are being literally exterminated. As someone who is Jewish, that’s not what we believe in. In fact, it’s the complete opposite.”
Women & Children First experienced an outpouring of community support Wednesday after people learned its window had been smashed, Hollenbeck said.
“We’re so grateful to the people who’ve expressed their love and support, but this isn’t about us,” Hollenbeck said. “I would just encourage people to learn more about Palestine and consider why, as a feminist bookstore, we’re called to this issue and why we’ve decided to be vocal in this way.”
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By ANDREW ADAMS
Capitol News Illinois
aadams@capitolnewsillinois.com
Tackling homelessness requires addressing racial injustice, according to a new report commissioned by the state’s Office to Prevent and End Homelessness.
The report found that Black people are eight times more likely to experience homelessness than white people. Remedying this disparity, according to the report, would require “long-term strategies that dismantle systemic barriers contributing to racial inequities in homelessness such as ending the mass incarceration of Black people.”
“When we think about the harms of racial segregation and red lining, we can draw a line to the realities of homelessness,” Christine Haley, the state’s chief homelessness officer, said in a news release.
The report, produced by the Institute for Research on Race and Public Policy at the University of Illinois Chicago, forms the basis of a new “action plan” from the governor, whose “Home Illinois” plan aimed at ending homelessness launched in 2022.
In his budget proposal for the upcoming fiscal year 2025, Pritzker proposed $250 million for the state’s homelessness prevention initiatives, a $50 million increase over the current fiscal year.
The additional money would be used to provide housing assistance, legal aid and to initiate pilot programs aimed at addressing racial disparities within the homeless population.
The “unified, whole of government approach” is set to embed state officials responsible for helping homeless individuals in at least five state departments, including the Department of Corrections and the Department of Children and Family Services.
“Homelessness is not an issue of personal failing, but of historical discrimination and structural barriers that have driven inequality for Black families across the nation and of course right here in Illinois,” Pritzker said.
Illinois had about 9,000 people experiencing homelessness on a given night in 2022, according to the latest data from the National Alliance to End Homelessness. Rates of homelessness are highest in the Chicago area and around Springfield.
Homelessness in the state has fallen by 41 percent since 2007, according to NAEH data. Most homeless people in Illinois, about 79 percent, were in shelters or other temporary accommodations in 2022.
Air quality report
Illinois’ air quality received mixed grades from the American Lung Association’s annual “State of the Air” report released this week.
While some counties in central and southern Illinois had low levels of pollution, areas in Chicagoland are some of the most polluted in the nation. The Chicago metropolitan area, according to the report, has the 17th highest level of ozone pollution of all cities in the nation.
Ozone is a product of vehicle exhaust and industrial pollution, and the pollutant can aggravate lung disease, increase the frequency of asthma attacks and make breathing difficult, according to the federal Environmental Protection Agency.
The Chicago area was also ranked the 22nd most polluted city for year-round particle pollution, which results from construction, industrial waste, car exhaust and other sources.
“In the 25 years that the American Lung Association has been doing our ‘State of the Air’ report, we have seen incredible improvement in our nation’s air quality.” Kristina Hamilton, advocacy director at the ALA, said in a news release. “Unfortunately, more than 131 million people still live in places with unhealthy levels of air pollution, and Chicago is listed as one of the worst places for ozone and particle pollution, which disproportionately impacts low-income communities and communities of color.”
Downstate communities had generally cleaner air. While data on ozone pollution is only available for 23 Illinois counties, Adams, Effingham and Jo Daviess counties all received an “A” grade from the lung group for having zero days last year with high ozone pollution levels. For the 17 counties with data on particle pollution, seven received an “A” grade, including DuPage and McHenry counties in Chicagoland.
The Springfield area’s air quality worsened this year compared to last year, when Sangamon County was ranked among the cleanest in the nation. It fell to a “C” grade for ozone and “B” grade for particle pollution, based on the number of days with high levels of each pollutant in the air.
Capitol News Illinois is a nonprofit, nonpartisan news service covering state government. It is distributed to hundreds of newspapers, radio and TV stations statewide. It is funded primarily by the Illinois Press Foundation and the Robert R. McCormick Foundation, along with major contributions from the Illinois Broadcasters Foundation and Southern Illinois Editorial Association.
MATTOON — Students at CHS Industries and Mattoon LIFT are getting educations in a variety of trades, and many of them also have been developing their public speaking skills in the process.
They put those skills into practice on Thursday as they gave presentations about their vocational programs to State Superintendent Tony Sanders during his site tours there, as well to as other visiting officials.
Mattoon High School senior Brodie Rentfro, who is enrolled in the Leadership Institute at LIFT, was among those leading presentations. Rentfro said he enrolled as someone who was shy and stammered while speaking. He said his experiences there, including job shadowing at the Coles County Courthouse, have since given him confidence and the desire to become a prosecutor.
"LIFT has put my life in focus and helped pave the road for me," Rentfro said of this regional high school vocational training program, located in a renovated downtown office building.
The students spoke to Sanders, Illinois State Board of Education members, Regional Superintendent of Schools Kyle Thompson, state Rep. Chapin Rose, R-Mahomet, and local business and government leaders. The LIFT tour group also included Sean Covey and other representatives of the FranklinCovey coaching company, from which the Leadership Institute there draws its curriculum.
State Superintendent Tony Sanders, second from the right, and FranklinCovey CEO Paul Walker speak with culinary arts students on Thursday while touring the Mattoon LIFT regional high school vocational training center. The students are Dante England, Bethany Pinnell, Logan Fitt and Ethan Freeman, all from Mattoon.
Thompson said that Sanders, who was previously superintendent of School District U-46 in Elgin, has made it a priority to try to visit a different school district every week since he was named as state superintendent in January 2023.
"His accessibility is fantastic," Thompson said.
During his visit to Charleston High School, Thompson met with CHS Industries vocational program students working in the Trojan Brew coffee shop and the Trojan Design center in the newly renovated 400 classroom section on the north side of the building.
Students in the adjacent Trojan A & M Center also spoke with Thompson. This expanded facility houses agriculture, construction, small engine mechanics, and other trades classroom and workshop spaces, plus a greenhouse.
"Thanks for letting the students lead the conversations. They did a great job," Thompson said afterward while speaking with administrators and teachers.
Senior Parker Pounds and junior Kaylin Nolte, who are interns in the Trojan A & M Center, gave presentations there. Nolte, who plans to major in an agriculture science-related field, said she loves studying and working at this center, particularly interacting with customers at the annual plant sale there.
Regional Superintendent of Schools Kyle Thompson, at left, and State Superintendent Tony Sanders speaks with Charleston High School junior Kaylin Nolte on Thursday in the small engine workshop area at the Trojan A & M Center. Nolte is serving as an intern in this facility.
Thompson said he also was impressed to hear that the Trojan A & M Center is hosting a geometry in construction class that is popular with students and is being expanded to offer a second session.
"The geometry component with the construction trades is amazing. I wish more districts would do that," Thompson said.
At Mattoon LIFT, Thompson and the other visitors met with students representing the academic programs on each of the building's seven levels. Those programs consist of childcare, communications, culinary arts, HVAC/green energy/robotics, information technology, leadership, and manufacturing/architecture/construction.
Bianca Arguelles, a senior from Arcola, and Ash Allison, a junior from Mattoon, were among the presenters in the communication studios on the lower level of LIFT. They said the classes there focus on audio/video editing, music composition/songwriting, media production and digital sound design.
Allison said the communication program's internship opportunities include one where students can help operate the sound and light systems at the Little Theatre on the Square in Sullivan. She added that, "Those are fun internships!"
Noah Noble, a junior from Mattoon who is studying communications at LIFT, also discussed how instructors there help him and other students with personal budgeting. This prompted Thompson to ask about his plans to save for a car while working at the Freddy's restaurant in Mattoon and about his long-term career plans.
"I kind of have a big aspiration to own my own restaurant someday," Noble responded, adding that he plans to enroll in the culinary program next year at LIFT.
Charleston school board member Jessica Mertz, at left, picks up a cup of coffee on Feb. 22 from Charleston High School's Trojan Brew student-run coffee shop, which is operating out of its new space adjacent to the recently renovated media center. The travel mugs at the shop were created by the Trojan Design Center.
image/jpeg capbriefs_dome_day-mRLClB.jpegMATTOON — Students at CHS Industries and Mattoon LIFT are getting educations in a variety of trades, and many of them also have been developing their public speaking skills in the process.
They put those skills into practice on Thursday as they gave presentations about their vocational programs to State Superintendent Tony Sanders during his site tours there, as well to as other visiting officials.
Mattoon High School senior Brodie Rentfro, who is enrolled in the Leadership Institute at LIFT, was among those leading presentations. Rentfro said he enrolled as someone who was shy and stammered while speaking. He said his experiences there, including job shadowing at the Coles County Courthouse, have since given him confidence and the desire to become a prosecutor.
"LIFT has put my life in focus and helped pave the road for me," Rentfro said of this regional high school vocational training program, located in a renovated downtown office building.
The students spoke to Sanders, Illinois State Board of Education members, Regional Superintendent of Schools Kyle Thompson, state Rep. Chapin Rose, R-Mahomet, and local business and government leaders. The LIFT tour group also included Sean Covey and other representatives of the FranklinCovey coaching company, from which the Leadership Institute there draws its curriculum.
State Superintendent Tony Sanders, second from the right, and FranklinCovey CEO Paul Walker speak with culinary arts students on Thursday while touring the Mattoon LIFT regional high school vocational training center. The students are Dante England, Bethany Pinnell, Logan Fitt and Ethan Freeman, all from Mattoon.
Thompson said that Sanders, who was previously superintendent of School District U-46 in Elgin, has made it a priority to try to visit a different school district every week since he was named as state superintendent in January 2023.
"His accessibility is fantastic," Thompson said.
During his visit to Charleston High School, Thompson met with CHS Industries vocational program students working in the Trojan Brew coffee shop and the Trojan Design center in the newly renovated 400 classroom section on the north side of the building.
Students in the adjacent Trojan A & M Center also spoke with Thompson. This expanded facility houses agriculture, construction, small engine mechanics, and other trades classroom and workshop spaces, plus a greenhouse.
"Thanks for letting the students lead the conversations. They did a great job," Thompson said afterward while speaking with administrators and teachers.
Senior Parker Pounds and junior Kaylin Nolte, who are interns in the Trojan A & M Center, gave presentations there. Nolte, who plans to major in an agriculture science-related field, said she loves studying and working at this center, particularly interacting with customers at the annual plant sale there.
Regional Superintendent of Schools Kyle Thompson, at left, and State Superintendent Tony Sanders speaks with Charleston High School junior Kaylin Nolte on Thursday in the small engine workshop area at the Trojan A & M Center. Nolte is serving as an intern in this facility.
Thompson said he also was impressed to hear that the Trojan A & M Center is hosting a geometry in construction class that is popular with students and is being expanded to offer a second session.
"The geometry component with the construction trades is amazing. I wish more districts would do that," Thompson said.
At Mattoon LIFT, Thompson and the other visitors met with students representing the academic programs on each of the building's seven levels. Those programs consist of childcare, communications, culinary arts, HVAC/green energy/robotics, information technology, leadership, and manufacturing/architecture/construction.
Bianca Arguelles, a senior from Arcola, and Ash Allison, a junior from Mattoon, were among the presenters in the communication studios on the lower level of LIFT. They said the classes there focus on audio/video editing, music composition/songwriting, media production and digital sound design.
Allison said the communication program's internship opportunities include one where students can help operate the sound and light systems at the Little Theatre on the Square in Sullivan. She added that, "Those are fun internships!"
Noah Noble, a junior from Mattoon who is studying communications at LIFT, also discussed how instructors there help him and other students with personal budgeting. This prompted Thompson to ask about his plans to save for a car while working at the Freddy's restaurant in Mattoon and about his long-term career plans.
"I kind of have a big aspiration to own my own restaurant someday," Noble responded, adding that he plans to enroll in the culinary program next year at LIFT.
Charleston school board member Jessica Mertz, at left, picks up a cup of coffee on Feb. 22 from Charleston High School's Trojan Brew student-run coffee shop, which is operating out of its new space adjacent to the recently renovated media center. The travel mugs at the shop were created by the Trojan Design Center.
Decriminalizing Adult Consensual Sex Work: Ensuring Safety, Rights, and Dignity
moderated by Senator Celina Villanueva
Panelists: Brian C. Johnson (Equality Illinois) and Reyna Ortiz (TaskForce / SWAG)
In light of increasing violence against sex workers, Equality Illinois and the Sex Worker Advisory Group (SWAG) have united to launch a campaign to keep adult consensual sex workers safe by decriminalizing sex work. Two-thirds of trans people killed in the past decade were sex workers and three-quarters of all sex workers will experience violence in their careers.
Join Brian C. Johnson, CEO of Equality Illinois, Reyna Ortiz, Chair of the Sex Worker Advisory Group, and Illinois State Senator Celina Villanueva to learn more about why this issue matters to many groups including those who care about bodily autonomy and the LGBTQ+ community.
April 25, 2024
