Dean Olsen

It appears that Amazon, one of America’s Big Five technology companies, will open and operate a planned $20 million warehouse and distribution center in 2025 at North Dirksen Parkway and Bissell Road in Springfield. Sangamon County property records show Amazon bought a 31-acre site at the Springfield’s intersection’s southeast corner for $2.85 million on Nov. […]

Sean Grayson will remain in jail at least another 35 days because of a ruling Dec. 3 by the 4th District of the Illinois Appellate Court. In an unsigned order, the Springfield-based 4th District said it will give State’s Attorney John Milhiser until early January to appeal the Appellate Court’s Nov. 27 order calling on […]

As many as 70% of patients who seek care in the emergency rooms of Springfield Memorial Hospital or HSHS St. John’s Hospital could be served quicker, and at less cost, by a new outpatient facility scheduled to open in early January. That’s the view of the future co-medical directors of Springfield Clinic’s Urgent Care Plus, […]

Having a roof over his head at night when temperatures dip into the 30s is “way better” than spending the night outdoors at North Grand Avenue and North Fifth streets, Alfonso Bland says. Bland, 48, said he had been living and sleeping at a homeless encampment at the southeast corner of the Springfield intersection for […]

Dignitaries from Springfield and the state were all smiles during a recent grand reopening of Poplar Place, a formerly run-down rental housing complex for low- and moderate-income people on the city’s east side. But Katherine James, 52, a Poplar Place resident with physical disabilities, said the renovations – costing $46.5 million in funding and financing […]

Tameika Thurman says she has enjoyed living in Poplar Place the past five months with her 11-year-old daughter and their dog, Coco. “It’s peaceful. I don’t have any problems,” said Thurman, 27, a single mother and Lyft driver who was born and raised in Chicago and moved to Springfield a year ago. The lack of […]

Members of the LGBTQ+ community in central Illinois have expressed fear, bewilderment and frustration after the Nov. 5 election of Donald Trump to a second nonconsecutive term as president. About 80 people attended a “post-election support group” Nov. 7 at Phoenix Center’s Out on Second site at 120 E. Scarritt St., and many said they […]

Construction on the only overpass in Springfield’s rail improvements project is expected to commence in early 2025 after federal officials announced $157 million in final grant funds. The federal allocation, announced by U.S. Rep. Nikki Budzinski, D-Springfield, and by U.S. Sens. Dick Durbin, D-Springfield, and Tammy Duckworth, D-Hoffman Estates, also will help pay for construction […]

Creating more affordable and market-rate housing, developing areas currently set aside for surface parking and catering more to walkers and bicyclists are among scores of suggestions in a newly released master plan for downtown Springfield and the Mid-Illinois Medical District. The costs of those suggestions aren’t included in the 278-page document, the first-ever long-term plan […]