Opinion

In November 2003 I became the city of Springfield’s first (and so far, only) education liaison, a cabinet-level position reporting directly to Mayor Tim Davlin, who by his selection of me fulfilled a popular campaign promise. I created the office using resources from the National League of Cities’ Mayors’ Education Policy Advisors Network. This is […]

An Illinois Environmental Protection Agency hearing for EmberClear’s natural gas plant air permit was held Nov. 17 in Pawnee. It was unusually warm that evening for mid-November, with one side of the auditorium packed with union workers, opposite a smaller group objecting to the permit. EmberClear’s project is now called Lincoln Land Energy Center. EmberClear […]

I was born and raised in Springfield, as were my parents, and their parents before them. I know and love Springfield more than anything and have worked with various community organizations to make our city a more equitable, and overall better, place for people to live – and stay. As an urban studies student at […]

It was called the “Great War” and the “war to end all wars.” Unfortunately for mankind, there were even greater, and more deadly, wars to come. Though overshadowed today by the Second World War, the effects of the first world conflict defined the remainder of the twentieth century. The war ostensibly began when Austrian Archduke […]

Should residents be allowed to have chickens within city limits? Should the city-owned hospital be sold? What programs should the school district cut to have a balanced budget? How should students be allowed to dress in school? Every city council or school board has issues large and small that impact the lives of the people […]

Carleen Hinkle worked as a registered nurse at Memorial Medical Center in Springfield for 22 years, including many years in the intensive care unit and two years as a CVICU (cardiovascular intensive care unit) nurse manager. She left MMC and worked as a travel nurse in Chicago from April to July 2020 in the beginning […]

I’ve been thinking a lot recently about what it means to be an American, to have a shared stake in this country and its fortunes. In some ways, I suppose the question is unanswerable: We are a vast, diverse country, and we each answer the question in our own way. Yet I also think there […]

During the early days of the pandemic, we all seemed to come together. Distantly, anyway. We stayed home to save lives. We taped up hearts and praised essential workers. Now – all these months later – many say they have never seen the country more divided. In Sangamon County alone, more than 270 people have […]

“Weary,” “Tired of it all,” “Over it,” are phrases that we all hear due to the pandemic and its constantly moving parameters. Changes have occurred in work settings, school participation, and social interaction due to the coronavirus disease (COVID-19) pandemic, and these adjustments have resulted in high levels of stress. The extended nature of the pandemic […]