Cover Story
Can cops say that?
Facebook posts by two Springfield police officers last year harmed police operations and community relations. That was the conclusion of internal affairs investigations by the city police department, as well as reactions from capital city activists working to improve the relationship between law enforcement and the people they serve. In a widely reported incident last…
Bargains galore
Need a microwave? How about a coat rack or a Pottery Barn rug? Don’t delay, act today. The Abraham Lincoln Presidential Library Foundation has launched an Eviction Special sale since the public institution last week said au revoir, adios, don’t-let-the-door-hit-you to its erstwhile partner aka the Abraham Lincoln Presidential Library and Museum. Chris Wills, ALPLM…
Here’s your hat, what’s your hurry?
Even before the Abraham Lincoln Presidential Library and Museum opened in 2005, its foundation created in 2000 has acted as if it owned a place paid for by taxpayers. When executive director positions for the public institution have come open, the private foundation has paid for searches, then helped pay the chosen person’s salary. Six…
Letters to the editor 04-08-21
In the minds of mid-April gardeners, this year’s garden will be the best ever. So far there are no weeds, no bugs, no heat or drought, no mistakes or regrets. Only seeds and great plans. This could be the year to plant more community gardens, to grow a crop of new gardeners and fresh friends.…
Science calls for action on climate change
I am an atmospheric scientist and a professor at University of Illinois in Urbana-Champaign. Climate change is one of the important issues facing humanity and, as Sir David King, science adviser to two UK prime ministers, has said, it may be “the biggest challenge of all time.” It is important to realize that climate change…
Complaint poem #6
Complaint poem #6 (by Mitch Hopper with slight tweaking by Jackie Jackson) We’re at your mercy, young turks! you see us old turds as old jerks! with your buzz words throughout us nerds never doubt your language is made up of smirks. It gives us ol’ seniors the blues to see how you youngsters abuse…
Letters to the editor 04-08-21
AUTISM ADVOCATES Many families wake up one day with a diagnosis of autism they know nothing about (“Rather than light it up blue…,” April 1). They struggle to find answers and ways to help their child receive medically necessary care. They fight to get services and ensure their child is not excluded. Self-advocates (most of…
Fired CWLP worker alleges discrimination
Mayor Jim Langfelder overruled his staff and didn’t fire a water meter reader, prompting a federal civil rights lawsuit from a former meter reader who was terminated and now accuses the city of disparate treatment based on race. In his lawsuit, Andrew Dunlevy, fired in 2018 after supervisors found that he’d falsified meter readings, says…
Planting seeds, growing trees
The Arbor Day Foundation last month named Springfield a 2020 Tree City USA and granted it a Growth Award for the community’s commitment to urban forest management. More than 150 Illinois towns and cities were granted the title last year. The recognition means the capital city has a public body dedicated to trees, a tree-care…
Opioid deaths rise in Illinois
“In all my years I have never seen anything like fentanyl,” said Marnell Brown. He is the founder of a harm reduction organization focused on drug use and violence prevention in Chicago. Brown has been in recovery for nearly two decades, and said he has been working in prevention for about the same amount of…
Full speed ahead
Sangamon County Sheriff Jack Campbell says that he remains committed to bringing an armored vehicle to the sheriff’s department despite opposition from the Faith Coalition for the Common Good. “This is an important issue to me because I’m afraid the vehicle will be used against peaceful demonstrators and deaths may result,” Susan Allen, a coalition…
ISBE: This is no time to drop school aid reform
Gov. JB Pritzker has proposed no increase in funding for education for the 2022 fiscal year, which begins in July. That’s a result of increasingly limited state dollars due to the pandemic. Education dollars did not see an increase for the current fiscal year either. But education advocates and officials say more is needed. Through…
Missionaries of masa
A while ago I was cleaning out my pantry, and I found an unopened package of tortillas that I had purchased last year, at the beginning of the pandemic. My forgotten tortillas looked as good now as they did when I first bought them. This freaked me out. A food that never goes bad is…
Concrete Cowboy and Made for Love are timely, but Breath falls short
Concrete: A familiar, yet vital story Sadly, Ricky Staub’s Concrete Cowboy contains a story that’s all-too-familiar. Cole (Stranger Things’ Caleb McLaughlin) is an angry young man, always in trouble, whose mother sends to live with his father, Harp (Idris Elba), in Philadelphia. This is not a situation either of them welcome, the young man’s anger…
April music showers
Here comes a hearty and hopeful welcome to music fans everywhere. We’re still not at full force, but what a weekend we have upcoming in the Springfield music scene. Let’s keep on the sunny side, always on the sunny side, and be careful, thoughtful and safety-minded to remain on the upward climb out of…
