Cover Story
Double vision
Springfield School District 186 faces challenges familiar to many urban school districts. Academic achievement at district high schools lags behind state averages. Parents are voting with their feet as they choose to live outside the district or enroll kids in private schools. Segregation remains and demographic trends are ominous. During the past 15 years, white…
Breasts, Viagra and hotel sex
An investigator with the inspector general’s office for the state Department of Human Services remains on the job despite findings that he has sexually harassed employees of agencies that hold DHS contracts. According to a report released last month by the state Executive Ethics Commission, Manuel “Manny” Zepeda told three women employed by Marcfirst, a…
Teslas, SUVs – meh
I have long had an affinity for sedans. Couches on wheels, made in America, the bigger the better. My love affair with cars no one else wants began with a optioned-out 1974 Ford LTD Brougham, baby blue with navy vinyl top. Strictly speaking, it was a coupe, having two doors, but at 19 feet…
Arroyo resigns, fallout continues
The first day of the 2019 veto session on Monday, Oct. 28, was unlike any other that most people have ever seen. First, we learned that Rep. Luis Arroyo (D-Chicago) had been arrested on public corruption charges. About an hour later, federal prosecutors claimed that Arroyo had attempted to bribe a state senator, who has…
Letters to the Editor 11/7/19
ELIMINATE LIBRARY FINES We were excited to open up the Illinois Times Best of Springfield 2019 issue and see that “Eliminate library fines” was literally front and center in the issue as Best Idea (Oct. 24). It’s an idea that I have been talking about since my first interview with the city, as I had…
Editor’s note
The state of Israel is always complicated, and difficult for Americans to understand, so not much stock should be put in one visitor’s impressions from a recent two-week visit. But the election stalemate of recent weeks seems to have occasioned optimism among some voters that Israel can move beyond the divisiveness of the past 20…
Better ways to hold presidents accountable
“I ask how and why this decision was reached,” Utah Sen. Mitt Romney said in the Senate recently. He was calling for an investigation into President Trump’s decision to pull U.S. forces out of Syria. “Was there no chance for diplomacy? Are we so weak and so inept diplomatically that Turkey forced the hand of…
Clean your plate
Comfort Food Week is making a timely arrival just as the autumn air takes on a bit of a nip. These chilly days go hand-in-hand with steaming pots of bean soup, savory mashed potatoes and gravy and creamy macaroni and cheese – all the stuff that’s good for the soul – and some area…
Diggin’ in the Dirt
When singer-songwriter Tom Irwin discovered an old book of handwritten notes in his family’s farmhouse, he had no idea where it would take him. The book was a diary written in 1893 by Harry Glen Ludlam, a 16-year-old boy whose family sold the house to Irwin’s great-grandfather. The diary took Irwin back to a time…
History of a hidden neighborhood
Springfield author Kenneth C. Mitchell in The Little Village that Could – the Untold Story of Devereux Heights, calls this section of north Springfield “a rare jewel of a community.” His book showcases people and events of Devereux Heights that he says is “about as ordinary a community as there is. Every one of the…
No deal
Springfield School District 186 teachers are set to resume negotiations for a new contract after union members Monday rejected a deal that included double-digit increases in salaries for starting teachers. While wages remain a sticking point, the gulf between the union and district includes concerns about security, safety, discipline and helping disruptive and disadvantaged kids.…
DRUG TRAFFIC
When the Decatur City Council voted 6-1 in September to disallow sales of recreational marijuana within city limits, it also voted against putting the question to the people in a referendum. But knowing that people denied pot are powerful, Springfield attorney Sam Cahnman volunteered his services to help a group calling itself the Decatur Dispensary…
NAMING RIGHTS AND WRONGS
Call it the Lord Voldemort rule. Without uttering the name of Adam Lopez, disgraced former school board member, the Springfield school board on Monday approved policy changes to prevent another trainwreck that was the Adam Lopez Country Financial Basketball Tournament. While on the school board, Lopez in 2015 established the tournament at Lanphier High School,…
November cometh
I’ve heard more songs about the dark and dreary days of November than any other time on the calendar. But that shall not refrain us from enjoying these moments any old way we can, so off into the depths of forbidding November we go. First, let’s pay our respects to a recently departed musician, as…
Josh Abbott Band
These rockin’ country fellas from Lubbock, Texas, take their hometown music legacy seriously and present a raucous live show backed by strong songwriting and mighty musicianship. Headed by singer and songwriter Josh Abbott (acoustic guitar, vocals) and other founding member Austin Davis (electric banjo), while ably joined by fellow JAB cohorts Preston Wait (fiddle, electric…
Innocence Project poem #3
a woman who’d been imprisoned for 17 years for arson and murder: burning her house with her child trapped inside was freed when new arson science proved she couldn’t have done it she was pregnant when jailed the baby was given to the grandmother – under the circumstances her son was raised poorly, suffers now…
Sunchokes
I was 17 years old in 1970 when Joni Mitchell released her album Ladies of the Canyon. I’ve always found her music to be very impactful, and her early recordings are among my favorites. A line from the album’s track “Big Yellow Taxi” has always stayed with me: “Don’t it always seem to go that…
