Adrian Palmer takes pride in his modest, immaculate apartment. “I live a clean, peaceful life,” the 59-year-old Chicago native said. After years of living on the streets of Chicago and Freeport, depending on girlfriends’ homes in northern Illinois for shelter and completing several stints in prison, Palmer credits a Springfield social service agency for helping […]
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Firestorm of fear
The leader of the Springfield YMCA says the longtime nonprofit won’t exclude transgender people from gender-specific locker rooms despite a nationally publicized and conservative-fueled firestorm over a 16-year-old swimmer’s protest and her family’s decision to leave the Y. “We are not planning to make any noticeable changes,” YMCA Chief Executive Officer Angie Sowle told Illinois […]
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Bringing health care to community gardens
When Kaye Barnes and her coworkers in purple T-shirts hand out free produce as they walk around a neighborhood on Springfield’s east side, residents are thankful but also taken aback that these strangers care about them. “They are sort of stunned, shocked and literally surprised,” said Barnes, a community health worker in the Access to […]
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Court rules against man filing serial lawsuits
A 32-year-old Springfield man identified by authorities as an anti-government “sovereign citizen” lost his appeal to overturn a lower-court decision Sangamon County prosecutors obtained in 2022 to stop his alleged harassment of them. The unanimous May 2 decision from a three-member panel of Illinois Appellate Court judges dismissing Derick L. Turner’s appeal affirmed an Aug. […]
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A pause on the pipeline
A Sangamon County Board committee’s recommendation April 20 to continue a moratorium on construction of the proposed Navigator Heartland Greenway carbon-dioxide pipeline is the latest of numerous efforts by elected county and state officials to balance safety and economic development. “Until we have all the evidence, I can’t vote for any of this at all,” […]
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Tuitions costs climb as Illinois disinvests in public colleges
As university faculties around Illinois strike for better pay and working conditions, budget analysts have found that state spending on higher education has fallen dramatically over the past 20 years. When adjusted for inflation, state spending on higher education fell 46 percent between 2000 and 2023, according to a new research report from the left-leaning […]
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Woman with disabilities criticizes group home for bad care
Amber Williams says a few things would improve her quality of life despite the cerebral palsy affecting her arms and legs. “Being able to use the bathroom and the toilet” is one of those things. Another is “getting basic needs met” by people paid by the Springfield group home where she lived the past year […]
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Emergency workers face murder charges
Family members of a 35-year-old Springfield man who died in December say they were glad two emergency medical service workers were charged with his murder after the pair allegedly put the man face-down on a stretcher and applied straps so tightly that he suffocated. “They were professionally trained to avoid situations like that,” Aaron Cutler, […]
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Deputy in trouble again
A Sangamon County sheriff’s deputy who has cost taxpayers a six-figure settlement is back in court. This time, Deputy Travis Koester and the county are being sued by Billie W. Greer, a retired Illinois Department of Corrections administrator whom Koester detained and handcuffed last February. According to her lawsuit and an internal affairs investigation, Koester […]
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County backs new $5 million homeless shelter
Helping Hands of Springfield’s emergency and transitional shelter would move from its current downtown location to a larger site more than three miles away through a proposed partnership with Sangamon County government that both Helping Hands and county officials view as a step forward in reducing homelessness. Vacant space at the county’s complex at 2201 […]
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Driving while Black
As Billie Dent drove her Dodge Charger down East Cook Street in Springfield three weeks ago at dusk, she saw a police car do a U-turn behind her. The Virden woman checked her speedometer, but she wasn’t speeding. Her Dodge Charger was souped up with fancy wheel rims and a custom paint job. But she […]
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Changes coming to Lincoln Library
Summer Beck-Griffith’s five-year plan for Lincoln Library is ambitious. It includes replacing all 67 of the library’s public computers, which she said are “incredibly outdated,” displaying exterior murals by local artists, starting up a digital content-creator studio, modernizing the building’s internet infrastructure, launching a bookmobile and renovating the youth-services department. Beck-Griffith, who became acting director […]
