September 22, 2023 Today’s headlines: Federal lawmakers from Illinois are calling on their Republican colleagues to avoid a government shutdown. The Illinois State Board of Education is considering further tightening rules for restraining and isolating students in schools. The American Library Association says 2023 has been another record year for book ban attempts in the…
September 21, 2023 Today’s headlines: A local mosque is gathering funds for survivors of the devastating earthquake that hit Morocco earlier this month. Illinois U.S. Senator Dick Durbin is calling on his colleagues in Washington to pass the Credit Card Competition Act. Democratic Congressman Eric Sorensen says he and his colleagues on the House Agriculture…
September 20, 2023 Today’s headlines: On National Voter Registration Day the first Black sorority in history joined with the Champaign County Clerk’s office and League of Women Voters to get Champaign County registered to vote for next year’s election. In the wake of disturbing allegations of sexual harassment by leaders at the National Association of Realtors,…
Tuesday, September 19, 2023 Today’s headlines: Monday was supposed to be Illinois’ first day without cash bail. But judges in some counties were still setting money bonds. Despite the historic changes to cash bail, it was mostly a slow day in Metro East courthouses. Illinois passed a new law that allows Native American ancestral remains to…
Monday, September 18, 2023 Today’s headlines: Advocates for survivors of sex crimes and domestic violence are cheering the end of cash bail in Illinois on Monday. The numbers are out on a COVID-era program aimed at helping preschool through eighth-grade students learn at Decatur Public Schools. Around a hundred people met Saturday at the Urbana Free…
September 15, 2023 Today’s headlines: The Fighting Illini football team plays their first Big Ten Conference game of the season Saturday against the Penn State Nittany Lions. The Danville Symphony Orchestra is getting ready for its first season since the retirement of longtime music director Jeremy Swerling. Parents and students from Chicago Catholic schools are…
September 14, 2023 Today’s headlines: The annual Pygmalion festival returns to Champaign-Urbana next week and two winners of RuPaul’s Drag Race will be an opening act. Book bans have been growing in many states. Some Illinois experts on the subject brought the matter before the U.S. Congress. Illinois is set to eliminate cash bail in…
September 13, 2023 Today’s headlines: Teaching assistants and security officers with the Decatur School District 61 rallied on Tuesday for wages they say they can live on. Transgender Illinoisans must now seek permission to compete in high school sports. llinois’ new law meant to prevent book bans at schools and public libraries got some attention during…
Tuesday, September 12, 2023 Today’s headlines: Illinois state representative Maura Hirschauer is enlisting gun control advocates to help revive a bill targeting domestic violence. A bell from the unfinished World War Two battleship, USS Illinois, was used in Champaign, to remember those lost in the September 11th, 2001 terrorist attacks. Five workers are still hospitalized after…
Monday, September 11, 2023 Today’s headlines: Illinois Senator Tammy Duckworth is reintroducing a bill to require seat belts on school buses nationwide. An attorney nationally known for defending men accused of sexual misconduct has been hired by an Illinois State University administrator charged with assaulting a minor. An electric vehicle battery plant is opening in Kankakee…
September 8, 2023 Today’s headlines: Illinois’s two U.S. Senators are outraged over the hold on confirming and promoting members of the military and they blame one fellow Senator. More than 6 million individuals are living with Alzheimer’s in the United States and one organization is working to bring those numbers down. A royal member of a…
September 7, 2023 Today’s headlines: A lot of consumer products list ingredients that many haven’t heard of. If exposed during pregnancy – some of these chemicals could impact a child’s life. Illinois Governor J.B. Pritzker is confident the state will still be able to support vulnerable students as federal COVID relief money is exhausted next…
September 7, 2023 Today’s headlines: Named for its hundreds of labor strikes and scorching heat – the “Hot Labor Summer” is coming to a close – but the writer’s strike in Hollywood hasn’t. Arab-American groups are applauding a new Illinois law that will add a Middle Eastern or North African box under the “race” category…
Tuesday, September 5, 2023 Today’s headlines: Illinois officials plan to hold a public hearing Tuesday about controversial cuts to state-funded health insurance for low-income immigrants. As the fall semester ramps up, so too, are the cases of COVID-19, at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. The Fighting Illini football team is on the road this week…
Friday, Sept. 1, 2023 Today’s headlines: The Fighting Illini football team opens the season at Memorial Stadium this Saturday against the Toledo Rockets. New legislation aimed at bringing homelessness to “functional zero” is being implemented in Illinois – and Champaign County is no different. Illinois Secretary of State Alexi Giannoulias’s plan to cut down wait…