News Local/State
Voters on April 4 elected the first African-American to serve on the board of Parkland College in Champaign. In addition, trustee-elect Rochelle Harden is also a member of the Parkland faculty, a position that brings legal questions along with it.
News Local/State
Urbana Mayor Laurel Prussing hopes the latest changes in a proposed redevelopment contract for a downtown hotel will win over more city council members. Council members are to take a preliminary vote Monday on whether to continue talks with developer Dionis Rodriguez on renovating and reopening the Urbana Landmark Hotel.
News Local/State
The Illinois General Assembly has sent legislation to Gov. Bruce Rauner that would prohibit further privatization of health care workers in state prisons. Lawmakers sent the measure to Rauner Friday. It won House approval a day earlier 68-42.
News Local/State
Zeshan Bagewadi's new album, Vetted, sounds a lot like classic American funk and soul from the 1960s and '70s. The difference? He sometimes sings in Punjabi. Bagewadi was born in Chicago to parents who were Indian Muslim immigrants, and he learned about soul, funk and blues from his father's music collection.
News Local/State
University of Illinois students living in the US without legal authorization talked about how their status keeps them from reaching their full potential at a campus rally Friday. I-CAUSE, or the Illinois Coalition Assisting Undocumented Students' Education, held the second annual 'Coming Out of the Shadows' event on the U of I campus quad. The group also provides training to other students and faculty on how to become advocates.
News Local/State
Judge Neil Gorsuch was confirmed Friday as the 113th justice to serve on the nation's highest court. In a largely party-line vote, Gorsuch received the support of 54 senators.
News Local/State
More than 2.5 million Americans who would have been covered by Medicaid expansion were left uninsured in the 19 mostly-Republican states that rejected it. Now, following the GOP’s failure to repeal the Affordable Care Act, some of those states are revisiting the decision.
News Local/State
Democrats in the Illinois House of Representatives Thursday passed a plan to send more than $800 million to human services and universities. They call it a “lifeline” for programs facing catastrophe.
News Local/State
Updated 8:37pm: President Trump has launched airstrikes in Syria in response to deadly chemical attacks allegedly ordered by the country's president, Bashar Assad, against his own people.
"Tonight I ordered a targeted military strike on the airfield in Syria from where the chemical attack was launched," the president announced from his Mar-a-Lago resort in Palm Beach, Fla, where he is meeting with Chinese President Xi Jinping. "It is in this vital national security interest of the United States to prevent and deter the spread and use of deadly chemical weapons."
News Local/State
“I don’t like to sling mud,” a young Urbana city council member named Lloyd Carter, jr. told the Champaign-Urbana Courier in 1971. “I think we could get more done if we work together”.
Carter, one of Champaign-Urbana’s first African-American elected officials, died Wednesday at the age of 86, one year after leaving public office.
