Lawmakers seek answers to Wal-Mart straining public resources. State Rep. John Lesch, a prosecutor in St. Paul for 15 years, can recite the address from memory: 1450 University Avenue West. That’s Wal-Mart’s Midway location, a magnet for shoplifting and other…
Peoria and Washington, D.C.: 800 miles apart, one voice
Two men, 200 miles apart, two rivers, one mission
BY CLARE HOWARD Donald Hey and Bud Grieves are focused on re-establishing the ancient “flood pulse” of rivers. The flood pulse is the lifeblood of rivers, the ebb and flow of seasonal cycles of gentle floods and droughts established over…
Trump victory de-coded
News Analysis BY GEORGE HOPKINS Democracy is not for the faint-hearted. Disappointing stuff happens. Neither our Founding Fathers nor the Greeks had much use for democracy. An old Greek joke described democracy as a process by which two wolves and…
ACLU questions Heartland Clinic about religious restrictions
BY CLARE HOWARD Federally funded health care clinics cannot operate under rules that are religiously based, however, some of the lease agreements between Heartland Health Services and OSF Saint Francis Medical Center have restrictions that limit counseling and access to…
Cautious optimism following election
News Analysis: BY TERRY BIBO Scanning headlines in 2016 could make you fearful, anxious, maybe crazy — even when you weren’t looking at the presidential race. On Dec. 14, “Dow nears 20,000” and the Federal Reserve raised interest rates because…
First let me thank Clare Howard for the opportunity to present my views and perspectives in Community Word. When Clare first approached me about this opportunity, I was very reluctant and wondered if anyone would care about Ray LaHood’s point…
COUNTY AUDITOR RESIGNS Not many people, especially those holding public office, will walk away from a job paying $96,000 a year, but Carol Van Winkle did. The Peoria County Auditor, angry and frustrated with the county board, resigned from her…
As the nation prepares to cope with a Donald Trump administration that’s nominating a Ku Klux Klan sympathizer as Attorney General (Alabama Republican Sen. Jeff Sessions), it’s wise to recall recent history so that it’s not repeated – and to…
Editor’s Note: On Jan. 20, Donald J. Trump will be sworn in as the 45th president of the United States despite losing to Hillary Clinton by a margin of more than 2.5 million votes. More than half of the country…
Halt fossil fuel pipelines Thank you for the article by Bill Knight (December 2016) about fossil fuel pipelines and their presence in Illinois. I need to stress that I am speaking as an independent activist in the story, not a…
Vibrant Public Schools Hurt by For-Profit Charters By Dan Montgomery President, Illinois Federation of Teachers When Professor Ray Budde first conceived charter schools in the 1970s, he had a vision for innovative schools that could be laboratories of best practices…
Living With a Loose Cannon Welcome to a new year, my friends. We are about to have a new President. I know some people must be happy about that, but I am not one of them. If he is your…
Winter Wings Winter has finally tightened its grip on Central Illinois. Crisp air and frozen ground define the landscape that was home to warm breezes and green growth not so long ago. In the shift of the seasons, nature also…
Calendars won’t be replaced by electronic devices in my world anytime soon. I realize my preference is not universally shared, and I don’t consider myself resistant to change. But I believe firmly in the adage, “If it isn’t broken, don’t…
The motto that the “Living is best to the west of Peoria” defines what we have here in West Peoria. The recent elections proved that when the counts were done for the voter turnout from Peoria County this past November.…
When thinking of a city like Charleston or New Orleans, it’s easy to connect that city with its historic architecture. Tales are told about the lives and activities that once were touched by buildings in those communities. Part of those…
Character Matters I am still in a state of disbelief and hoping we discover that the Russians or someone did hack into computers in states and altered the vote tallies. Unfortunately, today the fact is that the 46 percent of the…
In 2008, I founded the Inland Visual Studies Center at Bradley University. The Center’s mission draws attention to the significance of Illinois and the Midwest as a critical hub of American art that has been under-identified in the broader art…