Illinois Issues

Reforms include required implicit bias training for medical professionals. Before Vallena Adkinson’s 35-year-old daughter Helen Heath died in March from complications of the autoimmune disease lupus, Adkinson spent years navigating a health care system she said treated her daughter poorly because she was Black.

A man was arrested for domestic battery and had to appear in Cook County domestic violence court. He paid his bond and was released. Then he was charged and arrested again while out on bond. Those cases were still pending when he was arrested for violating an order of protection and finally taken into custody. “The guy just bonded out over and over and over again and kept violating,” said Melanie MacBride, who is a managing attorney at the Metropolitan Family Services’ Legal Aid Society.

Eighty-two years ago, theatrical impresario Orson Welles panicked the nation with his company’s “War of the Worlds” Halloween Eve radio broadcast. That was the reported story, but the truth is more complicated.

The kids called Grayson Alexander "dyke" and "faggot." The bullying got worse when he came out as transgender the summer between eighth grade and high school. Now a senior at Loyola University in Chicago, the Springfield native says attending school was “not fun.”

The campaign over Gov. J.B. Pritzker’s proposal to impose a graduated income tax has focused mainly on who would pay higher taxes. But perhaps just as important is the question of how that money would be used.

When Prohibition became law 100 years ago, it led to bootlegging and gang warfare throughout Illinois. Its effect in Chicago is well-known, but its impact on Southern Illinois was equally devastating. In the 1920s, among Southern Illinois’ hundreds of moonshine stills, hills and hamlets were gangsters whose lawlessness rivaled Chicago’s. However, few people outside of those bottomlands know their names today.

Franny Cole’s now-estranged husband had been emotionally abusive and financially controlling. She thinks sometimes about what might have happened had she not gathered the strength to leave prior to the coronavirus pandemic.

Immigration and Customs Enforcement had announced that international students must take some of their classes in-person. If not, they could be deported from the United States. The Trump Administration just rescinded that decision. But many international students continue to face uncertainty during COVID-19. When he first saw the news from ICE, Sina Tayebati thought he might be getting deported back to Iran. He’s a graduate student studying mechanical engineering at Northern Illinois University.

Editor’s Note: The Institute of Government and Public Affairs assembled a task force of interdisciplinary faculty experts from all three universities in the University of Illinois System to assess COVID-19’s effects on the state. This essay represents the work of several task force members to create a roadmap for safely reopening the state’s economy.

Illinois wants hundreds to potentially thousands of contact tracing workers trained and ready to start tracking the spread of the new coronavirus by the end of this month. At the same time, big tech companies are developing technology that could help with tracing efforts.

School districts across the state have been resourceful in coming up with ways to honor their high school graduates, as health regulations prohibit the typical ceremonies. But some of those plans ran into roadblocks with the governor’s office and the Illinois State Board of Education.

Massive layoffs and furloughs around the state will make it difficult for some to pay their property taxes on time. Some Illinois counties are trying to ease the pain by delaying the mailing of the bills. Others have extended deadlines. And most common are counties waiving interest on late payments.

Illinoisans experiencing mental illness have had to face a new world in the pandemic. Most -- except for those in residential or emergency situations – have had to make the choice between not having therapy or having to do it by phone or computer screen. For this week’s Illinois Issues in-depth report, Maureen McKinney looked into how the transition is working.

‘ Illinois’ population dropped for the sixth year in a row. And Illinois students leave the state for school at higher rates than almost anywhere else. Rockford is trying to leverage its engineering and manufacturing industry to get people to stay.

Illinois Gov. J.B. Pritzker is already making plans to spend money from a significant change in the state income tax, even though it can only happen if voters agree to amend the Illinois Constitution this November. A significant chunk of Pritzker’s annual budget proposal , delivered Wednesday, depends on the governor's graduated income tax.