Chicago-based community groups, parents and advocates for the
state's most vulnerable children called on Illinois lawmakers to restore
$25 million in funding for early childhood education at a gathering in Pilsen Tuesday morning.
About 100 parents and
members of eight local community organizations, such as the Latino
Policy Forum, Gads Hill Center and El Hogar del Niño, among others, plan
to travel to Springfield Wednesday for a subject matter hearing on
education funding cuts.
Gov. Pat Quinn's budget for fiscal year 2013 slashed $25 million from the Preschool for All program, which provides assistance for Illinois' most at-risk children.
“We
believe that the state is going through a tough time financially, but
the balance in the budget cannot be done on the back[s] of poor
children," said Maricela Garcia, CEO of the Gads Hill Center. "The
message tomorrow is going to be that we need to see the restoration of
$25 million that [was] cut [from] the Early Childhood Education Block
Grant last year."
It
includes revitalizing the Chicago River via restoring the natural
divide between the Great Lakes and Mississippi River Basins.
Physical separation of the basins and Lake Michigan
is the only permanent solution to prevent invasive species from
transferring through the Chicago waterways, members of the coalition
said at it’s public “Changing Course: Revitalizing the Chicago River”
talk Wednesday night. The meeting was set to get more people engaged with the issue.
“This is about a lot more than Asian carp,” said Tim Eder, executive director of the Great Lakes Commission.
“This is about more than just one fish that threatens Lake Michigan.
It’s about a number of different invasive species ... but it’s also about
more than fish, and the ecosystem, and the lake. It’s about restoring
and utilizing a precious resource that in many ways the city has turned
its back on.”
There
was no shortage of heated words today at the Chicago Board of
Education’s monthly meeting as Chicago Public Schools (CPS) CEO Barbara
Byrd-Bennett presented her final school closure plan. Parents,
teachers and activists all urged board members to consider the consequences the school actions will likely have on Chicago's communities.
There are considerable problems with air and land pollution in
Chicago’s Southwest neighborhoods of Pilsen and Little Village and, at a
meeting with community residents last night, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) committed to ongoing cleanup efforts.
Approximately 50 residents at Walsh Elementary School listened Tuesday night as the EPA presented the community with four plans for pollution reduction in their neighborhood.
A mayoral task force released
a report Saturday with broad guidelines for how to redevelop the site
of two Chicago coal-fired power plants on the Southwest Side that shut down in
August. A main recommendation was that the sites be used to
create local jobs in non-polluting industries.
Community advocates
who live in the Pilsen neighborhood, the site of the closed Fisk plant, and
Little Village, home of the shuttered Crawford plant, credit Mayor Rahm
Emanuel not just for working with Midwest Generation company to
shut down the plants, but also for using a task force to spark community
dialogue.
“Usually task forces are where something goes to be
forgotten,” says Nelson Soza, executive director of Pilsen Alliance and a
member of the task force. “But this task force raised the profile of
these sites.”
However, the panel did not weigh in on a central
concern of community residents: who will take on remediation, i.e. the
process of cleaning up the industrial site. The report reads that, “The issue of
remediation was discussed by the Task Force, but the Task Force was
unable to reach consensus on a recommendation for further action.” Read more »
With an eye toward the potential shut down of all of its Illinois coal-fired power plants and a possible bankruptcy filing, the February agreement
Midwest Generation made with Chicago Mayor Rahm Emanuel to close two
coal plants on the Southwest Side increasingly looks like a good deal
for the company, and not the ideal outcome for residents who live near the facilities.
Audience members offered a range of ideas at a city hearing last night
about what to do with the site currently occupied by the 108 year-old
Fisk coal-fired power plant in the Pilsen neighborhood, which closes
this September. Some of the ideas included a park, funeral home, public market, trade school,
and even a high school sports complex.
But all these visions will
be stymied if the Midwest Generation company cannot find a buyer
willing to not just build something new but also clean up, or remediate,
the site.
“There is a huge marketing job ahead of us,” acknowledged
Jean Pogge, CEO of the Delta Institute, the Chicago non-profit in charge
of a task force Mayor Rahm Emanuel created to determine the site’s future. Read more »
Chicago Mayor Rahm Emanuel’s office will hold two community hearings
this week regarding the Fisk and Crawford coal-fired power plant sites
on Chicago’s South Side. Midwest Generation is scheduled
to close the plants in September. Community excitement that the aging
plants are shutting down has partly given way to fears that the city and
Midwest Generation will never clean up or “remediate” the sites.
“Nobody
wants to deal with the remediation process,” claims Rafeal Hurtado, an
organizer at the Little Village Environmental Justice Organization
(LVEJO), a group that advocated shutting down the Crawford plant. Read more »
The EPA issued a preliminary report noting an unlawfully high amount of lead in the air in a 2-mile by 2-mile area in the city surrounding the Pilsen neighborhood.
Chicago-based community groups, parents and advocates for the
state's most vulnerable children called on Illinois lawmakers to restore
$25 million in funding for early childhood education at a gathering in Pilsen Tuesday morning.
Illinois’ 
There are considerable problems with air and land pollution in
Chicago’s Southwest neighborhoods of Pilsen and Little Village and, at a
meeting with community residents last night, the 
A mayoral task force 
Audience members offered a range of ideas at a city hearing last night
about what to do with the site currently occupied by the 108 year-old
Fisk coal-fired power plant in the Pilsen neighborhood, which closes
this September. Some of the ideas included a park, funeral home, public market, trade school,
and even a high school sports complex.
Chicago Mayor Rahm Emanuel’s office will hold two community hearings
this week regarding the Fisk and Crawford coal-fired power plant sites
on Chicago’s South Side. Midwest Generation is scheduled
to close the plants in September. Community excitement that the aging
plants are shutting down has partly given way to fears that the city and
Midwest Generation will never clean up or “remediate” the sites.