In the News
A handful of Illinois Democratic members of Congress Tuesday outlined county-by-county numbers of people who will lose unemployment benefits Dec. 28.
Their numbers come from the the Illinois Department of Employment Security.
U.S. Rep. Bill Foster is looking to constituents for answers when it comes to the federal government's budget deficit.
"There are no easy choices to be made here," Foster said Monday at Calvary Church in Naperville, before putting about 50 people through a 90-minute workshop on which items should have priority in the federal budget.
At least seven legislative proposals are pending in Congress to improve the new GI Bill for large swaths of beneficiaries, including active-duty and reserve troops, wounded warriors and families.
An Illinois congressman wants children of soldiers to avoid a case of educationus interruptus. Sgt. First Class Angela Dees of Joliet, now stationed in Virginia, says the Defense Department reversed itself on her son's tuition and demanded a refund.
A bill crafted with the help of The American Legion would, if enacted, correct a "bureaucratic nightmare" that has caused some servicemembers' children to be billed for thousands of dollars in educational benefits for which they were originally approved.
U.S. Rep. Bill Foster (D-IL, 11) kept his word and donated the pay he earned during the government shutdown to the Northern Illinois Food Bank on Friday.
Vicki Foley can trace her son Chris' drug use back to junior high, when he started smoking cigarettes.
The cigarettes led to marijuana and the marijuana eventually led to heroin.
The heroin led to his death.
"Heroin took his life," Foley said of the 27-year-old. "And it left a big hole in ours."
The numbers are grim: 71 overdose deaths in DuPage and Will counties so far this year. Last year, Kane County tallied 27 heroin fatalities. Fifty percent of all addicts are doomed to die from their dependency.
Still, there is reason for hope.
Inaction on immigration reform will have negative consequences for the mostly white, male-dominated Republican Party during next year's election, according to a group of protesters who vowed Saturday to vote Illinois' GOP congressional delegates out of office if they do not work towards passing legislation that would overhaul the nation's broken immigration system.
Aurora Mayor Tom Weisner is one of 21 elected heads of larger Illinois municipalities who recently wrote to the state's congressional delegation in Washington imploring members to overhaul immigration laws as a way to repair and boost the economy.