In the News
The news regarding President Barack Obama's executive action on immigration reform sent a whirlwind of emotions and charges across the states, but also left questions on what the move really means for undocumented immigrants.
Organizers of the Southwest Suburban Immigrant Project set up informational meetings days after the announcement, hoping to quell any misinformation.
Winter 2015. Commuter A nips out of her garage in the suburbs, turns onto I-88 and then crawls along the tollway and the Eisenhower Expressway, eventually arriving at work in the Loop where parking costs about $290 a month.
Commuter B drives to her local Metra station, parks, then hops on the UP West Line into Chicago. Her monthly pass and local parking is about $245.
Conventional wisdom holds that Commuter B is doing the right thing taking public transit, reducing pollution and traffic.
Scott and Caroline Schmauderer know all the acronyms and the nitty-gritty details of the federal government's various programs to help homeowners like themselves, whose plans were derailed by the housing bust.
They read up on loan modifications, but they aren't behind on their mortgage payments, so they don't qualify for one.
They rattle off the requirements of the federal government's refinancing program, but their loan isn't owned by Fannie Mae or Freddie Mac, so again they don't qualify.
For years, Jorge toiled in the kitchen of a Mexican restaurant.
In the midst of hot ovens and the frantic pace of food preparation, where the long hours tortured his feet and racked his lower back, Jorge, a native of Mexico, dreamed of one day getting his legal resident papers, which would permit him to join the U.S. Army.
NEWPORT NEWS -- In August 2010, Sgt. 1st Class Angela Dees sent her stepson off to college, a move made possible because she transferred her benefits to him under the GI Bill.
Or that's what she thought.
Halfway through the semester, Christopher hadn't received any money. Dees stretched her credit card to pay his living expenses, bus fare and other bills. She was confident the GI Bill benefits would come through because the Defense Department had OK'd the transfer.
In November, the Department of Veterans Affairs said the money wasn't coming.
U.S. Congressman Bill Foster visited B.J. Ward Elementary School Thursday, talking with students about the importance of going to college and also taking a tour of the school's computer lab.
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.
Last week, U.S. Rep. Jan Schakowsky, an Evanston Democrat, was the only House member from Illinois to vote against a bipartisan budget deal, saying lawmakers should have extended unemployment benefits.
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.
The four-year-old Post-9/11 GI Bill has served 1 million students at a cost of almost $35 billion — but some lawmakers clearly think it could be doing more to serve troops, veterans and their 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. "The only thing the VA website or any of the other literature concerning the Post-9-11 GI Bill stated was that it could be transferred to spouses and dependent children that had to be in (a military dependents' reporting system)," Dees said on a conference call arranged for reporters by the office of U.S. Rep.