ANNOUNCEMENTS
(notes provided by the erudite Mary Hodson)

 
The Books to Prisoners volunteer session scheduled for Feb. 8 will be rescheduled at a later date.
 
Bucket Money for January will go to Food For Kids.
 
Volunteer readers will be needed for Read Across America from 10-1 on March 26.
 
Projects in planning include helping the Habitat ReStore and the Centennial High School Drama Department.
 
 
PROGRAM
 
Bob introduced Brant Houston, Director of Graduate Studies in Journalism at the University of Illinois and popular OLLIE presenter.  He spoke about their website www.citizenacess.org, which is trying to fill the gaps in investigative reporting caused by cuts in local newspaper reporting staff. 
 
Citizen Access student and other volunteers gather data from local law enforcement agencies to track and map incidents of gun violence.  The maps reveal that since 2014, the locations of reported shootings have moved westward and north and south of Springfield and University Avenues.  Dr. Houston notes that the City of Champaign recently added money for license plate readers for SW Champaign and wonders how they define that area.   On the interactive map, he demonstrated the increase in shootings in the area north of Kirby Ave. in the Kenwood area.   He also mentioned that local police have stopped giving out under age drinking tickets and have redirected their efforts to dealing with gun violence.
 
Following up on new federal legislation requiring transparency in pricing, Dr. Houston now wants to collect comparative data on local hospital and clinic fees.  
 
Questions and/or tips can be directed to brant.houston@gmail.com.   Citizen Access is part of the University of Illinois and donations to support their work can be directed to them through the University.

 

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UPCOMING SCHEDULE (with program committee member responsible listed in parentheses)

 

February 3rd – TBD 

February 10th – Diane Marlin, Mayor, City of Urbana (via Zoom) (Cary)

February 17th – An official from the Monticello Railway Museum (Charlie)

February 24th – Tom Teper will discuss the new home for special collections at the undergraduate library at UIUC (Joe)

March 3rd – TBD 

March 10th – Ginger Mills and Marlin Livingston, Cunningham Children’s Home, will discuss housing refugee children from the border (Mary)

March 17th – AG Michael Harris will discuss visiting Rotary Clubs around the world (Mary)

March 24th – TBD (Tom)

March 31st – TBD

April 7th – TBD

April 14th – TBD (Bob)

April 21st – TBD (Cary)

April 28th – Jordan Dziura, the Executive Director at Illini Media Co., will discuss the Daily Illini’s 110th anniversary, upcoming reunion for IMC alums, and the future of college media (Charlie)

May 5th – TBD

May 12th – TBD (Joe)

May 19th – Major General (ret) William L. Enyart (Mary)