Smile Politely. Speak Directly. A Champaign-Urbana Culture Blog

In 2007, the Federal Bureau of Prisons made the decision to expunge all religious materials from prison libraries nationwide in an effort to prevent prisons from becoming potential “recruiting grounds” for terrorists. Amid public outcry and inmate lawsuits, the bureau was forced to reverse its initiative.

One-year prior, Pennsylvania was forced to justify, in court, its statewide ban on all news, magazines, and photographs to a sizable portion of the state’s inmate population.

If rusty chains, blown-out tubes or any other cycle malady has been keeping you from participating in this week's Bike to Work Week (May 12–16), and you feel like you don't have the tools or know-how for a DIY fix, The Bike Project of Urbana- Champaign can help (and before the big Bike to Work Day tomorrow, May 16).

After many separate discussions about enacting a ban on using cell phones while driving, the council has decided on an ordinance, but surprisingly, the new draft doesn't include talking on hand-held cell phones and hands-free units.

The ordinance put forth includes an amendment to prohibit sending text messages while driving a vehicle and an addition for bicyclists on the roadway to be susceptible to the same fines. Other elements of the ban include a hefty fine — maximum of $750 — if caught talking or texting on a cell phone while involved in an accident, and an educational program to teach the public about the new ordinance.

Late last year, the increasing prices of food and fuel were putting pressure on the Eastern Illinois Foodbank's ability to meet the needs of hungry people through its food pantries in the 14 counties surrounding Champaign County.

Since then, the price of oil hit a record high and the costs of basics such as rice have been soaring higher, too. With the U.S. economy having taken a turn for the worse, the lines at food banks have gotten longer.

Not surprisingly, things haven't gotten any easier for the food banks, either.

"The pressure has gotten much greater,"says Jim Hires, Executive Director at the Eastern Illinois Foodbank. "As lines at pantries have grown, we have not been able to increase our ability to acquire food."

For those of you downtown dwellers ever on the watch and diligently moving your car in the a.m. hours to escape the eye of parking enforcement, your time has come. The City of Champaign is currently accepting applications to be placed on a waiting list for parking spots in the new Hill Street Parking Facility, but the convenience comes with a price tag.

The parking deck isn't completed, but the city is taking requests at their Parking Programs Office located at 713 Edgebrook Dr. or online along with a $60 deposit fee.

Chris Knight, proprietor of one of Champaign's most popular bars, The Blind Pig, purchased the Barfly yesterday. The cocktail lounge will, Knight says, be open for business under his ownership tonight.

Barfly, a fairly typical lounge that never quite found its footing as a dance club due to the narrow structure of the space, will remain as is for a while. Knight has plans for the Neil Street locale, including a name change to the Twilight Lounge, after some alterations to the current spot.

After 15 years as one of Champaign’s prominent sports bars and billiards joints, Jillian’s has closed.

Employees got word on Sunday and by the end of the day Jillian’s had shut its doors for good. The “Champaign” link on the corporate website now leads to a blank page.

Jillian’s — a 20,000-square-foot space featuring pool tables, games and large TVs — was located at 1201 S. Neil Street, west of Memorial Stadium.

Urbana City Council did not provide many answers concerning the proposed cell phone ban scheduled for a vote on Monday. Plenty of questions, however, were put forward. Should cyclists be prohibited from riding and talking? How will a cell phone ban affect our twin cities? And the fundamental question, should the ordinance be for hand-held cell phones only or should it include hands-free units?

City Attorney Ronald O'Neal asked for more time to draft the ordinance.

Now that spring seems to have officially sprung, students at the University of Illinois are rediscovering the quad. More than a dozen organizations lined the walkway just outside the south end of the Illini Union this afternoon, and hundreds of students found places to relax in the grass. Look for temperatures near 80 for the next few days, but storms and chillier weather are just around the corner. Monday's forecast? A high of 48 and plenty wet.

At 4:35 a.m., an earthquake rumbled through Champaign-Urbana. WCIA Newsroom corroborated that over fifteen people in their viewing area had already called in to claim the movement. After a few minutes, the U.S. Geological Survey posted the information to their website, listing the earthquake's magnitude as a 5.2 and it's center was near West Salem, Ill.

It is assumed that the tremor was caused by the New Madrid Seismic Zone that runs between St. Louis, Mo., and Memphis, Tenn. In 1811, the fault moved for almost three months during the wintertime. The quake was felt as far away as North Carolina.

UPDATE: Aftershocks were felt in Urbana, Ill., at 10:15 a.m. A seismographic reading could not yet be identified. The U.S. Geological Survey has identified this one as a 2.5 on the Richter Scale.

When Council Member Michael LaDue walks around his Campustown neighborhood after a particularly successful football game things can get pretty rowdy on Green Street — more raucous, in fact, than the 2008 Unofficial St. Patrick’s Day, a two-day brew-ha-ha devoted to drinking, which LaDue called “uneventful.”

The event cooled its heels a bit this year after the City of Champaign and University of Illinois implemented new restrictions, including a “No Visitor” policy at the dormitories and a strong police enforcement on the street. And although the morning after included piles of puke on the sidewalk and bottles littering the lawns, statistics for arrests were down.

But Mayor Gerald Schweighart, also acting Liquor Commissioner, felt the City of Champaign needed to do more to curb underage drinking on campus. In a 6-3 vote last night, the council passed an ordinance granting Schweighart emergency powers to enforce a 21 and up limit on bar entrance for special events, particularly looking at next year’s “Unofficial” celebration.

Last night — to an overflowing council chamber — Urbana City Council held a discussion to hear the opinions of the public concerning Urbana Public Television’s airing of an anti-Semitic show that many residents at the meeting deemed hate speech towards the Jewish community.

The extreme program spews hateful propaganda about the Jewish community and was provided to a local resident by an out-of-town source.

One resident called the situation “heartbreaking." A second dubbed the proposed revisions to UPTV’s manual concerning airing public-access programs “an empty disclaimer.”

UPTV revised some of their policies and procedures including a disclaimer at the beginning and end of all public access programming that states, “the City of Urbana does not condone or endorse speech that promotes fear, hatred, prejudice or discrimination toward any group based on religion, ethnicity, race, gender or sexual orientation, Kate Gorman, Station Manager of UPTV says.

After a windy weekend rife with threats of snow (which never quite materialized), the weather is beginning to return to its springtime form. Still a little chilly, sure, but this morning's benevolent skies above St. Matthew Catholic Church in Champaign will usher in afternoon temperatures in the lower 50s. By Thursday, the thermometer will be climbing toward 70.

The City of Urbana will be introducing a new type of sign to the landscape of the ever-growing Philo and Windsor developments: an electronic message board with business advertisements changing every 10 seconds.

The sign, soon to post in front of the Pines at Stonecreek Commons shopping center, veers away from the current ordinance which allows electronic messages to adjust once every three minutes.

Bob McChesney, host of the WILL-AM show Media Matters, hosts this semester's Racial & Social Justice Book Club, organized by the YWCA of the University of Illinois. The discussion takes place today at 7 p.m. in Murphy Lounge at the University YMCA, 1001 S. Wright Street in Champaign.

Featured books for the discussion include The Shock Doctrine: the Rise of Disaster Capitalism by Naomi Klein, The Case for Impeachment: The Legal Argument for Removing President George W. Bush from Office by David Lindorff and Barbara Olshanksy and Media Control: The Spectacular Achievements of Propaganda by Noam Chomsky.

McChesney, a leading media scholar and activist, is a Research Professor in the Institute of Communications Research and the Graduate School of Library and Information Science at the University of Illinois. He has penned several books on media including his most recent venture, Communication Revolution, released in 2007.

John Currey, director of Champaign Central High School Jazz Ensemble, along with members of the group, collected a proclamation from Deputy Mayor Michael LaDue declaring April as Jazz Appreciation Month in the City of Champaign.

While Currey accepted the certificate, he had some news of his own: Champaign Central High School Jazz Ensemble was chosen as one of 15 schools across North America to participate in the prestigious high school band festival dubbed Essentially Ellington.

After about two years of learning how to build a business, and a year of renovation and construction at 114 Walnut Street in downtown Champaign, Trisha Bates and her sister, Amanda, are almost ready to open Champaign's first cupcake shop, Cakes on Walnut.

The shop, for a time known as Cream & Flutter, is scheduled to have its grand opening party the last week of this month. Cakes on Walnut will have a menu of rotating cupcake flavors — classic flavors like chocolate and vanilla will be served daily with three or four exotic "featured" flavors (such as green tea, for example, or lavender).

The World Wildlife Fund has asked the world to pledge just a single hour of the day to turn off all their lights. Now a global movement, called Earth Hour, they are hoping to send out a powerful statement about taking action against climate change. It was created last year by the WWF in Sydney and the image above is of the Sydney Harbour Bridge before and during last year's Earth Hour.

Urbana Alderman Charlie Smyth introduced an ordinance last night — to a packed council chamber — that would ban cell phone usage while driving in Urbana.

After much discussion and public input, the council opted to further the conversation and allow City Attorney Ronald O’Neal to draft a new ordinance reflecting questions raised at last night’s meeting.

Smyth’s proposal included most mobile electronic devices, including hands-free sets such as Bluetooth devices. Council members voiced concerns over banning two-way cell phone devices for businesses such as towing services: how the ordinance would be enforced and how to educate the public about the ban.

The stretch of Springfield Avenue that runs through campus, between Neil Street and Lincoln Avenue, has never been about great heights. From Am-Ko to several-story apartment buildings to the regal but relatively low-lying Grainger Library and Uni High, Springfield has long been, to a degree, a vertically modest road.

But the Springfield landscape is changing with the erection of Burnham310, an 18-story residential structure on Springfield between Third and Fourth streets.

After Mayor Gerald Schweighart read the resolution providing funds to the reconstruction of three residential redevelopments on North Neil and West Church streets, Council Member Michael La Due took time to note that the incentive deserves a little fanfare in what he called “a small step for the city, but a giant step for preservation and integrity of our downtown.”

The resolution grants $225,000 from the city to go towards expenditures incurred in reconstruction of the properties at 219 N. Neil St., 223 N. Neil St. and 109 W. Church St. The buildings would provide more residential living in the downtown area.

Over the past eight months, Urbana's Public Arts Task Force (encompassing seventeen local working artists), with the support of Urbana's Art Coordinator, Anna Hochhalter, have developed a Public Arts Program for Urbana. In order to directly support the arts in our community, the new program calls for the creation of a permanent Public Arts Commission and Public Arts Trust Fund, with an allocation of $4 per capita going into the fund to support an Arts Director and Annual Grants. One percent of any city building construction or renovation project over a half a million dollars will be put aside for project costs for the arts as well. Their mission statement is as follows: "The Urbana Public Arts Commission is established to recognize the arts as essential to the vitality of our city. The commission fosters a dynamic, innovative Urbana, where all residents — emerging artists, established artists, and 'non-artists' alike — may engage with the arts in its many forms and where artists thrive and are valued."

Attention all Insight customers in Champaign County: you can say goodbye to your Insight prices. Comcast, the nation's largest cable company, bought out the other half of their partnership with Insight Communications and has fully moved into town. With over 24 million cable customers, Comcast now serves Champaign-Urbana, Peoria, Quincy-Macomb, Rockford-Dixon, and Springfield cable television systems in Illinois.

Urbana City Council passed a resolution last night to join an intergovernmental agreement to fight against AmerenIP’s rate hike. The council voted to revise the budget to include funds to protest in front of the Illinois Commerce Commission alongside other downstate Illinois cities.

According to Mayor Laurel Prussing, who laid out the issue last week in her “Mayor’s Report,” the electricity hike could cost the city more than $100,000 in street lighting alone. AmerenIP is currently proposing a 14 percent increase in rates over a two-year period along with an 11 percent increase in natural gas rates.

Downtown Champaign will be suffering yet another Italian restaurant closing this year. First, Dom's closed at the end of 2007 and now, The Great Impasta, a downtown tradition for more than 25 years, will be shutting its doors at the end of 2008.

"It's not established, for me, if this is a closing or if it's another move. It might just be another part of the saga," Harold Allston, the former chef and now owner of The Great Impasta says. In years past, the restaurant occupied a space in the building three doors away, at 132 W. Church St., where Sushi Kame is currently located.

For more than ten years, a small company located on Danville's east side has been making a significant impact on the way we clean.

EnvirOx originally started in 1995 as a research project with the primary objective of developing a cleaning technology that would reduce toxicity in a meaningful way. As the company grew in recent years, a line of environmentally friendly home-cleaning products was launched, and now employees at EnvirOx are pulling double duty to produce 44,000 household cleaning kits before its national debut on the QVC shopping channel on March 18.

Criminal law, finance, tenant rights and employee rights are the topics of a three-part series beginning this weekend at the Champaign Public Library.

Presented by students at the University of Illinois College of Law, “Know Your Rights: How to Deal with Cops, Money, and Your Boss” offers a layman’s guide to the legal snafus often encountered by members of the Champaign-Urbana community. The series, which begins this Saturday and ends March 15, will offer interpretations of basic laws as well as advice on how to handle common legal frustrations.

Urbana Mayor Laurel Prussing delivered a report at last night’s Urbana City Council meeting, outlining a potential future increase in utility rates for Champaign County residents unless efforts from area cities to fight the rate hikes from Illinois American Water and AmerenIP are successful.

According to Prussing, the water company said the 60 percent increase does not include the total cost of the new water facility on West Bradley Avenue in Champaign and that the company may want to increase rates in the future.

Currently, the cities of Urbana and Champaign along with Savoy, Philo, Sydney and St. Joseph are spending $65,000 collectively to go up in front of the Illinois Commerce Commission to try and save $8 million for Champaign County customers.

The new dorm at the St. John’s Newman Catholic Center at the University of Illinois has become a significant player in the campus skyline. Set to be completed in July 2008, Newman Hall now has 85% of its brick exterior complete and crews are currently working on the interior. “We lost a little time in the hard winter months,” said Mark Randall, director of advancement at the Newman Center, but he added that the project remains on schedule to welcome new students in August 2008. “We have more applications than we have beds,” Randall said. The official dedication ceremony will be held Sept. 6–7, 2008.

Coffee drinkers: Perk up your ears.

Beloved Urbana coffeehouse and hipster study spot, Caffe Paradiso, changed ownership over the weekend. Café co-founder and owner Melissa Fanella had been looking to sell the business for the past year.

The café first opened in 1998 with partner Geoff Merritt of Parasol Records and That's Rentertainment. The café soon housed an extension of the John St. movie rental store, first in the seating area and then in the rental space adjacent to the cafe. After it ceased operations, Fanella continued to run the café with the help of the employees that had been on staff since its opening.

After weeks of keeping their new location under wraps, today Common Ground Food Co-op officially announces the site of their expanded store: Lincoln Square Village.

The co-op didn’t initially look at the former site of Lincoln Square Mall in downtown Urbana, but after discussing the 2200-foot space with city employees and managers at the Village, Common Ground Food Co-op was sold.

“We were actually blown away at how positive the conversation was, how excited they were about us and how excited we were about them,” Jacqueline Hannah, general manager of the co-op says.

Champaign voters got their first crack at democracy for 2008 this morning. At 11:58 a.m., 315 out of 900 people had already voted at the Holy Cross parish center, which covers the 11th and 12th precincts. The Democratic Party had significantly higher numbers in these precincts than other parties.

Students at the University of Illinois disappear into a foggy quad on Monday afternoon. After an evening of hail and ice, central Illinoisans woke to a quilt of fog that thickened as the day went on. Rain showers, thunderstorms and snow are in the forecast for the next few days.

Starting today, downtown dwellers should prepare to dig a little deeper in their pockets to feed meters in what the City of Champaign dubs the “downtown core” parking spaces.

City Council’s decision to triple parking rates in downtown Champaign from $.25 an hour to $.75 an hour was made on Dec. 18. In theory, the hiked rates will move long-term visitors to outlying areas where parking prices are lower to make way for short-term guests.

Flurries continued to dust the University of Illinois campus on Tuesday morning, but snow will soon give way to another round of frigid temperatures. How cold is it going to get? Keep an eye on the university's Department of Atmospheric Sciences website for the latest.

Driving west out of Champaign on Bloomington Road takes you past a 90-acre tract of land surrounded by chain link fence — the site of an old landfill owned by the City of Champaign. No one has dumped garbage at the site since 1975, but a number of groups have used the site for various purposes in the years since.

On Tuesday night, the Champaign Planning Department and the Champaign Park District held a public meeting at the Springer Cultural Center to discuss the future of the old landfill.

So the big question is: Where can you register in Champaign-Urbana?