AM-580 News Features

The Army offered reporters a rare post-9/11 look at the former chemical weapons factory in Indiana, where a stockpile of the deadly nerve agent VX awaits its on-site destruction.  Bill Niemanon (pictured) will manage operations at the plant being built to neutralize VX under the terms of an international chemical weapons treaty.  AM 580's Jim Meadows reports.

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the Army's Program Manager for Elimination of Chemical Weapons site

Ohio Citizen Action site -- this group opposes moving neutralized VX component to a Dayton, OH facility for treatment

Poverty Remains in Illinois, Even in Good Economic Times

An annual study from the Heartland Alliance for Human Needs and Human Rights suggests that only limited progress has been made to address some of the factors behind poverty, such as education levels, housing costs and infant mortality. Director Sid Mohn says government leaders from both sides of the political aisle commissioned the study to watch for trends among Illinois’ poor.  He spoke with AM 580’s Tom Rogers.

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Illinois Poverty Summit site

Part 6: When members of some cultures become ill, they turn to their treatment of choice -- home remedies.  But home remedies can do as much harm as good -- making it tougher for doctors to treat their patients.  Kavitha Cardoza reports there's a growing need for traditional medical providers to understand cultural medical practices.

Part 7: The American Medical Association endorses a “cultural competency” model when it comes to care for minority patients. Cultural competency involves taking cultural differences into account during diagnosis and treatment. But there’s a growing awareness among medical providers that cultural competency doesn’t go far enough to give minority patients proper care.  Kavitha Cardoza reports there's a new emerging model of care - the cultural sensibility model.

Part 8: Culture plays a part in almost every aspects of healthcare - but when it comes to mental health, it’s crucial doctors understand their patient’s culture and life experiences from places that often times are incredibly different from here in the United States.  Treating the mental illnesses of an increasingly diverse population can be complex.

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A dictionary would define jazz as "American music often characterized by syncopation and polyphonic ensemble playing."  But for musicians who have spent their lives performing, jazz can't be so simply defined.  University Laboratory High School students talk with local jazz musicians about their craft.

Part 1: Don Heitler is a full-time musician known in the Urbana jazz community for his piano arrangements.  Martin Geiger asked Heitler about what jazz means in his life.

Part 2: For Vicky Capo, jazz is a method of transport -- taking her to places she's never been. Capo says jazz has the power to break down racial and cultural barriers.  Alex Cahill asks Capo what she feels when she sings. 

Part 3: Guitarist Jordan Kaye (pictured) says as a child he occasionally slipped his guitar under the covers at night to play.  He says he's influenced by some of the earliest jazz artists who have been largely ignored by many modern musicians.  Stefanie Austin asks Kaye about the artists he most admires.

It's the biggest University of Illinois sports story you may never have heard: a perfect regular season that led to their 7th straight Big Ten Conference title.  They won the program's first-ever national title when they took the indoor championship in February.  And on May 20, they won the the N-C-A-A Tournament in Georgia.  The Illinois men's tennis team could reach dynasty status and few would ever know.  AM 580's Ali Kawa explores why a team with such a great record has gotten such little attention.

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UI men's tennis site 

Edgar says he doesn’t regret his choice not to run in next year's US Senate race, saying he doesn’t want to take time away from his family or his job at the University of Illinois.  He also told AM 580’s Tom Rogers that the nature of a senator’s job wouldn’t give him the executive abilities he enjoyed as Governor and as Secretary of State.

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Illinois Governor Rod Blagojevich says the state no longer can afford to pay the heads of the Regional Offices of Education.  His budget eliminates 21 million dollars in salaries for elected superintendents and their assistants beginning July 1st.  No regional school superintendents are saying they'll work for free.  And there are questions of who would pick up the numerous programs administered by superintendents that are required by law.  AM 580's Dave Dickey reports.

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Indiana is dealing with an estimated 800 million dollar budget deficit.  Last weekend legislators passed a spending plan, and the governor has said he will sign it.  Education seems to have emerged from the budget process as a winner.  Colleges say they won't have to increase tuition as much.  And K through 12 schools won't have to lay off as many teachers as expected.  Still, Brian Vargus -- director of the Indiana University Public Opinion Laboratory -- says the budget does little to solve the state's financial crisis.  And he paints a dismal picture of Indiana's fiscal future for AM 580's Ali Kawa.

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Bruce Weber is leaving Southern Illinois University, where he amassed a 103-54 record in five seasons.  AM 580's Jim Meadows reports on Weber's first day as U of I coach and how his new players are reacting.

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listen to full press conference 

People have been trying for years to figure out just who gave details of the Watergate scandal to Bernstein and his Washington Post reporters Carl Bernstein and Bob Woodward.  But UI journalism professor William Gaines (pictured) recently announced that after four years of investigations by his students, he’d concluded that “Deep Throat” is former Nixon administration attorney Fred Fielding. Gaines talked about his search for “Deep Throat” with AM 580’s Jim Meadows.

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deepthroatuncovered.com -- a site on the investigation developed by UI students

Craig Silverstein is director of technology at Google, which has grown to dominate the web-search field in less than five years.  He recently visited the home of the first popular Internet browser, saying Google is a financial success -- even though its chief product is free to users.  He talked with AM 580's Jim Meadows.

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AM 580, WBCP Radio and the Champaign County Health Care Consumers launch a six-month project to examine the need for better dental care, and what's being done about it. 

smilehealthy.org

Governor Blagojevich proposes deep cuts in higher education funding in the 2004 budget, and administrators are scrambling for ways to handle those cuts.  Celeste Quinn and Tom Rogers interviewed UI Vice President for Academic Affairs Chester Gardner during The Afternoon Magazine right after the governor's budget address.

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