2009 Report on Illinois Poverty

In 2009, a family of four that is poor by the federal government's definition has an annual income below $22,050. A family that is extremely poor has an income less than half the poverty line for their family size -- under$11,025 for a family of four. As discussions continue on the best way to help the nation weather and emerge from the recession, the focus must be on meaningful policy changes that truly lift all boats and make us collectively a much stronger nation. If solutions do not specifically address the needs of those whose lives and hardships are reflected in this report, millions will be left behind, and we will all be left weaker and more vulnerable

2009 Report on Chicago Region Poverty

In 2009, a family of four that is poor by the federal government's definition has an annual income below $22,050. A family that is extremely poor has an income less than half the poverty line for their family size -- under$11,025 for a family of four. As discussions continue on the best way to help the nation weather and emerge from the recession, the focus must be on meaningful policy changes that truly lift all boats and make us collectively a much stronger nation. If solutions do not specifically address the needs of those whose lives and hardships are reflected in this report, millions will be left behind, and we will all be left weaker and more vulnerable

2010 Report on Illinois Poverty

This 2010 report caps a decade of Heartland Alliance's annual reports on poverty. The project was initiated at a time when economic prosperity seemed widespread and the future outlook was infused with optimism. The goal with these reports at that time was simple: to serve as a caution that the rising tide of prosperity in the late 1990s had not lifted all boats and that many in our communities were being left behind.Today the situation is very different. The Great Recession has crumbled economic stability for millions of families in the form of massive job loss, cut backs in hours, the elimination of work benefits, skyrocketing foreclosures and bankruptcies, and the eroding value of retirement investments.The implications of massive service cuts to those experiencing poverty -- many of whom rely on state-funded services in their communities literally for survival, particularly those in extreme poverty -- will be nothing short of devastating. Without leadership to enact a responsible budget, Illinois can expect to see deepening hardship and further entrenchment of social problems

Pine Street Baptist Church: My Experience of Pine Street Baptist Church

Student perspectives on worship services from Instructor Jennifer Garvin-Sanchez\u27s Religious Studies 108 Human Spirituality course at Virginia Commonwealth University

A Miscarriage of Juvenile Justice: A Modern Day Parable of the Unintended Results of Bad Lawmaking

Sensationalized cases increasingly create the context for public policy discussion. Stories about violent crime are a common feature of the local evening news and their emotional nature can often create the hook politicians need to showcase their “tough on crime” agendas. Often anecdotal and lurid, stories of criminal misdeeds are widely used to convince the public of a need to create or change laws. This article demonstrates the perils of making law by extrapolating from a few random, albeit attention-grabbing, events. Specifically, the article examines the impact of a 1995 change in New Hampshire state law that lowered the age that a youth could be charged as an adult from 18 to 17. The law was passed in the wake of two isolated but brutal juvenile murders with little examination of the empirical data. To demonstrate the counter-productive and perhaps damaging nature of this approach to governance I review juvenile crime rate statistics for the period in question, but it is my view that the impact of the data alone can be significantly enhanced by examining specific instances of the law’s effect. If media stories are used to justify legislative actions, then the stories of those affected by the actions should similarly be useful in deciding if the change is warranted. I will therefore go beyond the data and recount the story of Justin B., a young man whose arrest for simple underage drinking began a Kafka-esque descent into legal limbo and incarceration. This article shows that in New Hampshire, as in states all over the country, the statutory change was an over-reaction prompted by sensationalized and anecdotal evidence. By looking at the events and influences that inspired New Hampshire’s legislative changes, the consequences of the new law, and the effects it had on Justin B.’s life, I show that the law not only fell far short of its intended goals, but possibly made the citizens of New Hampshire less safe and at greater cost