Champaign County | featured news

Today is Thursday, May 30, 2019. Here are local news reports from 100, 50 and 15 years ago:
In 1919, distribution began of the enormous surplus of canned meats left over from the Great War.
In 1969, a poll conducted by The News-Gazette showed a ratio of five "no" votes to every "yes" vote for the creation of a 4 percent state income tax.
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Today is Thursday, May 30, the 150th day of 2019. There are 215 days left in the year.
Today's highlight
On May 30, 1911, the first Indy 500 took place at the Indianapolis Motor Speedway; the winner was Ray Harroun, who drove a Marmon Wasp for more than 6 1/2 hours at an average speed of 74.6 mph and collected a prize of $10,000.
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Numerous renovation projects are happening right now at Unity High School, while some have already finished up.

With board approval on Wednesday, officials plan to apply for a Preschool for All expansion grant from the state that would allow it to offer three all-day classrooms, each with about 15 4-year-olds.

DANVILLE — Come next school year, some pre-kindergarten pupils in the Danville school district could be attending a full day of school.

Also included in the plan, still under review by the agency's board, are an accounting shift for some MCORE costs, the replacement of 11 older buses and $1.5 million in architectural and engineering costs for The Yards development.

URBANA — Bus drivers working for the Champaign-Urbana Mass Transit District may be in line for a 2.5 percent raise starting July 1.

A permanent UI email address for graduates and a potential partnership with LinkedIn are possibilities the university is exploring to keep closer contact — and potentially drive up fundraising.

CHAMPAIGN — The Champaign-Urbana Public Health District will again host a free-summer-meal program for kids beginning Thursday at its headquarters at 201 W. Kenyon Road, C.
The program sponsored by the Illinois State Board of Education is intended to help kids who typically get most of their nutrition intake at school. It will run each weekday through mid-August.
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CHAMPAIGN — The Housing Authority of Champaign County will start accepting pre-applications for its housing-choice voucher program waiting list June 17.
The list will remain open through June 30.
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EDP Renewables formally presented its proposal to county board members on Wednesday. The public-input hearing begins at 6 p.m. Thursday in the Tuscola Community Building, 122 W. N. Central Ave., Tuscola.

'The community needs to know that women won't be treated like your personal punching bag ... or your personal sex toy,' Judge Roger Webber told Germel Butler, 45.

URBANA — A Champaign man convicted of raping his girlfriend because she balked at his request to prostitute herself to get him money has been sentenced to 40 years in prison.