QCA.news - Quad Cities news and view from both sides of the river

Friday, July 10th, 2026
	‘I would not be here’: Iowa cancer survivors urge continued federal funding for cancer research Cancer survivors and advocates met with Republican Rep. Zach Nunn, IA-3, to urge continued federal funding for cancer research and to highlight gaps in treatment coverage.
	Special Weather Statement until FRI 9:00 PM CDT Funnel Clouds and Weak Tornadoes Possible Until 9 PM
	Silvis alderman resigning amid ethics probe The resignation of second ward alderman Craig Pirmann is effective immediately, according to the mayor's office.
	Rock Island affordable senior housing project secures tax credits The apartment complex, to be located at Ninth Avenue and 25th Street, received nearly $2 million in tax credits.
	West Burlington police officers escape their own office West Burlington police officers found themselves locked inside their own office but successfully escaped.
	Hot weather coming next week After several days in the 80s this week, things look to heat up next week in the Quad Cities. Highs will be in the lower 90s pretty often next week. So far this year we've had 7 days with a high of at least 90°, and we'll add on about 4 or 5 more next [...]
	Rock Island mayor revokes tavern's liquor license after shooting incident After citing numerous violations, Rock Island Mayor Ashley Harris has revoked the liquor license of DeAnna's Place.
	City of Monmouth, Lakeshore Recycling places dumpsters for storm damage drop offs The City of Monmouth and Lakeshore Recycling are placing three dumpsters on Third Street for storm debris drop-off.
	High diesel prices are squeezing drivers at the Walcott Truckers Jamboree With prices ranging between $4-5 across the country, drivers are adding a fuel surcharge to their rate.
	Rock Island County dedicates pollinator garden to the late Lee Barber, the Rev. Gabriel Barber County leaders said the dedication recognized the Barbers' decades of community service.
	High diesel prices squeezing drivers at the Walcott Truckers Jamboree With prices ranging between $4-5 across the country, drivers are adding a fuel surcharge to their rate.
	Muscatine family to hold annual Lemonade for a Cause fundraiser The event has raised more than $26,000 for the MCSA Domestic Violence Shelter, and this year's fundraiser aims to push that total past $30,000.
	Rock Island mayor revokes DeAnna's Place liquor license following 9 counts of violations Mayor Ashley Harris has revoked the liquor license for DeAnna's Place in Rock Island following nine counts of violations.
	"Next to Normal" production returns to Davenport Central High School The performances will raise money for theater improvements while also shining a light on mental health awareness.
	Rain wins again at Davenport Speedway Friday morning’s rain shower has forced SR Promotions to cancel the Friday night races at Davenport Speedway, according to a news release. Weekly points racing tops the agenda on Friday, July 17, at the Davenport Speedway. All six classes will be in action. The racing program will include the Street Stock Challenge sponsored by AVS [...]
	New mural unveiled at Rock Island EveryChild building EveryChild partnered with Quad City Arts' Metro Arts Apprenticeship Program to create the artwork.
	Silvis alderman resigning as ethics probe continues The resignation of second ward alderman Craig Pirmann is effective immediately, according to the mayor's office.
	Deanna’s Place liquor license revoked for following shootings, dozens of police calls Rock Island Mayor Ashley Harris has revoked the liquor license for Deanna's Place effective immediately after multiple shootings and police calls.
	Retired Iowa lawmaker Jean Lloyd-Jones reflects on her political life in memoir At 96, Jean Lloyd-Jones has published ‘A Woman’s Place: My Life as a Public Servant.’ The book tracks her path from the League of Women Voters to the Iowa Legislature, as well as her work founding the Iowa Institute for Peace.
	Graham Platner makes it official in Maine, submitting paperwork to leave Senate race In his withdrawal notice, Platner said "people are desperate for change" and that's why they made him the Democratic nominee. Now, Maine Democrats have to pick someone to replace him by July 27.
	Scott County Democrats nominate slate of candidates ahead of November 2026 elections Meet the newest Democratic candidates seeking Scott County offices and a state House seat this November.
	Police searching for man accused of driving into a Rock Island credit union 41-year-old Michael Lindquist allegedly fled the scene after striking the Gas and Electric Credit Union.
	Reynolds expresses hope for federal appeal of SNAP ‘unhealthy’ food restrictions Gov. Kim Reynolds supports a federal appeal of a judge's ruling blocking Iowa's SNAP food restrictions, as the state celebrates low error rates.
	Silvis alderman resigns One of Silvis’ aldermen has resigned. A news release from the City of Silvis says that Alderman Craig Pirmann has resigned, effective immediately. “The resignation does not affect the City’s Ethics Commission’s review of the complaint that was filed against Alderman Pirmann for a breach of the City’s ethics code,” the release said. “That matter [...]
	Rock Island police searching for driver accused of crashing into credit union while fleeing officers Rock Island police are hunting for 41-year-old Michael Lindquist after he crashed his truck into a local credit union while running from officers.
	City of Monmouth announces storm debris drop-off location Three roll-off dumpsters will be placed outside of the Street Department on July 17, 18 and 19 to collect storm-related debris.
	Muscatine family hopes Lemonade for a Cause tops $30,000 for domestic violence shelter The annual fundraiser benefits the MCSA Domestic Violence Shelter, with 100% of proceeds staying local to support shelter services.
	Patriotic art gets the spotlight as NEA funding shifts. Cue 'The Ronald Reagan Overture' Patriotic art and music is taking center stage this year under the Trump Administration, as funds shift away from DEI. For some orgs, like the Reagan Presidential Library, this is their wheelhouse.
	Special Weather Statement until FRI 7:00 PM CDT Funnel Clouds and Weak Tornadoes Possible Until 7 PM
	4 Your Money \| Short Leash Government debt has become a prominent topic in economic and public policy discussions. John Nelson, Financial Planner at NelsonCorp Wealth Management, is here to highlight the unusually high percentage of government debt that is being financed through short-term, adjustable-rate borrowing strategies.
	Leveling up: The past and future of video games in the US After Sony announced it will discontinue selling physical game discs, we dug deeper into the evolution of video gaming.
	National French Fry Day 2026: How to get free fries and other food deals We've rounded up the promo codes that unlock free fries on National French Fry Day.
	Houston neighbors started seeing more ICE agents around. Then came a fatal shooting. Lorenzo Salgado Araujo was a 52-year-old Mexican national who worked in construction for more than three decades. The father of three was shot by Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents after they attempted to pull him over.
	Federal Trade Commission and five states file motion to accept settlement in right-to-repair lawsuit against Deere & Company A years-long lawsuit alleges that Deere & Company has been withholding vital repair and diagnostic services behind costly software subscriptions, which are sometimes only available at John Deere-certified dealers. The FTC and attorneys general of Arizona, Illinois, Michigan, Minnesota, and Wisconsin filed a joint motion to resolve their lawsuit with a settlement agreement totaling nearly $100 million. WVIK spoke to a farmer and a right-to-repair advocate who caution claimants to read the fine print.
	Snapchat messages preceded deadly shooting by a former police officer: court records Caitlynn J. Girkin, a former Creve Coeur police officer, faces up to 60 years in prison for allegedly shooting her roommate Adolfo Cazares in March.
	Thousands of grills sold at Walmart and Lowe's recalled nationwide Thousands of grills sold online and at Walmart and Lowe's stores nationwide are being recalled, according to a notice posted by the U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission.
	Special Weather Statement until FRI 1:45 PM CDT Slow-Moving Thunderstorm with Potential Funnel Clouds in Western Scott and Southeastern Cedar Counties
	Iowa National Guard deploys 120 soldiers to Washington for America’s 250th anniversary A sendoff ceremony was held in Des Moines for 120 Iowa National Guard soldiers deploying to Washington, D.C., to provide anniversary security.
	Special Weather Statement until FRI 6:00 PM CDT Funnel Clouds Possible This Afternoon and Evening
	Monmouth officials warn of deadly generator mistake delaying storm power restoration Monmouth officials are warning residents against a dangerous generator mistake called backfeeding that can electrocute workers and cause fires.
	Quad-Cities Hy-Vees celebrate Birdies for Charity donations to local nonprofits Ten Quad-Cities nonprofits are receiving $1,000 each from the donation.
	Walk to End Alzheimer’s Oct. 24 in Muscatine The Alzheimer’s Association Walk to End Alzheimer’s – Muscatine Area takes place on Saturday, October 24 at Discovery Park's Environmental Learning Center, 3300 Cedar Street in Muscatine. Participants honor those affected by Alzheimer’s on Walk Day with the Promise Garden ceremony. Walkers will carry flowers of various colors during the ceremony and each color represents [...]
	Eligible Illinois seniors to get help buying farmers' market produce Farmers market season is underway across Illinois, and low-income seniors may be able to get help buying fresh, local produce. According to a release from the State of Illinois, the Illinois Department on Aging and Illinois Department of Human Services (IDHS) are administering the Senior Farmers' Market Nutrition Program to give income-eligible older adults benefits [...]
	North Dakota AI committee releases agenda for first meeting next week Senate Majority Leader David Hogue, R-Minot, announces a new interim Artificial Intelligence and Data Center Committee at the Capitol on June 25, 2026. Also pictured are, from left, Rep. Todd Porter, R-Mandan, Rep. Mike Nathe, R-Bismarck, Rep. Jonathan Warrey, R-Casselton, former North Dakota University System Chancellor Mark Haggerott, and Sen. Mike Wobbema, R-Valley City. (Photo by Michael Achterling/North Dakota Monitor)The new committee tasked with studying artificial intelligence and data centers ahead of North Dakota’s 2027 legislative session has released the agenda for its first meeting. The inaugural meeting of the committee is scheduled for 9 a.m. Wednesday in Bismarck. The committee will hear presentations on how other states and the federal government are regulating AI, how AI differs from traditional computing and the existing use of AI in North Dakota state government agencies. The day will end with a presentation on the relationship between the data center industry and the energy sector. Tony Clark, a former public service commissioner in North Dakota and the current executive director of the National Association of Regulatory Utility Commissioners, will brief lawmakers on this topic. Clark is also a member of the committee. North Dakota lawmakers zero in on AI, data centers Links to the presentations typically are added to the online agenda in the 24 hours before the start of a legislative committee meeting. Clark and former North Dakota University System Chancellor Mark Hagerott, who has expertise in AI, will join 10 lawmakers on the committee. It is chaired by Rep. Jonathan Warrey, a Republican from Casselton. The committee was formed at the end of June in order to equip legislators with a foundation of knowledge on AI and data centers before the Legislature considers policy changes when it convenes in January. Warrey has previously said the committee will meet three to five times before the session and that some of the meetings may be field trips held in other parts of the state. The committee scheduled 45 minutes for comments from the public at 11:15 a.m. A livestream will be available through the legislative website. North Dakota Monitor reporter Jacob Orledge can be reached at jorledge@northdakotamonitor.com. SUBSCRIBE: GET THE MORNING HEADLINES DELIVERED TO YOUR INBOX. SUPPORT: YOU MAKE OUR WORK POSSIBLE Courtesy of North Dakota Monitor
	Traffic alert: Country star Luke Bryan at Vibrant in downtown Moline Friday night Drivers should expect traffic delays on River Drive in Moline this Friday night.
	Vehicle strikes GECU building, Rock Island Police in Rock Island responded to GECU, 2300 4th Avenue, for a report of a vehicle striking a building and leaving the scene. A pillar in the credit union's drive-through was heavily damaged, with chunks of brick scattered around the drive-through. A large chunk of brick went into a parking lot next to the credit [...]
	QC Arts unveils new mural at EveryChild Quad City Arts unveiled its latest mural this morning in Rock Island. The new mural at EveryChild, 420 23rd Street, was created by apprentices from Quad City Arts’ Metro Arts Apprenticeship Program, under the direction of lead artist Sarah Robb. The mural features paper cranes flowing from a starburst surrounding a parent and child, reflecting [...]
	New Mexico behavioral health committee signs off on $8M plan for northern region The Behavioral Health Reform and Investment Act Executive Committee met in Santa Fe on July 9, 2026, to approve the second of 13 regional plans to rebuild New Mexico's behavioral healthcare infrastructure. (Joshua Bowling/Source NM)The committee tasked with overseeing the reconstruction of New Mexico’s behavioral health care infrastructure on Thursday unanimously approved an $8 million plan for the second of 13 regional proposals aimed at doing so.SUBSCRIBE: GET THE MORNING HEADLINES DELIVERED TO YOUR INBOX. The Behavioral Health Reform and Investment Act Executive Committee met in Santa Fe to vote on the plan for Region 1, which includes Santa Fe, Rio Arriba and Los Alamos counties, the Jicarilla Apache Nation and a half-dozen pueblos. Region 1’s plan has five priorities: regional medical detox, recovery and crisis stabilization expansion; medication-assisted treatment expansion; workforce development; regional navigation and on-demand transportation services; and prevention efforts across the age spectrum. Detox efforts, in particular, have been a priority for local leaders in recent years. Nearly a year ago, Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham declared an emergency in Española, which is included in Region 1, and mobilized the National Guard to the area due to its outsized rate of fentanyl deaths. Overall, the plan comes with a funding request of more than $8 million, Nick Boukas, the executive committee chair and director of the state Health Care Authority’s Behavioral Health Services Division, said during Thursday’s meeting. Boukas praised local leaders for compiling a “very comprehensive plan” and, in particular, said he believes its age-based prevention efforts will prove fruitful by intervening in New Mexicans’ lives early. The executive committee had previously approved the regional plan for Region 2, which includes Bernalillo County and Albuquerque. Lujan Grisham signed the guiding legislation for this effort, which carved the state into 13 behavioral health regions mirroring the state’s 13 judicial districts, in 2025. The law was aimed at repairing the state’s behavioral health system after former Republican Gov. Susana Martinez accused several providers of fraud and froze their Medicaid payments, which led to an exodus of providers. In the nearly 18 months since Lujan Grisham signed the legislation, the process of implementing it has not always been smooth. At a recent interim legislative committee hearing, an Otero County official working to finalize one of the regional plans told lawmakers that he had often received “nebulous” goals from the many stakeholders in his community. And at a recent interim Legislative Finance Committee hearing, Administrative Office of the Courts Deputy Director Sarah Jacobs told lawmakers that the lack of a uniform governance structure across the 13 regions was leading to some friction and “varying politics at the local level.” A report presented at that hearing found that some residents still struggle to schedule behavioral health appointments despite the state investing nearly $844 million on the effort in recent years. Thursday’s meeting, however, gave officials overseeing the effort cause to be optimistic. Boukas told Source NM that, in addition to approving two regional plans this year, his committee is scheduled to review another nine at its August meeting, although the agenda has not yet been finalized. That would leave just two of the 13 outstanding. “I think it’s meaningful progress,” he said, adding that he hopes to have all 13 plans approved by the end of the year. “When you have new legislation, you want to move as quickly as possible, but you also want to be very mindful of how you’re doing it.” The process has felt long at times, in large part because each of the 13 plans will have significantly different details tailored to the areas’ respective needs, Boukas said. “They’re not just saying, ‘Give us money and we’ll figure it out later.’ They’re saying, ‘Here’s what we’re doing to do with this money,’” he said. “It might just take a little bit of time.” Courtesy of Source New Mexico
	Premiums rise, but overall costs could fall for NC State Health Plan members under a new system NC Treasurer Brad Briner and State Health Plan Administrator Tom Friedman talk about insurance plan finances on Aug. 15, 2025 (Photo: Lynn Bonner/NC Newsline)State health plan members will pay less for their care beginning next year if they use UNC Hospitals, Novant Health, and Iredell Health System under a new plan adopted to help lower costs for state employees and the State Health Plan. State Health Plan trustees on Friday agreed to contracts with three health systems designated as “preferred providers.” These are hospital systems that have agreed to lower prices for the Health Plan with the expectation that they will treat more of its members. The new strategy sorts providers into three groups. “Preferred” providers would offer patients the lowest out-of-pocket costs. “Access” providers would stay at current out-of-pocket costs, and “non-preferred” providers would cost plan members the most to use. Atrium Health, the state’s largest healthcare system, is a “non-preferred” provider network, so members who go there for care will pay some of the highest out-of-pocket costs. Some Duke/LifePoint hospitals and Granville Medical Center are also “non-preferred” providers where care will cost members more. The picture for the Triangle remains unfinished. Health Plan administrators are continuing to negotiate with Duke Health and WakeMed about becoming “access” providers, locations where out-of-pocket costs will remain unchanged. Tom Friedman, executive director of the State Health Plan, said the system has to change. “The status quo is bankrupting the State Health Plan and not getting members healthier,” he said. Big changes ahead for State Health Plan as trustees work to lower costs The Health Plan is using preferred provider contracts to help close its own deficit and reduce costs for members. The State Health Plan insures about 750,000 employees, dependents, and retirees. At the same time, the trustees adopted insurance premium increases of 5%. That would mean a monthly increase in premiums anywhere from $1.76 per month to $8.04 per month for individual coverage for members who are still working. Monthly premium increases for family coverage will range from $28.76 per month to $42.04 per month. Members’ premiums are based on salary bands the Health Plan began using this year. The size of the premium increases are based on members’ salaries and whether they’re enrolled in the standard or the plus plan. Ardis Watkins, executive director of the State Employees Association of North Carolina, said workers shouldn’t have to pay higher premiums when their raises haven’t kept up with inflation. State employees received no raises last year and most of them received a 3% raise this year. “We don’t want premium increases,” she said. “We think that’s absolutely wrong-headed.” She challenged the trustees to speak out against the Atrium Health merger with WakeMed, which is projected to increase healthcare costs. State Health Plan members will be able to save money even with premiums increasing if they use preferred providers because their out-of-pocket costs will be lower, Friedman said. “The premiums are going up with inflation,” he said. “There’s an opportunity for your costs to go down.” For example, the yearly deductible for an individual enrolled in the standard plan using preferred providers will be cut in half, dropping from $3,000 to $1,500. For the same person using a non-preferred provider, the yearly deductible will increase to $5,000. Some healthcare services, including trips to the emergency room, transplant services, cancer treatments, maternity care, and neonatal intensive care, will not cost more for members who use non-preferred hospitals. State Treasurer Brad Briner said the health plan is using its bargaining power as the largest commercial payer in the state to lower costs. Using preferred providers, members will pay 2012 prices for their health care, Briner said. “This is monumental. It’s thousands of dollars for the average member of the State Health Plan if they participate in the preferred provider program. Our members know that those thousands of dollars are much more important than the $2 to $4 premium increases.” Choosing preferred providers will likely be easier for some plan members than others. For example, in the Charlotte-Mecklenburg area, 54% of members use Atrium, a non-preferred provider. Taking advantage of the cost cuts will require some of them to seek treatment at different hospitals. “We have to communicate to a lot of different people in a lot of different places,” Friedman said. Courtesy of NC Newsline
	Gen Z’s political gender divide is now showing up in schools Gen Z’s political gender divide is now showing up in schoolsOn Nov. 5, 2024, men and women around the U.S. headed to the polls to decide a race hyped as a battle of the sexes.By evening’s end, Kamala Harris’ quest to punch through the “highest, hardest glass ceiling” and become America’s first female president lay in shambles. Donald Trump, the Republican Party’s undisputed alpha male since 2015, would return to the White House. And voters, especially the youngest ones, were themselves divided starkly on lines of gender.As in each of the three previous federal elections, women’s support for the Democratic ticket considerably exceeded men’s. But the gulf separating Americans between the ages of 18 and 29 was historically wide: According to an analysis by Catalist, a data and analytics company that contracts with progressive organizations, Harris won the backing of 63% of women and just 46% of men.The 17-point gap cleaving through Generation Z was not only bigger than that of every other age group; it was comfortably the largest Catalist had measured across four presidential cycles. Surveys of Trump’s approval conducted by NBC News corroborated the same trend the following year, showing disparities between the men and women of Gen Z that eclipsed smaller splits among Millennials, Gen Xers, and Baby Boomers. Catalist Jennifer Benz, a political scientist who leads the Associated Press-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research, said findings like that were consistent across surveys she administered prior to the Trump-Harris contest, as well as exit polling conducted at the end of the campaign. Men and women have generally favored different political parties for roughly a half-century, but it was unusual for newly minted voters to lead the way, she added.“What’s been notable about this younger generation is that the gender divide is already shaping up now, as opposed to when they age into the more typical partisan patterns we’ve seen over recent years,” Benz said.While Gen Z’s gender gap is a relatively new phenomenon, its features can already be seen in K-12 schools. They spring from the rancorous gender politics of the 2020s, which have left girls repelled by Trump’s policies and boys disaffected by Democrats’ seeming indifference to their concerns. Spencer Platt // Getty Images As the youngest “Zoomers” enter high school this year, they appear to be accelerating toward the political — and often social — estrangement already evident among their older brothers and sisters. Their stories, based on interviews with The 74 and supported by the insights of educators and public opinion researchers, offer a rare snapshot of that polarization as it takes shape. In America’s college dorms and high school homerooms, young adults are seeing the world differently, occupying separate online spaces and even demonstrating an aversion to dating.Sarah Campbell, a high school teacher in Brunswick, Maine, said she’d noticed a pronounced change in her social studies classroom. Earlier in her career, students broadly approached discussions of politics and public policy with open minds. But over the past 10 years, a growing number have entered those conversations “already aligned with certain ideas.” Peter Zay/Anadolu Agency // Getty Images “I’ve had girls talk about things like safety, rights or future opportunities in very real, personal ways, and in the same conversation, boys are questioning whether those issues are still relevant,” Campbell wrote in an email. “They’re not just disagreeing, they’re experiencing these issues from completely different realities.”‘Feminism rooted in me’Those distinct worldviews may have origins stretching long before adolescence. Celeste Lay, a professor at Tulane University who studies how young people acquire political beliefs, noted that their beginnings overlap with children’s early attempts to fashion adult identities for themselves.“At the same time young people are going through political socialization, they’re also going through gender socialization,” she said. “So as they’re developing their politics, they’re learning what it means to be a boy or a girl and what society says those concepts mean.”In a 2022 paper, Lay and several co-authors used survey data from more than 1,500 children to determine when they start to examine the world through the lens of partisanship. They discovered that kids as young as 6 are already tottering down the path to the ballot box, and nearly half the study’s participants affiliated with a party by the age of 12.A high school senior named Lily was once such a novice partisan. Raised in South Lyon, Michigan, along the outskirts of Metro Detroit, she was encouraged by liberal-minded parents to take an interest in U.S. history and current events. When she was 8, the Democrats nominated the first woman to lead a major party’s presidential ticket. After that, her course was set.“This sense of feminism rooted in me because my parents were letting me educate myself,” Lily recalled. “When Hillary Clinton was up against Trump, I was like, ‘There’s never been a female president! I have to support her.’” Justin Sullivan // Getty Images A decade after that formative electoral heartbreak, she spoke to The 74 while taking part in the National Student Leadership Council, a for-profit summer program offering learning experiences in a range of fields. Alongside a few dozen others with similarly arcane interests in bicameralism and campaign finance, Lily — whose last name has been withheld to allow her and her peers to speak freely about political matters — spent nine days last July at the Georgetown University campus. In between sessions, role-playing as U.S. congressmen, the group made field trips to walk the halls of the Capitol in person.Lily and her fellow government enthusiasts might reasonably be called some of the most civically engaged high schoolers in the nation. But countless girls her age followed a similar trajectory to both political consciousness and the political left.In the years spanning the Clinton and Biden administrations, the youngest female voters steadily warmed to the label of “liberal” (historically the least-popular ideological category). By 2023, Gallup research shows, the proportion of women aged 18-29 who described themselves as liberal had leapt from 28% to 40%, while liberal men of the same age stalled at 25% over the same period.The evolution was not merely rhetorical. Teenage and 20-something women adopted more progressive stances on the environment, abortion, gun rights, marijuana access, the Israel-Palestine conflict and an array of other cultural issues. Today, the women of Gen Z are commonly regarded as the single most liberal voter demographic.Marie Sarnacki, an English and history instructor in South Lyon, contrasted recent waves of female students with those in her own graduating class of 2009. While stipulating that she spoke only for herself, Sarnacki added that girls in 2026 had far fewer reservations about voicing feminist beliefs on some of the most pressing questions of the day.“I don’t know if they would give themselves the label, but it’s safe to say they’re more open about their concern for reproductive rights or supporting classmates who are gay,” she said.The elephant in the roomSarnacki believes that the ideological shift she has witnessed throughout 11 years in the classroom can be substantially explained by a corresponding development unfolding on the right.Trump’s presidencies, each achieved through the defeat of historic female candidacies, have repeatedly pushed debates around sexism and women’s rights to the center of the national agenda, she argued. From the Women’s March to the #MeToo-inflected Brett Kavanaugh hearings, the stunning demise of Roe v. Wade, and the president’s demeaning comments about various female antagonists, the Trump era may have hastened a leftward drift that was already in progress. Mario Tama // Getty Images Daniel Cox, director of the conservative American Enterprise Institute (AEI)’s Survey Center on American Life, agreed with Sarnacki. While women have lately gained ground against or even pulled ahead of men in some professional and educational spheres, he continued, many of the most “momentous cultural events” of the last 10 years led them to the conclusion that their rights were imperiled.“They were doing really well in higher education and high schools in terms of AP courses and graduation rates, and tons of statistics suggest that young women were comparatively doing better than men,” Cox said. “But when they looked around politics and the culture, they were upset about a lot of things and became politically active.”Public opinion research provides clear signs that their dissatisfaction remains high during the second Trump presidency — and is equally vivid among those too young to participate in elections. An AP-NORC survey from last summer revealed that, within a representative panel of children aged 13-17, girls were vastly more negative than boys in their assessments of Trump (-38 from females versus -7 favorability from male respondents) and the GOP (-16 from girls and +2 from boys), while also much warmer toward the Democratic Party (+13 from girls and -5 from boys). Andrew Lichtenstein // Corbis via Getty Images Trump’s macho stylings and media omnipresence play a crucial role in expanding the rift. Lily remarked that he has become an inescapable figure, whether in school or on social media. If anything, the president’s ubiquity was actually heightened by his reelection defeat in 2020, which lengthened his time in the spotlight.“He’s so loud, with all the scandalous things he’s done,” she said. “You can avoid the news, but you can’t avoid him.”Another participant in the NSLC’s Georgetown session was Cate, a junior enrolled at a small private school in Louisville, Kentucky. Like Lily, she said she was motivated by societal injustice to become involved in politics. Her father is gay, and his experiences were part of what spurred her to activism.But whether engaged in private discussions with friends or public outreach through her school’s Human Rights Club, Cate felt frustrated by her male classmates’ lack of interest in the politics of Kentucky or the wider world.She expressed particular disappointment with boys in her school who, she suspected, held views similar to hers but would not voice them out of fear of losing face with friends who “idolize” Trump’s brash manner. The gush of short-form entertainment glorifying the president on platforms like TikTok helped foster a hero worship that was difficult to puncture.It was understandable that young men would seek to emulate a powerful personality, Cate said, specifically citing the 2024 assassination attempt on Trump in Butler, Pennsylvania. The moment after that attack, when the then-candidate rose to his feet and exhorted his audience to “fight,” has become a centerpiece of video edits aimed at teenage boys, she said. Yet his influence heightened a dynamic in which “empathy is seen by this generation of men as weak, feminine.”“It gets into all this misogyny,” she lamented. “But women, who don’t care about that and can be empathetic loudly, are more able to share their political opinions.”‘Where am I in this equation?’Girls were not alone in observing the stridency of gender conflict. Nor were self-described progressives the only ones to complain about its occasionally personal nature.Nathan, a junior from the prosperous suburban enclave of Westfield, New Jersey, struck a note of bemusement when describing an oft-abused target of the online right: left-leaning white women, a category encompassing many of the students he’d met that week at Georgetown.“There’s a stereotype that liberal white women are self-hating,” he said. “And supposedly it’s not feminine, and it’s not attractive, and it’s not manly if you support it.”Voluble and direct, Nathan described himself as a “right-winger,” one of the few participating in the program. But he professed no admiration for political harangues mingled with sexism, and he objected to the treatment suffered by some of his gay classmates at home, who he said were frequently mocked in private.Instead, along with several other male students, he spent much of an hour-long conversation with The 74 lampooning the fixation of social authorities — including his school’s leaders — with identity politics. A multitude of perceived sins drew their attention, including the proliferation of various “heritage months” across the school calendar and the alleged maligning of the Founding Fathers in history curricula. The most annoying of these were dismissed as “virtue signaling.” The 74, Source: apnorc.org Many politically engaged young men share Nathan’s perspective on the newfound prominence of equity-focused language and policies.This is, in fact, a key distinction between male and female Zoomers. According to an AP-NORC poll released in 2022, Gen Z men and their Millennial counterparts were only about half as likely as women to “closely follow” news coverage of social issues. And while the rising salience of such causes, including LGBT rights and abortion, has clearly played a role in politically activating many American women, they do not appear to have galvanized men to support Democratic candidates.Catalist’s overview of the election results shows that both men and women became more likely to vote Republican between 2020 and 2024, but the gender gap across all ages was principally driven by men abandoning the Democratic Party.Monty, a junior from deep-blue San Diego, said that students attending his private high school were “extremely left,” and typically surrounded by friends and family members of the same mindset. A strong impulse to activism also pervaded the halls, he added, attracting a number of his peers to Pride marches and No Kings rallies over the past year.As Monty described it, the somewhat airless ideology of his school mirrored that of the larger progressive movement: Just as he’d periodically felt isolated during a long stretch of school assemblies commemorating the historic contributions of women and minority groups, a groundswell of “stranded people” was successfully targeted by the Trump campaign with identity-focused appeals.“You have all these other groups represented, and then you have a generation of these young white males saying, ‘Okay, where am I in this equation? Because I’m not Black, I’m not a woman, I’m not LGBTQ, and I don’t know where I’m going to fit into this,’” Monty said.Rachel Janfaza is an independent researcher who writes the newsletter The Up and Up, which aims to surface the attitudes of Gen Z for a national audience by convening focus groups and listening sessions around the United States. In an interview, she said Democrats had “fumbled” in 2024 with a critical group of potential male supporters.“I don’t think the Republican Party necessarily set out to attract young men from the start, but the Democratic Party being so coded as being friendly to women made it hard for young men to see themselves in that party,” Janfaza said. “A lot of the men I spoke to who voted for Trump in 2024 felt like they were still not being messaged to by the Democratic Party.”‘This system doesn’t benefit us’Part of the difficulty in communicating to Gen Z is the fact that, beneath the level of partisan affiliation, perceptions of society and gender often differ significantly.Nowhere is this clearer than in the respective views of men and women toward feminism, a cause that has continually gained public support since the 1960s. Women have always been more keen than men to accept the label of “feminist,” but a 2023 poll from AEI showed that over half of male Millennials said the term fit them personally; that figure was actually higher than the proportion of women from preceding generations who agreed with the description. The 74, Source: American Adolescence Survey, 2023 Yet far fewer of the youngest male respondents agreed. Zoomer men were only as likely as those in Gen X — a group more than twice their age — to call themselves feminists. Between that striking reversion and the leap in self-described feminism among younger women, Gen Z saw the widest gender gap on the issue of any age cohort.In the same survey, 23% of Gen Z men said they had experienced gender-based discrimination, a nearly fourfold increase over the oldest men included in the sample. Women are also increasingly likely to express this belief, with half of all Gen Z females saying they’d been discriminated against (compared with just 38% of Boomer women).Some fear that such sharp departures on fundamental questions will foment mutual resentment. Nathan, the New Jersey high schooler, said that boys his age were becoming embittered by a lack of recognition from the political left. In particular, he said that white males could be alienated from the Democratic Party in the same way that African Americans tossed aside their Republican allegiances in the 20th century.“I think a similar situation is happening with young white men,” Nathan said. “They’re like, ‘This system, this establishment, doesn’t benefit us in any way. We have no stake in maintaining it.â€˜”Meanwhile, dramatic developments in the political realm can leave residue in the social one. The interpersonal relations of men and women are under greater strain than at any time in the past few decades, epitomized by a plummeting number of teenagers exploring romantic relationships. While almost 90% of high school seniors reported that they’d gone out on at least one date in 1987, according to a recent poll by the Institute for Family Studies, only about half said the same in 2024.Competing partisanship seems to be at least partially responsible for the decline. In a poll conducted last year by NPR and PBS News, 60% of Zoomers agreed that it was “important to date or marry someone who shared your political views”; by contrast, 62% of respondents aged 60 or older said that politics didn’t carry much weight in matters of the heart. A broader report published last year on the American dating scene found that fully three-quarters of single women with a college degree said they would think twice before dating a Trump supporter.Campbell, the Maine social studies teacher, said she had seen both sides of the dichotomy in her high school class. Girls are increasingly hesitant to pair off, or even socialize, with male classmates. Boys jokingly attack one another as “simps” — a slang term for men desperate for the attention of women — and have become “much more likely to push back” in class discussions of gender differences.“There is almost a defensiveness in their attitude, as if I am trying to tell them they aren’t important and girls are,” Campbell wrote. “It is genuinely a shift that is concerning to me.”Lily, who now attends high school in State College, Pennsylvania, didn’t address her dating life. But she opined that the apparently right-wing outlook expressed by some boys may simply reflect their wish to fit in — an instinct with which she sympathized.“The same way we find ourselves in social situations where we’re pressured to join some clique, that’s present in our political positions too,” she said. “And guys experience that too. I just think they’re better at hiding it.”What comes next?Neither students, teachers, nor researchers could guess whether the gender gap would reverse with time or continue to grow.In his sixth year in office, young women haven’t relented in their loathing for Donald Trump. In fact, it might be said that American women and the Democratic Party have become increasingly synonymous, both measurably more feminist, more liberal, and more credentialed than they were a generation ago. According to Gallup data, 1 in 3 Democrats is now a college-educated woman.On the other hand, it is far from clear whether a sufficiently large number of today’s high school boys will reverse course and embrace the Democratic candidate in 2028. A recently released edition of the semiannual Yale Youth Poll showed that 68% of voters aged 18-22 disapprove of Trump’s performance in office, a four-point increase since the previous fall; still, men in that age range actually became less favorable toward the Democrats during that same five-month span.If national Republicans hope that disenchantment brings them an army of converts, they may find themselves disappointed. AEI’s Cox said the evidence from most polling and election results shows only that young men have become hostile toward Democrats — not that they have become doctrinaire conservatives.“I’m not even sure they like the Republicans that much, honestly,” Cox said. “It’s not so much that they’re attracted to the whole GOP agenda — it’s that, between the two parties, they’re looking at which one seems more receptive to the concerns they have.”Asher, visiting NLSC’s summer program from Pennsylvania’s solid-blue Delaware County, said he would have voted for the Democratic ticket in 2024 had he been old enough. The measured junior particularly came to admire Tim Walz after he was selected as Harris’ vice-presidential pick.Yet he critiqued the way in which the party sought to woo men as “pandering,” including an affinity group launched to rally “White Dudes for Harris,” and Walz’s misuse of football lingo. (The Minnesota governor later disclosed that he saw his ability to “code talk to white guys” as one of his major contributions to the campaign.)Nathan recalled an episode that saw Walz join Democratic Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez in a gaming session streamed on the popular service Twitch. “They had the most artificial attempts to win over men,” he marveled. “Tim Walz and AOC playing video games, and you could tell they weren’t actually playing. No one related to that!”Asher — happy to number himself among the relatively scarce white dudes for Harris, albeit one without a vote — said he hadn’t personally felt excluded from political debates with left-leaning classmates, but acknowledged that such conversations sometimes hinged on participants’ personal “credibility” to speak on specific issues.“I have seen that happen with people: ‘You don’t have female genitals, so you don’t get to have an opinion about abortion,’” he said.The Up and Up’s Janfaza said that similar complaints are a hallmark of her listening sessions with college undergraduates. Many feel as though their sentiments, goals, and desires are so diffuse that they are “talking past each other.”“When I ask young men and women, ‘Do you see a gender divide in your community?’ they are so quick to tell me that they feel men and women are on different playing fields,” she said. “This isn’t fun for anyone.”This piece was copublished with The 19th, a nonprofit newsroom covering gender, politics, policy, and power.This story was produced by The 74 and reviewed and distributed by Stacker.
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	Among the millions of Americans affected after the One Big Beautiful Bill Act, 100,000 Tennesseans lost SNAP food aid Among the millions of Americans affected after the One Big Beautiful Bill Act, 100,000 Tennesseans lost SNAP food aidAs she neared her 60th birthday, the stable pieces of Cassandra Doyle’s life began to fall away: first, she was laid off from her job. Then, her newly purchased used car died in the middle of the freeway.She depleted her savings and retirement to pay rent, while unsuccessfully trying to find a job with limited transportation. Ultimately, Doyle said, she decided to make a fresh start in Nashville, arriving in December from her hometown of Minneapolis-St. Paul.Weeks after she moved to Tennessee, Doyle was diagnosed with ovarian cancer.Living in a woman’s shelter while undergoing treatment at Vanderbilt University Medical Center, Doyle, in January, qualified for a $300 Supplemental Nutritional Assistance Program, or SNAP, to supplement the food provided at the shelter with the healthy and fresh foods her healthcare providers urged her to consume. She lost that benefit in April.“The notice said I was denied because I am able-bodied,” Doyle told Tennessee Lookout. Notice came from the Department of Human Services, which administers the federal program in Tennessee.Doyle joins about 100,000 people in Tennessee who have lost the federal food aid since July 2025, according to state enrollment data. In May of this year, 597,890 Tennesseans received some level of SNAP benefits, down from 696,000 people in July 2025, the data shows. One in 7 individuals who relied on the benefit last year no longer have it.The drop in enrollment coincides with a new law from the Trump administration that overhauled many of the program's rules. Beginning last July, the One Big Beautiful Bill Act cut $186 billion from the SNAP program, an 80-year-old federal program that provides individuals and families with low income a monthly cash benefit, loaded onto debit cards, to spend at the grocery store.The law also added and expanded the requirement to hold down a job or attend school as a condition of receiving the benefit: previously, the rules made exceptions for individuals over the age of 55, veterans, children aging out of foster care and individuals experiencing homelessness. Now, these individuals must work or attend training or school to get the food assistance.Doyle falls into two of the new categories: she is unhoused and over 55. She has applied for federal disability benefits, but these can take months, or even years, to obtain. In the meantime, she said that even if she felt physically well enough to work, her frequent cancer treatments and doctor’s appointments make it nearly impossible to find a job. John Partipilo // Tennessee Lookout “I’m just so close to saying, ‘forget it,’ and figuring out a way to get any job,” she said. A job would allow her to rent an apartment and move on with her life. “But the reason I haven’t done it is simply, with my medical stuff going on, who’s to say I wouldn’t end up homeless again in a few months?”“It’s frustrating, because I’m trying to do the right thing all the way through. That’s what it feels like, ‘You are doing what you are supposed to do, and you get penalized for it,” she said.A spokesperson for the Tennessee Department of Human Services said last week the agency does not track how many individuals lost benefits due to new work or other federal requirements imposed by the One Big Beautiful Bill Act. Individuals may roll on and off for a variety of reasons, including changes in their economic circumstances, job loss and job gains.“We do not have data available at this time specifically tracking the information you have requested,” the spokesperson said. “As previously mentioned, there are many factors that affect an individual’s SNAP eligibility.”Advocates with the Tennessee Justice Center, a Nashville-based nonprofit legal advocacy organization, said the steep drop in enrollment since the legislation’s adoption makes the correlation clear.“Tennesseans did not suddenly stop needing help putting food on the table,” said Signe Anderson, senior director of nutrition advocacy at the Tennessee Justice Center.“What changed was the law. New barriers and paperwork requirements have made it harder for working families, older adults, veterans, and children to access the nutrition assistance that they are qualified to receive.”Even as enrollment drops, the Department of Human Services has taken alternative steps to expand eligibility for certain individuals, the department spokesperson said.The state last month adopted a new category, referred to as “broad-based categorical eligibility,” that raises the income and asset limits for individuals and families to qualify for SNAP benefits.Previously, families’ gross income limit was 130% of the federal poverty guidelines. Under the newly adopted rules, the gross income limit was raised to 200% of the federal poverty guidelines. Under the former guidelines, families could not qualify if they had more than $3,000 in savings. The new Tennessee guidelines eliminate this asset test.The federal government has long permitted states to adopt the broad-based categorical eligibility rules. Tennessee was the 47th state to adopt them, according to the Tennessee Justice Center.This story was produced by Tennessee Lookout and reviewed and distributed by Stacker.
	Crime Stoppers Solved: Man wanted by Rock Island police on charges of sexual abuse and assault arrested Christian Beard is wanted by the Rock Island County Sheriff’s Office for failure to appear for armed violence.
	Visit Quad Cities announces new board chair, board members Visit Quad Cities has announced its FY2026-2027 board of directors. Neil Dahlstrom will serve as board chair, succeeding Jennifer Sautter, a news release says. Dahlstrom has served on the board since 2022. He currently leads Heritage Marketing for John Deere and is Deere’s official archivist, serving the company for more than 25 years. “I am [...]
	A major housing bill is set to become law at midnight — even though Trump says he won't sign President Trump says he is refusing to sign the bill without Congress first passing his sweeping voter ID bill.
	Milan Harvest Festival returns this Labor Day weekend Enjoy four days of family fun at the 2026 Milan Harvest Festival in Camden Park, 1247 32nd Ave E, this Labor Day Weekend. This year's festival offers more excitement with a larger layout, more attractions and activities for all ages. The festival grounds will have carnival rides, food vendors, live entertainment, a fireworks display, a [...]
	Taking a summer vacation thanks to AI Taking a summer vacation thanks to AIBefore AI took hold of the financial advisory landscape, it was more challenging for advisors to take a day off or go on a summer vacation. That involved a lot of trust in their teammates and technology’s capabilities, let alone whatever efforts it took to go on the trip.But now with the adoption of AI assistants, many more advisors are looking forward to leveraging some more newfound freedom this summer thanks to AI assistants. Advisors utilizing AI can save time thanks to the efficiencies it allows them and their team to achieve. That could be a long lunch or stacked up to create regular three-day weekends.Catching Everything Even When You’re Not at Your DeskFor Danielle Darling, CDFA, founder of Darling Wealth Management, she’s often traveling either with clients or having interactions with them while away from her desk.“We’ll have a conversation, and then I’ll plug it in my CRM,” Darling tells Jump. “And then when it comes time to schedule the initial call, the notes or the pre-meeting prep already pops up.”Enabling Delegation of Responsibility“I no longer feel like my brain is the only place where the essence of client conversations live, allowing me to step away from my desk with confidence,” said Emily Rassam, CFP, partner at Archer Investment Management. “As a result, I also save time during the workday and experience far fewer interruptions, since my team can access the context they need to follow through on post-meetings tasks without coming to me for clarification.”And since AI assistants have become that centralized repository where all team members get their information and tasks to complete, Sarah Cicero, CFP, financial advisor at StoneBridge Advisors, has saved time and energy from having to delegate tasks to her teammates while she’s away. Since her AI assistant is enabled on all her meetings, when Cicero was recently out of town performing eight annual review meetings, her team reviewed the notes from each interaction and began performing their associated tasks shortly thereafter, without any prompting from Cicero.What would this situation have been like before AI assistants?“In the past, that would have meant balancing meaningful client conversations with the constant task of taking detailed notes, documenting action items, and making sure my team had everything they needed once I returned,” Cicero said. “It’s a great example of how AI can strengthen continuity and collaboration while allowing advisors to focus on what matters most: the client relationship.”Furthering TrustFor Matthew Koppelman, CFP, cofounder of Precision Wealth Planners, a self-proclaimed “control freak,” his AI assistant enables him to review how client interactions and tasks are being completed while he’s away from the office without letting the team know what he’s doing. Given that the boss calling while on vacation tends to make everyone’s stomach drop, this saves his employees anxiety and fear while also “scratching the itch” as he termed it to see how everything’s going while he’s away.Bringing in Pinch Hitters Without Much DisturbanceDrew Boyer, CFP, founder of Boyer Financial Group, recently had his long-time office assistant away on her honeymoon at the same time as his new junior planner was on his first vacation as part of the Boyer Financial Group. While this could have meant that Boyer had to split himself into three to cover all the different duties, instead, his wife assisted by answering phones. Boyer’s wife is not a financial advisor and was not familiar with these clients.Being in Two Places at OnceAmanda Dunlap, RFC, chief executive officer of Absolute Financial Planning, is both the owner of a financial planning business in Texas and a campground company in central New York. Given the rather large distance between those two destinations, her firm has always leaned on creativity, ingenuity, and technological advances to make everything work as seamlessly as possible. Her AI assistant has allowed her to feel as if she’s in Texas with her team and clients who are being well served by others while she can be at the fireside, literally, managing her other business.“Being physically separated from the office can sometimes create challenges around communication and continuity, leaving team members feeling disconnected from client conversations and ongoing account activity,” Dunlap noted. “With AI-powered meeting notes and workflows, any member of our team can quickly access the context they need, understand next steps, and provide seamless support to clients without waiting for my involvement.”Will Hoffman, AIF, president at Hoffman Wealth Management, sympathizes as he’s had his AI assistant on during meetings, as he’s been on a long drive or other trip with his young sons.When does Hoffman feel grateful for his AI assistant?“When I’m in the middle of North Carolina driving to Florida or in the middle of an airport chasing a 7-year-old the wrong way down a people mover and in the middle of a phone conversation, and nothing gets missed, even though I know I’m missing something in that moment,” he says. “Our clients don’t even realize that we are unfortunately missing part of this conversation, but everything’s still getting done as effectively as possible.”This story was produced by Jump and reviewed and distributed by Stacker.
	Officials monitor potential exposures after Iowa's first measles case of 2026 DES MOINES, Iowa – Iowa has confirmed its first measles case of 2026, and Polk County health officials are working to prevent additional spread. The Polk County Health Department says the infected adult had been traveling internationally and was vaccinated. Officials have identified locations the individual visited where potential exposures may have occurred. You can [...]
	A beautiful, sunny weekend After some cloudy skies and a bit of some rain from yesterday and today, things are clearing up for the weekend. Temperatures will range in the upper 80s for Saturday and Sunday with lots of clear skies and sunshine to help you get outside. That is before we get back to some hotter temperatures in [...]
	These three artists are poised to invade the top of the pop charts We're in that phase of summer pop doldrums when the same songs seem to be on repeat week after week. Can Stella Lefty, Yung Miami or Malcolm Todd make a run to crack the top 10?
	May cause joy: The full-spectrum health benefits of dance May cause joy: The full-spectrum health benefits of dance When musician David Byrne, the founder of Reasons to be Cheerful, performed at the sold-out Dolby Theatre in Los Angeles last fall, the entire crowd was on its feet for almost the entire show. They danced enthusiastically for nearly two hours straight, feeling a kind of unfiltered joy that’s rare to access in everyday life. The experience was a reminder of a long-dormant love of dance. The following month brought a sign-up for “Groove Therapy” with local dance teacher Leah Lynn. The youngest in our group is 16, the oldest over 70. Every Saturday, the class plays out a verb each participant brings to class — release, gather, resist, invite — translating abstract intentions into motion. It sounds faintly ridiculous. It is also disarmingly effective. Within minutes, something shifts. Stress loosens. Then for the next hour, the group learns hip-hop shuffles and swings their hips to Kool & the Gang or Beyoncé. The class ends with the same feeling each time: exhausted and exhilarated.The dance classes provoked such a profound shift in mood as well as in the body that it was worth finding out if there was more to it. Eddie Marritz // Dance for PD Modern research is now increasingly suggesting that dance is medicine, a deeply effective intervention for physical, cognitive, and emotional health. Behind the feel-good performance lies hard science. On a purely physical level, dance improves cardiovascular fitness, strength, and coordination. In a longitudinal study, seniors who took part in regular dance training fell less often and were described as “physically better off and mentally fitter” than those in the control group. Though the body benefits are impressive, the neurological ones are what make scientists lean forward. Dancing activates a wide network: auditory pathways, visual and motor cortex, the amygdala, and, above all, the somatosensory cortex and networks that keep track of where your body is in space. Each change in rhythm or melody is processed in milliseconds and translated into new steps, adjustments, and expressions, a form of real-time “multitasking” that pushes the brain harder than many other sports.Nobody understands this better than the dozen people who gather for David Leventhal’s class at a dance studio in Brooklyn. Though it’s cold outside, Leventhal is conjuring a beach. “Visualize what that warmth feels like,” he says, brushing his hands over his arms as if applying sunscreen. “Can we take those waves in different directions, just like they do in the ocean?” Around him, a dozen bodies begin to ripple to the tune of the pianist in the room. Arms slice, float and curl through the air. For a moment, the bare white room is less clinic than coastline. Eddie Marritz // Dance for PD Leventhal, who danced for 13 years with the Mark Morris Dance Group, has spent the last quarter century leading a different kind of choreography: Dance for PD, a program for people living with Parkinson’s disease. What began in Brooklyn in 2001 now reaches more than 30 countries and roughly 500 communities. Across the room, people who arrived with their shoulders slightly caved inward now stand taller. They trace arcs through space, step through a tango phrase, and turn what might otherwise register as tremor into jazz hands. Amber Star Merkens // Dance for PD Participants in the program, which was created by the Mark Morris Dance Group and the Brooklyn Parkinson Group, routinely report better balance, more confidence walking, and a renewed sense of self. But just as often, they mention something less clinical and more essential: joy.“I sometimes cannot walk, but I can dance,” participant Cyndy Gilbertson said in the documentary Capturing Grace. “The music leads, in other words; it’s not my brain telling me to take a step.” You don’t need a severe diagnosis to benefit from dance. “Dance has been part of our human culture for millennia,” Leventhal points out. “It’s how we communicate, how we express emotion, how we find each other, how we build community.” Across cultures, from Indigenous North American traditions to Māori and Pacific Islander practices, dance has also long been intertwined with healing. Amber Star Merkens // Dance for PD Over time, this seems to change the brain’s structure. A German study that followed older adults in a dance program for more than a year reported increases in gray matter volume and synaptic density in regions important for memory and executive function, along with preserved cognitive performance over five years of follow-up. The researchers found that dancing appeared to build “cognitive reserve” and was “the best prevention” against age-related cognitive decline in their cohort, with dancers showing a statistically lower risk of dementia than nondancers.Those findings dovetail with a widely cited observational study: People who danced more than once a week had a 76% lower risk of developing dementia than those who danced less often, an association reported as stronger than that seen with many popular “brain games.”“It’s a full-spectrum activity,” Leventhal explains. “It engages the body, cognition, emotion, and social connection — all supported by music.” Amber Star Merkens // Dance for PD The real power, he argues, lies in the overlap. “The benefits come from the synergy among those domains.” Amber Star Merkens // Dance for PD That synergy matters especially for Parkinson’s, which affects motor control, cognition, emotional expression and social engagement. Many people withdraw from public life as symptoms progress. “The beauty of this art form,” Leventhal says, “is that it’s a full-spectrum intervention for a full-spectrum condition.”In a large meta-analysis of 55 randomized controlled trials in Parkinson’s disease, dance emerged as the most effective of nine exercise interventions for improving balance in that analysis, outperforming even advanced rehabilitation technologies. Styles like tango, waltz and foxtrot have been shown to improve gait speed and reduce falls. While there is no cure for Parkinson’s, some early research suggests that dance can slow down the progression significantly for some people. “It’s early evidence,” Leventhal says carefully. “But exercise may be one of the only disease-modifying approaches we have.”“Our auditory cortex synchronizes with the motor cortex,” Leventhal explains — a mechanism particularly relevant in Parkinson’s, where internal rhythm is disrupted by dopamine loss. External rhythm can step in as a kind of substitute metronome. “It creates a roadmap,” Leventhal says. “Someone described it as a red carpet rolling out in front of them.” For people who struggle to initiate movement, that cue can be transformative, enhancing neuroplasticity — the brain’s ability to form new connections. “Novelty is huge,” Leventhal says. “New patterns, new music, new movement.” But novelty alone isn’t enough. “When something is also meaningful to you — when it connects emotionally, that’s when the brain is really activated.” Eddie Marritz // Dance for PD Another, more practical advantage: People keep coming back. Some participants have been dancing with Leventhal for over 16 years. People are welcome at all stages of Parkinson’s. Some arrive in a wheelchair, others have recently been diagnosed. “If people can get to class, they stay,” Leventhal says. That kind of adherence is rare in exercise programs, especially for chronic conditions. The reason, again, circles back to neuroscience. Motivation is tied to dopamine, the very neurotransmitter depleted in Parkinson’s. Apathy is common. Getting on a treadmill can feel like scaling a wall. Dance, by contrast, lowers the barrier.“The combination of music, social interaction, and movement is highly motivating,” Leventhal says. “Some people come to see their friends and stay for the movement. Some come for the music.” Amber Star Merkens // Dance for PD And one more factor he considers crucial: “We don’t treat people as patients,” he says. “You’re a dancer. You’re learning a craft.” Eddie Marritz // Dance for PD When we move rhythmically, stress hormones like adrenaline and cortisol decline while the brain’s own reward chemicals — endorphins, dopamine, serotonin — surge, a set of “pleasure cycles” documented by researchers at Aarhus University who studied how music and synchronized movement generate feelings of social bonding and euphoria. For people living with depression, anxiety or trauma, dance offers something more subtle: a way back into the body. According to a 2024 review, dance can be more effective in alleviating depressive symptoms than any other form of exercise. Where distress constricts expression, dance expands it. Amber Star Merkens // Dance for PD Plenty of workouts happen with headphones and in isolation. Dance, by contrast, almost always involves connecting with others. Social neuroscientists have shown that moving in synchrony with others increases liking, trust, and willingness to help. “We entrain to each other,” Leventhal says. “And that raises empathy, connection.” For people with Parkinson’s, the stakes are higher than mood or fitness. The disease is the fastest-growing neurodegenerative condition in the world. By the time it is diagnosed, estimates suggest that roughly 70% of dopamine-producing cells are already lost. Which makes timing critical. “We want people to start earlier,” Leventhal says — not just to maintain function, but to build skills and resilience before symptoms advance.At the end of Leventhal’s class, the participants play an imaginary volleyball game, batting an invisible ball through the air. “We won, you won, we all won!“ Leventhal cheers, and all arms lift in victory.This story was produced by Reasons to be Cheerful and reviewed and distributed by Stacker.
	Hy-Vee and Birdies for Charity donate thousands to 10 local organizations Hy-Vee and Birdies for Charity have partnered to award $1,000 each to ten Quad Cities nonprofits to support their community work.
	Trump administration targets state AI laws over ideology A laptop shows Grok, an artificial intelligence chatbot developed by Elon Musk's company xAI. The Trump administration is continuing its pushback against state AI laws that it views as ideologically biased. (Photo by Robbie Sequeira/Stateline)The Trump administration is continuing its pushback against state artificial intelligence laws that it views as ideologically biased, proposing a new Federal Trade Commission policy. The proposed policy statement, which is open for public comment through July 31, would affect how the FTC regulates AI companies. The agency said it’s meant to address concerns that “AI companies that distort their systems’ outputs to achieve undisclosed ideological objectives” could be deceiving consumers in violation of federal law. “The FTC wants to hear from businesses and consumers about their experiences and concerns regarding the subversion of AI systems for ideological ends,” Chairman Andrew N. Ferguson said in a statement. The proposal specifically mentions a first-of-its-kind Colorado law that had banned “algorithmic discrimination,” or AI output that might lead to decisions disfavoring people on jobs, loans or healthcare based on their race, religion, gender and other protected categories. But the Colorado legislature already has repealed that provision. The revamped law instead focuses on regulating technology that results in “consequential decisions” for consumers. The controversial law prompted a lawsuit from xAI, Elon Musk’s artificial intelligence company, which the U.S. Department of Justice supported. In December 2025, President Donald Trump issued an executive order targeting state AI laws, including creation of a Department of Justice AI Litigation Task Force to challenge state AI laws. His order also directed the FTC to issue a policy statement on regulation of state laws that “require alterations to the truthful outputs of AI models.” Stateline asked the FTC if there were any state and city laws that officials felt were currently in violation of federal laws, but received no response. States will keep pushing AI laws despite Trump’s efforts to stop them Tyler Thompson, a Denver-based lawyer with firm Reed Smith who tracks emerging technology law, said the FTC proposal is important because it raises the possibility that companies could face deceptive-practices claims based on how they tune, weight or steer AI models, which could also prompt state policy on the issue. “Just the fact that companies could be tweaking their models and that could lead to a deceptive trade practice, I think is huge news,” Thompson said. Thompson believes the legal battle and the FTC’s focus on restricting similar laws will lead to “a more niche” policy focus on AI – such as deepfakes, nonconsensual sexual content, children’s safety, companion chatbots and data centers — areas where there is bipartisan agreement. Noah M. Kenney, founder and principal consultant of Digital 520, an AI governance, security and privacy consultancy, who also responded to the FTC’s request for public comment, said the proposed statement carries more political pressure rather than being an enforceable federal regulation. “The real effect of this statement is signaling and pressure, not legal preemption, especially paired with the December executive order’s AI litigation task force.” Kenney said there is also an irony in the federal government’s argument. “A federal effort to dictate what counts as a ‘neutral’ or ‘accurate’ output raises its own First Amendment concerns about compelled speech,” he said. Stateline reporter Robbie Sequeira can be reached at rsequeira@stateline.org. SUPPORT: YOU MAKE OUR WORK POSSIBLE Courtesy of Stateline
	Once dismissed as weeds, native plants are now flying off the shelves Once dismissed as weeds, native plants are now flying off the shelvesRenee Costanzo cranked on the rusty pulley with both hands, watching the greenhouse roof creak open in sections. A breeze of spring air swept over 12,000 seedlings lined up in plastic trays in the Kilbourn Park greenhouse.Costanzo, the Chicago Park District’s only full-time employee at the north-side greenhouse, spearheads a months-long effort to grow more than 15,000 plants, including vegetables, greens, and flowers, to get them ready in time for the Kilbourn Park’s annual plant sale.The massively popular sale, which took place in May, typically draws upwards of 1,100 people every year, with local gardeners lining up around the park waiting to snatch up plants at $4 a piece. But this year, Grist reports, attendance broke records — more than 2,300 shoppers turned out.“We generally start these annuals at the end of February,” said Costanzo, pointing to rows of popular annual flowers like zinnias, marigolds, and geraniums, which provide bright blooms all summer long before dying at the end of the season. “So we’ve been coddling and loving these babies for months now, and we just want to get them into happy homes.” Manuel Martinez // WBEZ For decades, Chicago gardeners flocked to the Kilbourn Park sale to pick up tomatoes, cucumbers, and some annuals — the standard starter kit for backyard gardeners. But this year, the park responded to a relatively new demand: Nearly 1 in 5 plants for sale are native plant species that have adapted to the local climate and wildlife and are generally low maintenance.“Just in the last five years, people have asked for more natives, which is why we’ve been increasing our production,” said Costanzo, who experimented with 30 different native species in November ahead of the plant sale this year.For a long time, native plants were seen as little more than weeds, but their value has grown significantly in recent years. Other local plant sales across Chicago and the country are incorporating native species at a pace surprising to even veteran horticulturalists who remember a time when they couldn’t give them away.“I’ve watched this for 44 years, from almost zero to now,” said Neil Diboll, the president of Prairie Nursery, a Wisconsin-based nursery dedicated to growing and shipping native plants across the country.“It’s not a fad,” Diboll said. “This is a long, steady climb.”Last year, Diboll said his nursery experienced a 7% increase in native plant sales. This year, they’re shipping out about 500,000 plants and even more seeds. Back in 1982, when Diboll first started selling plants, business was tougher: The company grossed just over $13,000. These days, he said, “you can add a few zeros on there.”That relatively new mainstream demand has been driven, in part, by concerns about dramatic declines in insect species and climate change-powered extreme heat, drought, and flooding. The caterpillars of the Monarch butterfly, for example, depend on native milkweed as a food source. But as land use patterns have changed, local milkweed species have disappeared, leading to recent declines in Monarch populations. Manuel Martinez // WBEZ “Native plants have been adapting to change for thousands of years,” said Tiffany Jones, who leads habitat education throughout the Great Lakes region for the National Wildlife Federation. “They need less water, less maintenance, and they’re incredibly resilient — not to mention they help flood prevention with their deep root systems and provide habitat for all kinds of crucial species and pollinators. They’re practical and beautiful.”In Minnesota, Becky Klukas-Brewer, co-owner and head of marketing and sales at Prairie Moon Nursery, a popular native plant nursery, said the Midwest greenhouse is shipping more plants and seeds than ever before. “In the last seven years, we have seen a 350% increase in sales, which is pretty awesome,” said Klukas-Brewer. At the same time, the 44-year-old nursery has seen its orders triple. She credits that success, in part, to the growing number of local plant sales across the country, drumming up interest in ecologically minded gardening.For nearly 50 years, Wild Ones, a national nonprofit, has been educating the public about the benefits of reintroducing native plants back into their habitat. What started as a gardening club in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, has ballooned into a nationwide organization with over 14,000 gardening enthusiasts putting on plant sales, seed giveaways, and exchanges. The group has also been noticing an uptick in native plant sales.Over 110,000 native plants were sold last year through the organization’s 107 plant sales, according to Josh Nelson, development director with the Wild Ones. He added that another 40,000 native plants were distributed as part of the group’s various programs. Manuel Martinez // WBEZ As the native plant business continues to grow, the annual Kilbourn Park plant sale is helping meet some of that demand. To make it happen, a team of local volunteers came out on a weekly basis over several months to help sort, pot, and move seedlings.“It’s completely worth it,” said Lourdes Valenzuela, a retired schoolteacher who has volunteered at the north side plant sale for 12 years. Valenzuela is part of the Friends of Kilbourn Park Greenhouse, a dedicated group of local volunteers who fundraise to help expand the resources at the nursery. With help from funds collected at previous plant sales, they’ve been able to buy benches, a shed, and even a patio — increasing the footprint of the educational center. The goal this year was to raise $25,000, about half of the total projected cost, for a new outdoor learning center. But Valenzuela said the plant sale was a huge hit, and they easily surpassed the goal. The Chicago Park District confirmed the sale generated approximately $48,000.“We literally sold every possible plant, all the compost, lots of baked goods,” she said. “We’re not fighting against the climate here. We’re working with it because it’s what’s native to this area, and they’re beautiful.”This story is a partnership between Grist and Chicago Public Media, a public media company serving the Chicago metropolitan region.This story was produced by Grist and reviewed and distributed by Stacker.
	Extra patrols deploying across RI Co. to target speeding, seat belts, and impaired drivers Rock Island County deputies are launching extra patrols this July to crack down on speeding, seat belt violations, and driving under the influence.
	USA 250, Algeria 64: A shared weekend of independence days among World Cup allies A silhouette is cast against the Algerian flag held up by fans at the Cortège Parade at the DoubleTree in Lawrence. (Photo by Naomi Sui Pang)LAWRENCE — The bond built between this college town and the Algerian national soccer team during its World Cup stay came together last weekend with back-to-back independence days. On July 4, Americans celebrated the 250th anniversary of their break from British rule, tossing tea in Boston Harbor and launching a democracy that would grow into a world superpower. On July 5, Algerians remembered how they freed themselves from the French 64 years ago by pulling their children out of colonial schools and waging a war of independence that took 1.5 million lives. The weekend of fireworks came amid a World Cup love affair between people in and around Lawrence who chart their country’s birth to 1776 and the visiting Algerians who celebrate the retaking of their sovereignty in 1962. (The Algerians voted for their independence on July 1, 1962, and formalized the decision on July 5). For the Algerians, who survived 132 years under the French, the memories are fresher. The cost of fighting for independence feels more raw. “It’s a day of pride and loyalty commemorating the sacrifices of the martyrs and freedom fighters who struggled for Algeria’s liberation,” said Ibrahim Le Seul, who said he came to Lawrence from Algeria five years ago at age 39. “I feel pride, gratitude and respect, and I reflect on the magnitude of the sacrifices made to achieve freedom. For Lawrence travel adviser Imad Mido, July 5 represents more than a historical milestone. “It is a symbol of freedom, dignity and the rebirth of national identity after 132 years of colonialism,” Mido said via Facebook. Stories of Algerian resistance are passed through families, classrooms and national commemorations. They include things like non-violent resistance and the boycott of French schools through the Refus Scolaire, or school refusal, movement. Many Algerian families withdrew their children from from the colonial education system, which was seen as a French effort to replace Algerian identity, language and culture with French values. Algerians established independent schools where students learned Arabic, Algerian history and Islamic traditions to help preserve their national identity. “Algerian history has taught me resilience and courage, and the importance of preserving freedom, unity and national identity,” Le Seul said via Facebook. Algeria’s independence resonated far beyond its borders, inspiring liberation movements across Africa and Asia during the 1960s that Le Seul said proved “that independence is possible.” Algerians around the world gather for festivals, concerts, cultural performances and traditional meals on July 5. National flags decorate homes and public spaces while patriotic songs recall the country’s journey to freedom. Le Seul said those traditions help preserve the country’s history while strengthening community bonds. “It brings people together,” he said. As younger generations grow further removed from the events of 1962, preserving the history behind Independence Day has become increasingly important to Le Seul. He said he hopes storytelling will ensure those sacrifices are never forgotten. “Glory and eternity to our righteous martyrs, and long live Algeria,” he said. This article was written for a class at the University of Kansas’ William Allen White School of Journalism and Mass Communications and distributed through the Kansas Press Association. Courtesy of Kansas Reflector
	The quest to build a better AI tutor The quest to build a better AI tutorIt’s easy to get swept up in the hype about artificial intelligence tutors. But the evidence so far suggests caution.Some studies have found that chatbot tutors can backfire because students lean on them too heavily, get spoonfed solutions, and fail to absorb the material. Even when AI tutors are designed not to give away answers, they haven’t consistently produced better results than learning the old-fashioned way without AI.Still, researchers who have produced these skeptical studies haven’t given up hope. Some are still experimenting, trying to build better AI tutors. One promising idea has less to do with how an AI tutor explains concepts and more with what it asks students to practice next. In this story, The Hechinger Report examines how researchers are experimenting with new approaches to AI tutoring and personalized learning.A team at the University of Pennsylvania, which included some AI skeptics, recently tested one new approach to AI tutoring in a study of close to 800 Taiwanese high school students learning Python programming. All the students used the same AI tutor, which was designed not to give away answers.But there was one key difference. Half the students were randomly assigned to a fixed sequence of practice problems, progressing from easy to hard. The other half received a personalized sequence with the AI tutor continuously adjusting the difficulty of each problem based on how the student was performing and interacting with the chatbot.The idea is based on what educators call the “zone of proximal development.” When problems are too easy, students get bored. When they’re too hard, students get frustrated. The goal is to keep students in a sweet spot: challenged but not overwhelmed.The researchers found that students in the personalized group did better on a final exam than students in the fixed problem group. The difference was characterized as the equivalent of six to nine months of additional schooling, an eye-catching claim for an after-school online course that lasted only five months. The AI tutor’s inventor, Angel Chung, a doctoral student at the Wharton School, acknowledged that her conversion of statistical units was “not a perfect estimate.” (A draft paper about the experiment was posted online in March 2026 but has not yet been published in a peer-reviewed journal.)Still, this is early evidence that small tweaks — in this case, calibrating the difficulty of the practice problems to the student — can make a difference.Chung said that ChatGPT’s responses may already feel very personal because they are directly responding to a student’s unique questions. But that level of personalization isn’t enough. “Students usually don’t know what they don’t know,” said Chung. “The student doesn’t have the ability to ask the right questions to get the best tutoring.”To address this, Chung’s team combined a large language model with a separate machine-learning algorithm that analyzes how students interact with the online course platform — how they answer the practice questions, how many times they revise or edit their coding, and the quality of their conversations with the chatbot — and uses that information to decide which problem to serve up next.In other words, personalization isn’t just about tailoring explanations. It’s about tailoring the learning path itself.That idea isn’t new.Long before generative AI tools like ChatGPT were invented, education researchers developed “intelligent tutoring systems” that tried to do something similar: estimate what a student knew and deliver the right next problem. These earlier systems couldn’t produce natural conversations, but they could provide hints and instant feedback. Rigorous studies found that well-designed versions helped students learn significantly more.Their Achilles’ heel was engagement. Many students simply didn’t want to use them.Today’s AI tools could help address that problem. Students might feel more interested in a chatbot that converses with them in an almost human way.In the University of Pennsylvania study, students in the personalized group spent more time practicing, about three additional minutes per problem, adding up to about an hour per module in the Python course, compared with half as much time (a half hour or less) for the comparison students. The researchers think these students did better because they were more engaged in their practice work.Students’ previous knowledge of a subject affected how well the personalized sequencing worked. Students who were new to Python gained more than those who already had Python experience, who did just as well with the fixed sequence of practice problems. Students from less elite high schools also appeared to benefit more.All the Taiwanese students in this study volunteered for an optional computer programming course that could strengthen their college applications. Many were highly motivated, with highly educated parents, and many already had prior coding experience.It’s not clear whether the chatbot would work as well with less motivated students who are behind at school and most in need of extra help.One possible solution: fusing new and old.Ken Koedinger, a professor at Carnegie Mellon University and a pioneer of intelligent tutoring systems, is experimenting with using new AI models to alert remote human tutors who can motivate struggling students who are drifting off. “We are having more success,” said Koedinger.Humans aren’t obsolete — yet.This story also appeared in Mind/ShiftThis story was produced by The Hechinger Report, a nonprofit, independent news organization that covers education, and reviewed and distributed by Stacker.
	Davenport residents invited to meet new police chief, assistant chief Meet Davenport's new Police Chief Greg Behning and Assistant Chief Jason Smith at a community meet and greet on July 27
	NV tobacco taxes need to be reformed, reallocated, and raised, coalition says The coalition estimates a tax increase would result in a 12% decrease in youth smoking and prevent 4,000 children from becoming adult smokers. (Photo: Hugh Jackson/Nevada Current)A coalition of health organizations are urging lawmakers to consider nearly doubling Nevada’s cigarette tax and dedicating some of that funding to tobacco prevention and cessation programs. “Today we’re generating significant tobacco revenue but investing very little back into helping people quit or preventing youth from starting,” said Jennifer Atlas, the Nevada government relations director for the American Cancer Society Cancer Action Network. ACS CAN is part of the Nevada Tobacco Control & Smoke-free Coalition, which presented policy recommendations to the Interim Legislative Committee on Revenue on Wednesday. The coalition also includes the Southern Nevada Health District and American Lung Association. Nevada’s cigarette tax is currently set at $1.80 per pack, a rate last adjusted in 2015. The average rate nationally is $2.05 per pack. The smoke-free coalition recommends raising Nevada’s cigarette tax by $1.75 per pack and raising the “other tobacco products” tax to 47% of wholesale price to achieve tax parity. Currently, OTPs — the category that captures e-cigarettes and vape products and some alternative nicotine products — are taxed at 30% of wholesale. The coalition estimates these changes would bring in an additional $65.8 million annually, even after factoring in expected reductions in sales. It would also lead to a decrease in smoking, particularly among young smokers. The coalition estimates a tax increase would result in a 12% decrease in youth smoking and prevent 4,000 children from becoming adult smokers. “These are measurable health outcomes that translate into healthier families and lower long-term healthcare costs for Nevada,” said Atlas. Tobacco trends The rate of Nevada high school students smoking cigarettes has gone from 18.3% in 2005 to 4.4% in 2025, according to a youth tobacco use survey. But vaping remains a major concern. In 2025, 34.3% of Nevada high school students reported using vape products 20 or more days in the past month — a threshold public health officials consider chronic use. Among middle school students, the rate is 16.5%. Cigarettes remain the more popular choice among adults in Nevada, according to a 2023 survey, which put the rate of cigarette use at 14.5% and vape products at 7.3%. An estimated 4,100 Nevadans die each year from smoking-related diseases, according to the coalition, and smoking contributes to an estimated $160.1 million in annual Medicaid costs to the state. Across Nevada’s entire healthcare system, smoking is associated with $1.25 billion in annual costs. JoAnna Strother, with the American Lung Association, told lawmakers that research has shown youth and lower-income smokers are more likely to benefit because they are more likely to quit smoking because of tobacco tax increases. “This is also where state cessation resources become really important and should be provided,” she added. Using Nevada Department of Taxation data, the coalition found that only 0.5% of the state’s more than $205 million in annual tobacco revenue is allocated to tobacco control and prevention. That estimated $1.1 million in tobacco prevention funding comes from the state’s tobacco master settlement agreement, not from the state-collected cigarette or “other tobacco products” taxes. The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention recommends Nevada spend $30 million per year on tobacco prevention. Nevada currently ranks 46th in state funding for tobacco prevention. The smoke-free coalition also warned lawmakers against creating a separate tax structure for so-called “modified risk tobacco products,” like Zyn, that are pushing regulators to market themselves as lower-risk nicotine products. Such products are addictive and not approved as cessation products by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration. “The industry is going to keep introducing new things to the market,” said Atlas. “They’re not going to stop.” She added that Nevada needs a tax structure that treats new products the same — “so that it’s not this new product that all of a sudden is extremely cheaper than what they may have been using before.” The ultimate goal is for people to stop using tobacco and nicotine products entirely. Democratic state Sen. Dina Neal, who chairs the committee, raised the issue of declining tobacco use offsetting the bump in revenue provided by a tax increase. “What’s the replacement then?” she asked. Atlas replied that every state that has enacted a similar tax increase has seen revenue increase. “While it’s diminishing, it is predictable,” she said. “It’s not all at once.” Data presented later in the meeting by the nonpartisan staff of the Legislature appeared to back that up, showing sharp increases in cigarette tax revenue collections in 2003 and 2015 after tax hikes, followed by slower declines in revenue. The Interim Legislative Committee on Revenue will reconvene in August to determine which policy recommendations to sponsor as bills during the 2027 Legislative Session. Lawmakers on the committee gave no indication Wednesday whether they would support the coalition’s proposal. Courtesy of Nevada Current
	Food Lee in Bettendorf announces temporary closure Chinese restaurant to reopen after temporary closure.
	El Sarape Taco & Burritos opens in Silvis Family restaurant serving handmade Mexican food with fresh ingredients opens in Silvis
	Taliban declares war on smartphones A newly announced ban on smartphones for government workers, police and military personnel is spilling over into healthcare and educational facilities. Ordinary citizens worry they'll be next.
	Holiday weekend heat-deaths labeled ‘mass casualty event’ by advocates A homeless encampment sits in the woods off the canal path along the Delaware River. Advocates for the homeless are concerned about the impact of the recent heat wave - which resulted in 29 deaths in New Jersey on people who are unhoused. (Photo: Dana DiFilippo \| New Jersey Monitor)Heat-related deaths in New Jersey appear to have shot up roughly five-fold over last summer following a holiday weekend with record-high temperatures, prompting advocates to urge the state to do more to protect vulnerable residents. New Jersey reported 29 heat-related deaths between July 2 — when state data shows temperatures in New Jersey peaked at 108 degrees — and July 6, according to state health officials, up from six such fatalities last summer. Roughly a dozen of the deaths involved people who were unhoused or living in their cars, said Connie Mercer, CEO of the NJ Coalition to End Homelessness. “Really we had a mass casualty event,” Mercer said. Mercer and others want the state to expand its network of emergency cooling centers and take other steps to better protect those who are living or working outside from the impact of extreme temperatures. State health officials did not provide specifics on the recent heat-related deaths, which must still be confirmed by autopsies, but they said most occurred in north and central New Jersey and involved people of all ages, not just elderly residents. Some were found in homes without air conditioning, while others died on the street or in parked cars, they said. The heat also led emergency rooms to diagnose 132 people with heat-related illnesses on July 3, the highest single-day total in several years. Between July 2 and July 6, more than 350 people sought emergency care for heat issues, state data shows. “This is not a typical summer heat wave and it’s really important that we all take it seriously because it can become life-threatening very quickly,” state health commissioner Raynard Washington said at a July 4 press conference on storm damage and heat impacts. New Jersey has reported heat-related fatalities in the single-digits for most years since 2000, when there were just two such deaths, according to health department data. Deaths peaked at 11 in 2002 and reached 10 in 2011 but fell to three in 2024. The recent high death toll underscores the need to do more to protect those who work outdoors, according to state Sen. Joe Cryan (D-Union), who has championed a bill to create a state program to reduce occupational heat stress. The bill, which has yet to get a hearing, calls for farms, amusement parks and other outdoor job sites to provide water, shade breaks and monitor workers for heat stress, among other things. “Twenty-nine heat-related deaths is a staggering figure for one of the wealthiest states in the nation,” Cryan told the New Jersey Monitor, adding that he is renewing his push for worker protections and believes Gov. Mikie Sherrill “should be leading the charge for it.” Sherrill’s office declined to comment but pointed to a broadcast interview the governor gave earlier this week about the impacts of the recent extreme weather, in which she said she was open to new ways to better serve the public during storms and heat waves. She said state agencies had sought to warn residents through social media and other channels and noted her office had worked closely with counties to establish cooling centers. The governor also announced a new heat-health website during a July 4 press conference and urged residents to look out for each other during the extreme temperatures. “Extreme heat is the number one weather-related killer in America, and this is the hottest stretch we’ve seen in over 14 years. And the heat is hitting all of us — not just seniors, not just people with underlying conditions. People of all ages,” Sherrill said. Advocates like Mercer said extreme temperature was only part of the problem. The recent deaths were preventable, she said, a result of systemic policy failure. New Jersey needs to do more to create affordable housing, support shelters and invest in emergency sites to keep people cool on dangerously hot days, she said. “Quality shelter in a variety of forms would make sure that not too many people died horrible deaths out in the sun,” she told the New Jersey Monitor. According to the most recent annual point-in-time count, more than 13,700 people were considered homeless in 2025. Heat-related illnesses occur when the body can’t properly cool itself, according to the health department, and the higher the temperature, the greater the risk. Infants, the elderly, and people with chronic health conditions like diabetes, cardiovascular issues and respiratory diseases are most in danger, it notes. Kelvin Boddy, director of healthy homes and communities with the Housing and Community Development Network of New Jersey, said the recent fatalities underscore the need for a statewide ‘code red’ alert system for extreme heat, like the ‘code blue’ warnings now in place for deep freezes. As it is, Boddy said a handful of urban centers have instituted comprehensive responses to heat events, with designated cooling centers and clear strategies to communicate these options to residents. A pilot program adopted last year and backed by $2.5 million in state funds calls for similar programs in the five counties with the highest homeless rates: Essex, Burlington, Hudson, Union and Mercer. Work on the pilot is progressing slowly however, Boddy said, and the need for cooling services stretches statewide. “Clearly, as we saw with the recent statewide heatwave, this is needed outside the five counties,” he told the New Jersey Monitor. Mercer said the code red program, while well intentioned, is not enough to address the need. “It’s a joke,” she said. SUBSCRIBE: GET THE MORNING HEADLINES DELIVERED TO YOUR INBOX. Courtesy of New Jersey Monitor
	Need help? Idaho state health agency, nonprofits, churches collaborate to create resource network A worker at El Ada Community Action Partnership Food Pantry in Garden City helps load food items into a client's car in this Nov. 6, 2025, file photo. A joint effort among the state, nonprofits and churches is aiming to connect Idaho families in need to services such as food banks near them. (Laura Guido / Idaho Capital Sun)An Idaho family searching for help with rental assistance, affordable child care or help finding new clothes for work may not know where to begin. Laura Denner (Courtesy of Idaho Department of Health and Welfare) Laura Denner, administrator of the Idaho Department of Health and Welfare Division of Family and Community Partnerships, and her team want to ensure that there’s “no wrong door” for families to access help. This desire led to the Idaho Community Resource Network. “It’s an ecosystem of support for Idaho families,” Denner said. “We’re all working together, and I think this is a really unique approach at bringing together nonprofit, corporate partners, churches, government, to overall reduce reliance on government and create community.” Denner brought in Health and Welfare Resource Development Specialist Casie Jones to help lead the effort to connect families with government, nonprofit, or church services. Work on the resource network started in late 2024, with the goal of keeping children out of foster care when possible. However, the resources are available to all Idahoans. “Idaho is very resource rich … They are doing it in rural areas through churches in supporting youth and families, supporting individuals who need help. All the way to larger, urban areas, to government, who have organized programs, ” Jones said. “So it’s diverse in its ability to serve people, but it can be a little chaotic when one person is in crisis with their child.” As a result, the state’s 211 “CareLine” is now connected with the database for the United Way of Treasure Valley’s FindHelpIdaho.org. The agency is also in the process of expanding access to support from churches through the Idaho Care Portal. This new connection means that if a parent needs information about receiving food assistance through the federally funded Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, SNAP, or help accessing pro bono legal services from a nonprofit, they can either call Health and Welfare’s 211 hotline or search on Find Help Idaho to see the same list of options. SUBSCRIBE: GET THE MORNING HEADLINES DELIVERED TO YOUR INBOX. Idaho youth and families are target of resource network The resource network sprung from recommendations from the Idaho Behavioral Health Council, which brings together the three branches of government and other partners to develop strategies to improve the state’s behavioral health system. The council targeted foster care prevention as a top priority, Denner said. “Our data that we’re starting to pull reflects that over 97% of the families that are working with navigators never enter child welfare in the next six or 12 months,” Denner said, “so really exciting upstream prevention and case management happening there.” Some of the resources go to families, but some of them may go directly to young people. Jones said she worked with Jennie Sue Weltner, who helps lead Idaho Public Television’s youth drug and alcohol prevention campaigns. Jones said she used Weltner’s 2025 research into what families and teenagers in Idaho see as their biggest challenges. Need to get in touch? Have a news tip? CONTACT US “Really good prevention starts with really good listening, and so we listened to kids,” Weltner told the Sun. The survey of more than 1,600 parents and 852 teens in Idaho found that while parents identified social media as teens’ biggest problem, the teenagers said they were most worried about money, followed by mental health and loneliness. Weltner is working with the health agency to launch an awareness campaign directed at young people to advertise that they can use resources like 211 or Find Help Idaho to get connected to things like scholarship programs, job training, mental health care and other services. “If we can help them deal with the problems that they’re actually concerned about, maybe we can prevent them from turning to substances,” Weltner said. “If we can help them find a job, find an internship, find money for schools, maybe even food security, some of the things that are going to help them feel more secure or clear about their future, we might prevent them from turning to self-medication.” Where can you go to find help? Call 211 or 800-926-2588 or text 898-211 for help connecting to health and human services. The line can be reached 8 a.m. – 6 p.m., Mountain time, Monday-Friday. Using your zip code, search for resources on FindHelpIdaho.org. How to help others Faith-based organizations may contact Sage Dixon at sage.dixon@dhw.idaho.gov or get in touch through the Idaho Care Portal online here. To learn about getting a nonprofit or service listed on FindHelpIdaho.org, go online here. Others who are interested in adding resources may contact Casie Jones at Casie.Jones@dhw.idaho.gov. SUPPORT: YOU MAKE OUR WORK POSSIBLE Idaho Health and Welfare 211 and Find Help Idaho website are now connected Often when people are trying to find help, they find it difficult to access up-to-date information, especially in rural areas of the state, according to Anne Wolverton, director of Community Impact United Way of Treasure Valley. “One of the barriers that we were hearing about when people were looking for help was that they were being given a list of paper resources, and oftentimes those resources were out of date,” Wolverton said. “The phone number was wrong, the address had changed, or maybe the need that they had wasn’t on that sheet of paper, and they didn’t really know where to turn.” The United Way of Treasure Valley is the largest United Way organization in Idaho, which is why it was well-positioned to launch some statewide initiatives, she said. In 2022, the Treasure Valley United Way launched FindHelpIdaho.org, a searchable database of local, regional and national resources. The website is backed by the national FindHelp.org, which is used in other states as well. Anyone may suggest a resource to be posted on the site, and someone will verify that it is free or reduced cost, serving the community it’s in, and responsive to needs, Wolverton said. There are now more than 4,500 programs in Idaho listed on the site. Denner, from the health agency, said she connected with Find Help Idaho because the state’s 211 call center was on a dated platform and she was looking for ways to update it. The two entities combined their databases, ensuring there weren’t missing or out-of-date resources between the two. Gaps in services still exist. Wolverton said as more people use the system, the group intends to collect more data about services people aren’t finding. The most common searches statewide are related to housing, she said. Between 40% and 45% of all searches are related to eviction prevention, rental assistance, utility bills, and other related topics, she said. Health and food are the next most-common categories, she said. “That’s another gap that we’re looking to address,” Wolverton said, “is sharing this information with cities and counties, decision-makers, programs that provide services to show them where those gaps exist in programming, so when they’re thinking about where should we stand up a new food pantry, they can see here’s an area where people are searching consistently for food, and there’s not a pantry within 15 miles of their zip code.” Idaho churches may join resource network through Idaho Care Portal Former Rep. Sage G. Dixon, R-Ponderay, talks with fellow lawmakers at the State Capitol in Boise on Jan. 9, 2023. (Photo by Otto Kitsinger for Idaho Capital Sun) Sage Dixon, the regional director of faith-based initiatives at Health and Welfare, is hoping local church communities will be able to step in to meet immediate needs that might not be served by the other resources. Dixon left the Idaho Legislature in 2024 to join the health agency in the newly created role, with a focus on supporting foster families and preventing children from entering child welfare. Shortly after he took on the position, he learned about Care Portal, a platform used in several states to connect families in need with faith groups in their communities. “The idea is not just to drop off that crib or not just to fill the tank with gas, but it’s to build the relationship, so those people have a support network around them that’s close to them,” Dixon said. Dixon partnered with the nonprofit Redemption Stories, run by the non-denominational church Redemption Hill in Boise, to pilot use of the portal in Idaho. Robert Frazier, a leader at Redemption Hill, said he had separately been working to bring Care Portal to Idaho before he started working with Dixon and the state health agency. “Our neighborhoods are built to isolate us into our socioeconomic strata,” Frazier said, “And so rich people know and live with rich people, middle class people know and live with middle class people, and poor people live and know poor people. And that’s one of the reasons why people struggle to find help when they need it, is they don’t know each other.” Frazier said that the church’s nonprofit launched Care Portal in Canyon and Ada counties last fall, mostly serving families connected to the foster system. In the first five months, it was used to meet 35 needs through four faith communities, he said. Frazier said the plan is to move into North Idaho next, and eventually move statewide. One family needed help buying Christmas gifts over the holidays, Frazier said, but after the connection was made, church members found out the family also needed its car fixed. Members were able to raise money for parts and get a local repair shop to donate labor and get the vehicle fixed, he said. Meeting their transportation needs contributed to that family eventually moving into more stable, long-term housing, he said. “That’s a five-month relationship that starts with Christmas gifts, but then you get to uncover the real needs,” Frazier said. “And over time that kind of snowballs into bringing them stability, and hopefully a relationship that lasts for the rest of our lives.” Courtesy of Idaho Capital Sun
	Alabama state representative accuses former Corrections healthcare provider of fraud Rep. Chris England, D-Tuscaloosa, speaking to media after the Joint Legislative Contract Review Committee meeting on July 9, 2026, in the Alabama Statehouse in Montgomery, Alabama. England accused the previous healthcare provider of Alabama prisons of fraud at the meeting. (Anna Barrett/Alabama Reflector)A state representative Thursday accused the former healthcare provider of Alabama prisons of fraud and sharply criticized the Alabama Department of Corrections’ relationship with a Montgomery-based law firm. Rep. Chris England, D-Tuscaloosa, said the events leading up to Tennessee-based company YesCare’s bankruptcy filing in May, after the state abruptly canceled a $1 billion contract in April with the firm, appeared to be fraud. “Sounds like to me that you were deceived. The state of Alabama was deceived,” England said to Mary-Coleman Roberts, general counsel for the Alabama Department of Corrections. “Not only did they defraud the state, they defrauded each and every employee that they did not pay, so they should be prosecuted.” Messages seeking comment from YesCare was left Thursday afternoon. According to Alabama law, aggravated theft by deception, when a person or entity “commits a theft of public funds or revenue of any state, county, or municipal government agency or department,” of more than $100,000 is a felony, punishable by up to 30 years in prison or up to $60,000 per violation. Corrections canceled the contract for what it called YesCare’s failure to “adequately fulfill its contractual duties.” England raised questions about the contract in 2023 over the presence of Bill Lunsford, an attorney who has received millions of dollars in legal contracts from Corrections, on a YesCare advisory board. Roberts said at the time Lunsford was on the board for the first round of contract awards but not a subsequent one. Roberts said the DOC is evaluating all options with YesCare, but did not want to comment publicly on the department’s legal strategy. “I don’t disagree with you,” she said to England. “Conversations have been had, though there has not been a formal request yet from our office because we felt like we are still in the investigative stages of what we need to do next.” The company told employees early last month that it could not pay wages for hours worked before the company filed for bankruptcy in May. “They did make payroll on April 24. They received the payment earlier that week,” Roberts said. “They did not make the May 8 payroll. When I asked David Goldwasser, who was their chief restructuring officer, what our money was used for, he said other things.” The Department of Corrections on Thursday requested a $200,000 contract with Butler Snow, LLP attorney Jack Crawford to help the department with the contract termination, which is connected to a bankruptcy case in the U.S. Bankruptcy Court for the Middle District of Florida. “I am not a bankruptcy expert, nor am I a bond expert, nor do we have anyone on staff at the DOC who are experts in this matter,” said Andi Spears, an attorney for the DOC. “We are pursuing what legal avenues that may be available to the department under the breach of contract of YesCare to recoup any money that the department may have for that breach of contract.” England was also critical of the contract with Butler Snow, which employs Lunsford. Lunsford and two other Butler Snow attorneys were removed from a lawsuit against the department in 2025 after an attorney used an artificial intelligence program in a filing, leading to fabricated citations. “Lord have mercy, what do we do to vet these folks, and how do we choose lawyers if the firm we just hired got caught using AI on other cases with prisoner litigation?” England said. The committee held the law firm contract, which it can do for up to 45 days. England said he does not know how many employees went without a paycheck from YesCare, but that a new healthcare provider NaphCare hired many of the YesCare employees when it was awarded an emergency contract in May. “At the end of the day, the state of Alabama is just as much responsible for even entering into business with a company like YesCare,” England said after the meeting. “Ultimately, YesCare is responsible, because as the evidence has shown, they’re nothing short of a bunch of criminals.” NaphCare has faced controversies and has been banned from operating in other states, but has not been reported to fail to meet a payroll. Roberts said former YesCare employees have not received the last missed paycheck yet, although they expected to by June. England said after the meeting that in order for them to get paid, they will have to join the bankruptcy lawsuit. But, he said employees will be last in line to receive compensation. “Can you imagine somebody who’s owed a paycheck versus a big major corporation that’s owed hundreds of thousands, or maybe millions of dollars? The likelihood that if they ever recover from this company in bankruptcy is – just like YesCare designed it – very little, because they’re trying to get out as much of their financial responsibilities as possible,” England said. Courtesy of Alabama Reflector
	NC’s childcare crisis disproportionately affects disabled kids. A lawmaker says it’s time for change Families of disabled kids struggle to find childcare options that accommodate their children, often facing long waitlists, exorbitant costs, and untrained staff. (Photo: Daria Nipot/Getty Images)Zack Hawkins is the father of two children with autism. Like many parents of kids with special needs in North Carolina, he has struggled to find childcare options that accommodate his children. His sons received their diagnosis in 2018. When they were younger, the family found an inclusive summer program and an at-home caregiver, Hawkins says. But now his sons, ten and eleven years old, are always either with him or his wife when they’re not in school, because they haven’t been able to find childcare that meets their needs. The only options they’ve found have come with long waitlists, exorbitant costs and untrained staff. “A lot of people are told it’s not the right fit, or they can’t safely take care of them.” Hawkins said, “At some point, families just sort of tap out of trying and spending money to send their kids to go to camps with people who overpromise and underdeliver.” Not having regular or emergency childcare creates a strain on the family. The lack of childcare forces many parents, often the mother, to reduce their hours and sometimes leave the workforce entirely, according to Hawkins. “The lack of childcare for these families – it’s crushing people,” Hawkins said.”The lack of all of these services layered together makes the world sometimes feel impossible.” Hawkins is also a state lawmaker. He was first elected to the North Carolina House of Representatives just months after his sons first received their diagnosis. As a proud advocate for people with disabilities in the legislature, Hawkins co-chairs the General Assembly’s Intellectual and Developmental Disability caucus, a bipartisan group of legislators focusing on policies that support individuals and families with disabilities like autism, down syndrome, and cerebral palsy. Last week, the legislature passed a long-awaited state budget that included two key goals of the I/DD caucus. It spends $21.3 million per year for higher pay for direct-support professionals who provide in-home services and health care to people with disabilities. It also allocates $70.8 million to increase Medicaid funding for programs that offer community and in-home resources for disabled people who might otherwise be institutionalized. Hawkins said that in the next legislative session, he hopes to tackle the challenges families with I/DD kids face in finding and maintaining affordable childcare. “We’re just now at a place where we can really start to think about what this childcare situation looks like,” Hawkins said. “Fundamentally unfair” It is against the law for childcare providers to discriminate against a child solely because of their disability, but as private organizations, childcare facilities are not required to accommodate them. If childcare owners think they don’t have the resources or that it will otherwise burden them to have a child with a disability in their program, they are allowed to turn that child away. Christy Moore, a parent educator at the Exceptional Children’s Assistance Center, helps families navigate resources for kids with disabilities. Moore said she has worked with many families who’ve found that, after they disclose their child’s disability, childcare centers tell them they can’t accommodate their child. “Finding quality childcare that’s within an affordable price range that has staff who is appropriately trained to provide care and teach children with disabilities is going to be very, very, very rare,”Moore said. “And if there is a center like that, I’m sure the waiting list would just be so long that potentially the child would already be in kindergarten before a spot came open.” For many families, the long waitlists and lack of accommodations lead them to look toward other resources, like in-home care and forms of therapy. However, accessing these programs can present its own challenges, particularly when it comes to obtaining a diagnosis. Receiving a diagnosis can be especially complicated for kids with autism spectrum, because there are many different types of tests for determining if a person is on the spectrum. Some federal, state and private programs require specific tests to qualify for certain programs. Some families unaware of this wait months and spend thousands of dollars to receive their diagnosis using a different test, only to discover they still don’t qualify for help. NC lawmakers seek tighter rules for autism therapy in push to eliminate Medicaid fraud Hawkins is hoping the legislature can help clarify the rules on the different types of tests, particularly for people in rural areas who often have limited choices in where to go to receive a diagnosis. “I think [we need] to be even more clear about who has diagnosing power and how far that diagnosing power goes, because it does really confuse families,” Hawkins said, “We’ve created a system that, again, depending on where you live, is depending on what you have access to, and that’s just fundamentally unfair.” “Comes down to money” Jacqueline Simmons, Project Director for the North Carolina Child Care Health and Safety Resource Center, said the main issue in childcare for kids with special needs is the lack of investment in hiring and training staff, and “that comes down to money.” Simmons emphasized the importance of specialized training and competitive pay for early educators working in childcare. She said they need to hire more people with healthcare experience to work in childcare because they are better equipped to care for children with diverse needs. She argued more funding is needed to ensure that special-needs kids are safe at childcare. “As a parent, all you’re trying to do is work to make sure that you can keep a roof over your head and food on the table,” Simmons said. “If you’re dropping your child off at a place where you aren’t sure if they can be safe, it’s not okay.” Hawkins agreed that they need to invest more in the childcare workforce. One solution he suggested is providing financial incentives to childcare facilities that train staff to work with kids with I/DD. He also suggested working with community colleges to provide grants for students majoring in early childhood education with a focus on kids with I/DD, and using non-profit organizations focused on I/DD to coach teachers to build more inclusive practices. “What are we doing instead of letting families just struggle?” Hawkins asked. “It’s unfair, and so I’m just glad to be in a position to be able to raise my voice about it.” Courtesy of NC Newsline
	Volunteer Capitol This is Roald Tweet on Rock Island.Fourteen miles upstream from Rock Island at the head of the Rock Island Rapids, sits the small town of LeClaire, Iowa,…
	Childcare, education and children’s health are inseparable The state’s school clothing allowance application process did not open as expected on July 1, leaving families uncertain about basic school clothing. (Photo by Marcus Constantino for West Virginia Watch)I write as one of West Virginia’s lost children: a child of poverty from North Central West Virginia who left my home among the hills to become a doctoral pediatric psychologist and graduate faculty member who supervised ten young doctors practicing in the United States and abroad. After nearly 30 years of practice hundreds of miles from where I began, and as I move toward retirement, I believe I have earned the right to speak beyond the office, clinic, and examination room. I do not mean I have earned the right to speak carelessly. Decades of listening to children and families have made me more cautious about simple explanations. I have never stopped carrying the children of West Virginia whose futures are narrowed by poverty, limited access, and public choices. Recent events should concern anyone who cares about children. Childcare centers are closing. In Sissonville, one closure displaced 60 children and 12 staff. In Clay County, the only infant and toddler childcare center was reported to be closing. The state’s school clothing allowance application process did not open as expected on July 1, leaving families uncertain about basic school clothing. The House of Delegates spent $114,000 on a RAND study of West Virginia’s school-aid formula, a study that identified the need for more funding for highly qualified staff and children with special needs. Yet lawmakers did not implement its major recommendations. At the same time, the Hope Scholarship continues to expand, with more than 26,000 students applying for full funding and approximately $277 million appropriated for the program. These are often discussed as separate policy issues. In the life of a child, they are not separate. A child does not experience poverty, limited childcare, public-school strain, transportation barriers, Medicaid dependence, pediatric specialty scarcity, behavioral-health shortages, unstable housing, environmental exposure, clothing insecurity, and family stress as separate categories. They are the same crisis entering through different doors. This is why education policy is pediatric policy. Healthcare access is pediatric policy. Childcare is pediatric policy. Public-school funding is pediatric policy. Behavioral-health access is pediatric policy. The Hope Scholarship may benefit some children and families. That should be acknowledged. But statewide, many children live inside stacked barriers that make formal choice very different from usable opportunity. A family must be able to locate an appropriate school or provider, transport a child there, supplement services when needed, and navigate what happens when public-school protections and supports do not follow the child in the same way. A voucher amount is not an individualized education program. A provider list is not access. A school-choice slogan is not a pediatric system of care. This concern becomes more serious when school-choice politics are shaped by large outside spending. Recent reporting has described millions of dollars in outside political spending connected to West Virginia elections and school-choice advocacy. When child policy is heavily influenced by outside money, West Virginians should ask who benefits, who is accountable, and who manages the consequences. This should not be reduced to a red-versus-blue argument. West Virginia’s children are not abstractions in a national political fight. They are children living in rural counties, families burdened by poverty and lack of childcare, underfunded classrooms, understaffed pediatric clinics, local churches, parents’ and grandparents’ homes, and family systems where policy decisions become developmental reality. West Virginia has seen this pattern before: outside money arrives, value is extracted, and local communities are left to manage the consequences. Education, childcare, pediatric healthcare, and behavioral healthcare should not become another version of West Virginia’s long history of extraction. When adults weaken the systems surrounding children and then blame children for the predictable developmental consequences, we mistake the symptom for the source. To say this plainly is not to deny agency. Children are asked to learn, grow, try, repair, practice, and become. Families, educators, clinicians, and healthcare providers each carry real responsibility. But they should not be asked to compensate endlessly for social policy failures they did not create. Public systems and political choices are responsible for building conditions adequate to children’s needs. Scores, diagnoses, enrollment counts, funding formulas, and school records can be useful, but they are not children. They must be interpreted within the developmental ecology that produced them. It has been far more than coal, timber, gas, and income that have been extracted from West Virginia. Children’s futures have been, and continue to be, neglected and narrowed as well. Our children and grandchildren should not be the place where social policy failures are deposited and named pathology. SUBSCRIBE: GET THE MORNING HEADLINES DELIVERED TO YOUR INBOX. Courtesy of West Virginia Watch
	Kentucky’s ‘blizzard of opportunities and obligations’ to its children Terry Brooks at Children's Advocacy Day in Frankfort on March 4, 2026. (Kentucky Lantern photo by Sarah Ladd)Ask Terry Brooks how Kentucky’s children are really doing and the answer depends on what data one wants to explore. The longtime child advocate can remember a time when Kids Count rankings of all the states in the country placed Kentucky in the 40s — scraping the bottom of the pack. Now, the commonwealth is in the 30s. “Do I wish they were in the 20s or the teens? Absolutely,” said Brooks, who recently left his post as executive director of Kentucky Youth Advocate after more than two decades with the organization. “By quantitative data that doesn’t have anything to do with stories and anecdotes and tragedies…Kentucky’s kids, relatively speaking, are significantly better than they were two decades ago.” The longtime schoolteacher and advocate isn’t disappearing into retirement. He will now work as executive vice president and ambassador of Sunrise Children’s Services, a Christian nonprofit that operates therapeutic residential programs, a psychiatric residential treatment center, foster care and adoption services and other related services. Shannon Moody Shannon Moody became the new executive director of KYA, effective July 1. She said she is “deeply committed to building on the foundation of effective education and mobilization around issues impacting Kentucky kids” and “I look forward to expanding KYA’s impact, deepening relationships, and advancing meaningful, lasting change.” For Brooks, his professional shift is a marriage of his 21 years of advocacy with KYA and his years as a teacher. “On one hand I want to be trying to organize a summer football clinic, and on the other hand I want to be in Frankfort talking about big swings when it comes to child welfare,” Brooks said. “So, that merger of those two passions that I think have kind of exemplified a 50-year career.” To mark this shift in his advocacy, Brooks, 76, recently spoke at length with the Lantern about the future of child advocacy in a state that has, despite its progress in some areas, one of the nation’s worst rates of abuse and neglect. Elected officials, Brooks said, need to commit to more bipartisanship and less national trend-chasing going forward if they are to make a lasting difference for the commonwealth’s children. Children sacrificed to political theater Brooks can easily remember key moments when the right and left put aside ideological differences in the name of children’s welfare. In 2018, for example, Speaker Pro Tempore Rep. David Meade, R-Stanford, and former Rep. Joni Jenkins, D-Shively, worked together on an omnibus child welfare bill, managing to set aside the “collateral noise” of any other disagreements. Spike in child sex abuse spurs new guidance for Kentucky investigators “I mean, you can’t get more urban or liberal than Joni, or more rural and conservative than David, and they came together on an omnibus child welfare bill that was really powerful and changed really a number of lenses through which child welfare was seen,” Brooks said. “I worry a lot that I don’t see that type of statesmanship based upon a singular issue as much anymore.” There are many lawmakers working on children’s issues, from childcare reform to vaping prevention and the criminalization of sexual extortion. And Gov. Andy Beshear has made a push for pre-K a cornerstone of his administration’s work. But are lawmakers and the governor focused enough on child welfare? “If collaboration is a prerequisite for fundamental improvement for kids, the answer is easy: No,” Brooks said. “You know the governor is going to build a case against the General Assembly. The General Assembly is going to build a case against the governor.” Brooks believes nationwide partisanship and “political narratives” have bled into policymaking. “Kids have become the sacrifice for political rhetoric, and that political rhetoric I don’t perceive as being generated by Frankfort, but it’s being inherited by Frankfort from national conversations,” Brooks said. “That is an increasing threat, because ideology is put before kids’ issues.” Waiting for action Terry Brooks (Kentucky Lantern photo by Sarah Ladd) Each year, the Annie E. Casey Foundation releases its Kids Count Data Book, which looks at indicators of wellbeing including education, health, economic success and community and family measures. Each year, with slight variations, it’s clear Kentucky children in general lack well-rounded resources. Many aren’t proficient in reading and arithmetic, they live in poverty and many aren’t in school at all. “Every year when Kids Count data comes out, I always offer the thesis that the most important data point is childhood poverty,” Brooks said. About one in five children in Kentucky live in poverty. “That is just an absolute predictor of future trends,” Brooks said. “Multiple governors, as well as multiple General Assemblies — plural — seemingly can’t get their hands, their arms, around that issue, and that is an issue that invites action. It invites tax policy action; it invites regulatory action on things like predatory lending.” One of the most immediate avenues for action, he said, is in the kinship care arena. Families raising minor relatives have long needed help from the state as they provide foster care services that both keep children out of the foster care system and keep them with family. A long-debated law from 2024 promised them that help, but the General Assembly and the governor’s office have long debated who is responsible for funding it. By “improving the economic well-being of kinship families,” he said, the state could positively move the poverty needle. “Every year, there’s ideas on the table, and somehow it gets caught in the political game of playing chicken between the governor and the general assembly,” Brooks said. “So, childhood poverty, while it seems such a big issue, is actually very actionable, but I’m still waiting for there to be action.” A ‘blizzard of opportunities and obligations’ Looking to 2027, Brooks wants to see both party nominees for governor make children a priority in their platforms. Kentucky children keep dying in ‘preventable’ drug overdoses “I want both candidates for governor in 2027 to say that they will create a children’s cabinet,” he said. “We’ve been talking about that for a decade. More and more states are following that model because state government is finally learning that you can’t talk about child welfare without talking about education. You can’t talk about education without talking about health.” As the system stands now, he said, there are too many points of contact for children’s work to be maximally effective. He also wants to see a head-on plan to deal with the state’s “crisis in juvenile justice” and its ongoing issue with certain foster children lodged in office buildings and other nontraditional placements, among other issues. The next set of gubernatorial candidates “can fight about a myriad of other issues, and I would suggest that’s part of democracy,” said Brooks. But they should decide, he said, that doing better for children is nonnegotiable for the state and an issue that transcends party. “Don’t feel like you can’t agree with the other person or you’ll be accused of copping out,” he said. “When you listen to both sides talk, they want the same thing, they just want their brand to win.” ‘A unified way’ forward Terry Brooks speaks at the Kentucky Youth Advocates’ Children’s Advocacy Day in the Capitol Rotunda. March 5, 2025. (Kentucky Lantern photo by Sarah Ladd) Brooks’ transition to an organization focused on the foster care sector comes at a time of great shifts. In 2025, Congress cut Medicaid spending over 10 years by $880 billion as part of the sweeping One Big Beautiful Bill Act. That same budget package made recent foster care youth, among others, no longer exempt from work requirements to receive food benefits for themselves and their families through the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP). Nearly half of the people who receive SNAP assistance in Kentucky are under the age of 18. From Brooks’ perspective, the child welfare system needs to be revamped, and leaders could start by looking to the healthcare system — even though it’s “far from perfect,” he admitted — from preventive care through clinics, to the emergency room. “While imperfect, the health system has an articulated continuum of care. There’s holes in it, but there is an articulated continuum of care,” he said. “I think we need to re-recalibrate the child welfare continuum of care. On that front end is prevention and family restoration. The next step is foster care and adoption and kinship care.” The “equation falls apart,” he said, when it comes to transitioning kids from residential care to “self-sufficient citizenship.” Kentucky needs a “cohesive approach to kinship care” and more intermediate steps for kids exiting the foster care system. “I realize that’s a huge challenge and a big swing,” he said, “but I hope that we might begin to create a more unified way to treat kids.” SUBSCRIBE: GET THE MORNING HEADLINES DELIVERED TO YOUR INBOX. SUPPORT: YOU MAKE OUR WORK POSSIBLE Courtesy of Kentucky Lantern
	Virginia nonprofit launches mobile tech education bus for underserved students RFK Outreach's new STEM Cybersecurity Mobile Bus will be traveling throughout parts of the Hampton Roads region, starting this summer. (Photo courtesy of RFK Outreach)Two retired military cybersecurity experts in Virginia recently launched a bus service in Hampton Roads to raise awareness and educate students about technology, after receiving an unexpected state budget appropriation of $200,000. The cyber education bus is the latest way the nonprofit organization RFK Outreach will fulfill its goal to help children and teens learn about technology. Kimberly and Ricardo Frost, the founders of RFK Solutionz Corporation, the umbrella organization for RFK Outreach, said they were surprised to hear about the appropriation requested by House Transportation Committee Chair Cliff Hayes, D-Chesapeake. For a decade, RFK Outreach has been operating the Cyber Academy, training and developing people who want to build or advance careers in cloud computing, cybersecurity, information technology (IT), networking, and project management. The couple said around 100 students have joined the academy each summer over the past 10 years. Students at a recent Cyber Academy event organized by RFK Outreach. (Photo courtesy of RFK Outreach) Now, RFK Outreach will hit the road, offering lessons on tools such as drones and robotics. The state money will go a long way towards fulfilling their youth-focused mission, the Frosts said. “We were serving active duty in the military, and we still, kind of, feel like serving (but) this time by training children today to have the knowledge and wisdom that they need to be able to protect themselves, their parents, and our nation when it comes to cybersecurity,” Kimberly Frost said. Ricardo Frost said the STEM Cybersecurity Mobile Bus will also help reach children who cannot come to the Cyber Academy. “We knew that a lot of people of color are normally in underserved communities or rural areas, so that’s where the cyber bus initiative came from,” Ricardo Frost said. “Since they can’t get to us, we’ll do what we can to get to them.” Ricardo Frost said the Outreach’s mission also includes developing Virginia’s workforce, a focus that has received strong policy support from the state legislature. He said state and federal lawmakers, including Virginia Democratic U.S. Sens. Tim Kaine and Mark Warner, have stressed the need to retain tech talent in the commonwealth. He said RFK’s mission is aligned with those efforts. “Oftentimes… a lot of the students that learn and get their education from Virginia typically leave the state, so we’re looking at a way to… have those young bright minds stay local,” Ricardo Frost said. The couple said the cyber academy has typically operated during the summer, but hopes to potentially expand with a bus and a second bus on the way to other areas of the commonwealth. The group’s partnerships have expanded since its founding, and businesses have started to call after seeing the bus. Most recently they have partnered with the Virginia Space Grant Consortium, pairing interns from Virginia’s colleges and universities with academy students. The couple said Google has also agreed to sponsor $180,000 to RFK Outreach to support its initiative. Ricardo Frost said technology is expanding, and the organization’s goal is to raise public awareness among children and adults alike. “Our goal … is to ensure that we get those people on board and get the awareness up, so they know we’re now in a whole new era than we’ve ever been before, and we want everybody… to be prepared,” Ricardo Frost said. Hayes, who successfully secured funding in the recently passed budget for the organization’s efforts, said the funds will help address the digital divide in Hampton Roads, and potentially other regions of the state. “We want to give 100% adoption in all communities, and again, with artificial intelligence, with our massive interests, we want to have these technologies everywhere,” Hayes said. “This digital divide should be closed. There’s no excuse why it shouldn’t be closed in this day and time.” More Mobile Services in Virginia: Go TEC, the Great Opportunities in Technology and Engineering Careers program, runs the GO TEC Mobile Lab—a 46-foot classroom on wheels that brings hands-on STEM and career education to schools and communities across Virginia. Aimed at middle school students (grades 6–8), the lab features Wi-Fi, expandable classroom space, and interactive technology to introduce students to robotics, IT, cybersecurity, manufacturing, and other engineering fields. It also trains teachers and administrators, supporting workforce development and career awareness statewide. SUBSCRIBE: GET THE MORNING HEADLINES DELIVERED TO YOUR INBOX. Courtesy of Virginia Mercury
	The biggest drag on Virginia’s business ranking is Trump and more headlines The state Capitol. (Photo by Ned Oliver/Virginia Mercury) • “The biggest drag on Virginia’s business ranking is Trump.” — The Washington Post • “Planning kicks off for special election to replace Arlington County treasurer.” — ARLnow • “Virginia Beach restaurant owners push to lower one of the highest meals taxes in the country.” — WTKR • “Western Virginia Water Authority implements water conservation measures in Roanoke and surrounding areas.” — WSLS • “Gas prices rise 12 cents overnight in Virginia.” — WAVY SUBSCRIBE: GET THE MORNING HEADLINES DELIVERED TO YOUR INBOX. Courtesy of Virginia Mercury
	Waymo called the cops on teen riders, raising privacy concerns Two 15-year-olds were allegedly drinking alcohol and shooting toy guns from a driverless taxi when the company disabled it and alerted police.
	Shelling at night, gunfire by day in Israel's expanding zone of control in Gaza When the U.S. brokered a ceasefire last year, Israel controlled half of Gaza. Now Israeli forces have pushed deeper, and Palestinians are paying a deadly price.
	No internet, no screen time? FCC weighs cutting subsidy that lowers school internet bills Many schools rely on consumer fees funneled through the federal government to cut internet costs. FCC Chairman Brendan Carr called for ending this program before Donald Trump tapped him for the job.
	Count Binface: The intergalactic warrior who could upend Britain's strangest election Meet Count Binface: the challenger from another planet taking on Nigel Farage as questions over the Reform UK leader's finances overshadow his election comeback.
	U.S. and Iran exchange intensifying fire across Mideast, threatening ceasefire deal Back-and-forth attacks have repeatedly threatened the ceasefire, but Thursday's appeared bigger all around.
Thursday, July 9th, 2026
	New hope for evacuated Muscatine business in a temporary location Energy 108 YOGA is moving into a space in the Muscatine Mall after holding classes outdoors for almost a month.
	Fresh Films gives students hands-on experience as studio plans move forward Fresh Films hopes to bring a $12 million film studio to downtown Rock Island.
	Bettendorf woman located after going missing on Thursday 86-year-old Barbara Rhode was found after being reported missing on Thursday.
	North Liberty teen among 2 victims in fatal crash in Iowa County Investigators believe a 2014 Ford failed to stop at a stop sign, causing it to be struck by an oncoming dump truck.
	New hope for evacuated Muscatine business after finding a temporary location Energy 108 YOGA is moving into a space in the Muscatine Mall after holding classes outdoors for almost a month.
	Fresh Films gives students hands-on experience as plans for a new studio move forward Fresh Films hopes to bring a $12 million film studio to downtown Rock Island.
	988 Suicide and Crisis Hotline signs added to I-74 Bridge Local mental health advocates have been pushing for more suicide prevention measures at the bridge.
	Quad City Tennis Club's new grass courts bring Wimbledon to the QCA It takes a lot to surprise reigning state champion Connor Feehan out on the tennis court, but it happened Thursday. The Quad City Tennis Club unveiled its new grass courts. "I mean this one of a kind," Feehan said. "It's the most amazing place that I've ever played tennis and I feel like everyone from [...]
	President Trump cleans house at the bipartisan Election Assistance Commission With just months until the midterms, President Trump relieved the remaining members of the U.S. Election Assistance Commission, a move condemned by Democrats and voting rights advocates.
	Illinois' ban on assault weapons upheld An appeals court upheld Illinois' ban on assault weapons. The U.S. Court of Appeals ruled in a 2-1 decision to uphold the statewide ban passed in the months after the deadly July 4, 2022 parade shooting in Highland Park. Illinois Attorney General Kwame Raoul called the move "a win that enhances public safety in Illinois." [...]
	QCA veterans reunite through Honor Flight of the Quad Cities More than 6,000 veterans across the QCA have taken the adventure of a lifetime through the Honor Flight of the Quad Cities programs, and many reunited to reconnect at the Quad-Cities Waterfront Convention Center. Our Quad Cities News photojournalist Mike Colón was there as friends old and new shared their experiences serving their country and [...]
	Muscatine moves forward with stabilization of 200 block of East 2nd Street Muscatine city council members are moving forward with plans to stabilize the 200 block of E. 2nd Street. The decision came at Tuesday night's city council meeting. City council members decided stabilizing the buildings is the safest and quickest way to get residents back in their homes and businesses back open. “The safety of our [...]

Friday, July 10th, 2026

Thursday, July 9th, 2026