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New report lists 5 Illinois cities among worst to get high in across the US

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New report lists 5 Illinois cities among worst to get high in across the US


Illinois is dominating a new report about the best places to blaze it up across the country – but not how you might think.

Recreational cannabis was legalized for adult use in different states in 2023 and to catalog the growth of cannabis tourism, LawnStarter’s latest report ranks the Best Cities to Get Stoned in 2024.

They also prepared a list for the worst cities to get stoned in the U.S., where Illinois captured half the spots.

The online platform that allows to reserve lawn care and mowing services through its website doubles online as a dataset collector, compiling data collected by the company to create studies covering anything from vacation rentals to hiking cities.

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Here’s a breakdown of the report.

How did Illinois do?

According to the report, five cities out of ten are from Illinois for the worst cities to get high in, with Cicero the third worst city in the country.

The other Illinois cities that cracked the list include Elgin (5th worst), Bloomington (7th worst), Springfield (9th worst) and Rockford (10th worst).

Chicago was the highest ranked city in Illinois to get high in, according to the report, at No. 38.

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More: New report finds air quality in Springfield, surrounding areas is getting worse

Methodology used

According to LawnStarter, the metrics to rank each city were first determined as six categories: access, consumer satisfaction, convenience, lounging, entertainment and munchie relief.

After the six categories were chosen, each was assigned a weight based on importance for the stoned experience. Access to dispensaries was weighted highest on the list, with munchies relief weighing the least.

Data was collected from 292 cities across the country before final calculations scored each city out of 100 points to determine its rank in each factor and overall. The score is the average of the city’s scores combined.

Best places to get high?

Here’s a look at the best places, according to the report:

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  1. Los Angeles, California
  2. San Francisco, California
  3. Las Vegas, Nevada
  4. Denver, Colorado
  5. New York, New York

Claire Grant writes about business, growth and development and other news topics for the State Journal-Register. She can be reached at CLGrant@gannett.com; and on X (Formerly known as Twitter): @Claire_Granted



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Illinois

Illinois data shows inmates with violent records from shuttered prison sent to medium-security sites

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Illinois data shows inmates with violent records from shuttered prison sent to medium-security sites


SPRINGFIELD, Ill. (AP) — Among the approximately 400 inmates transferred when Illinois’ decrepit Stateville prison closed over the summer, 278 were convicted of murder and 100 more are serving time for other violent offenses.

Yet, nearly four in five of the offenders formerly housed at the suburban Chicago lockup were not shipped to top-level maximum-security prisons, where the toughest criminals, troublemakers and escape risks are housed. Instead, they went to mid-level medium-security facilities, according to an Associated Press analysis of Illinois Department of Corrections data.

Prison employees believe housing for the transferred inmates was based on which facilities had bed space and sufficient personnel who are adequately trained in a critically understaffed system.

All transfers properly placed, prison agency says

Corrections spokesperson Naomi Puzzello said all of the transfers from Stateville are appropriately housed and that none was reclassified to a lower security level to match that of the receiving prison. She acknowledged scores of maximum-security beds are vacant but said corrections’ understaffing played no role in the transfers.

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However, the AP obtained minutes from a meeting at a separate facility nearly a year before Stateville’s shutdown in which administrators discouraged staff from bumping troublemakers up to a higher risk level because “maximum security beds are in short supply.”

And the AP found that in more than half of the relocations, ex-Stateville inmates were transferred without regard to a corrections guideline that those serving sentences of 30 years or more be housed in max prisons.

Opened in 1925, Stateville was targeted for closure in the spring when Gov. JB Pritzker set aside $900 million to replace it and Logan Correctional Center, the deteriorating women’s facility in central Illinois. A federal judge, accelerating the plan by declaring Stateville uninhabitable and inaccessible, ordered it shuttered by Sept. 30.

Security staff shortages a national problem

Prison staff shortages are a problem nationally. Wisconsin has seen a spate of inmate deaths while it struggles with vacant posts. “Grossly inadequate” staffing was among problems listed last fall in a searing Justice Department critique of violence, drugs and sexual abuse in Georgia prisons.

Data compiled by the nonprofit Safer Prisons, Safer Communities shows that the number of state-employed corrections officers dropped from 237,000 in 2012 to 182,000 in 2023.

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Simply put, it’s a tough job, said Wanda Bertram of the Prison Policy Initiative, a nonprofit, nonpartisan research and advocacy group that espouses decarceration.

“You’re going to witness violence, you might witness serious mental illness,” Bertram said. “You’re going to be around a lot of drug use and these things have a measurable impact on corrections workers.”

400 job openings, 1,750 open max beds

The Illinois Department of Corrections is 396 frontline security officers short of what was budgeted, according to October department staffing numbers. Total current officers are more than 2,800 shy of the authorized headcount, or the number needed to operate without substantial overtime.

Under the Illinois public records law, AP obtained a list of 406 inmates housed at Stateville as of August 2024 and matched each with the prison to which they’d been transferred, noting its security level. Corrections denied a request for the accompanying pre-transfer security levels of each inmate.

Statewide, there are 1,750 currently unoccupied beds in max prisons, Puzzello said. However, the majority are in cells designed for two inmates and most prisoners are in single-occupancy cells, so short staffing isn’t to blame, she maintained. The agency continues to vigorously recruit security cadets.

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Improperly placed inmates pose a risk

Employees are unconvinced and believe some inmates who qualify for max security have been diverted to less secure places, posing a risk to inmates as well as staff.

Although not part of the latest transfers, an offender moved to Sheridan Correctional Center in north-central Illinois from Stateville in November 2023 viciously attacked a prison educator, who required facial reconstruction surgery, according to the employees’ union, the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees Council 31.

There have been at least two suspected homicides of inmates since mid-2024, but corrections denied the AP’s public records request for information on them. The news agency is appealing that decision.

‘Maximum security beds are in short supply’

High-security bed space appears to have been an issue months before Stateville’s shutdown. In minutes obtained by the AP from a December 2023 management meeting at Dixon Correctional Center in northern Illinois, administrators advised staff to “use good judgment” before upgrading a troublemaker’s risk level to maximum, necessitating a transfer.

“Maximum security beds throughout the state are in short supply,” the minutes say. “If we try to transfer all the max security individuals, they will more than likely just end up at another medium security facility.”

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Puzzello reiterated that none of the Stateville transfers had security downgrades. She said transfers are based not only on criminal background but on programming needs, medical and mental health treatment and staffing ratios at the receiving facility.

“This ensures each individual’s classification is appropriate and tailored to their specific risk factors, behaviors and needs, supporting a safe and secure correctional environment,” Puzzello said.

However, a general corrections guideline is that any offender serving a sentence of 30 or more years be housed in a maximum-security cell. Those with 10 to 30 years go to medium, according to the guideline.

Of ex-Stateville inmates, 261 — or 64% — locked up for 30 or more years are now sitting in medium-security prisons, according to the AP review.

AFSCME spokesperson Anders Lindall said prison counselors who evaluated each inmate for an appropriate transfer location believed management had already decided where each would go. Puzzello denied that happened.

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Lindall said the union received reports of “ongoing instances of recommendations made at the facility level — by employees whose job it is to evaluate, classify and place the offenders who they know best — being overruled by departmental management.”





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Illinois university sued after professor alleges he was fired for objecting to race-based hiring policies

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Illinois university sued after professor alleges he was fired for objecting to race-based hiring policies


The University of Illinois Chicago (UIC) is facing a lawsuit over its racial hiring quotas after a former professor claimed he was illegally “retaliated” against for objecting to its allegedly discriminatory practices.

Professor Stephen Kleinschmit was a clinical associate professor at UIC’s Department of Public Policy, Management and Analytics (PPMA) until his contract was terminated in August 2023.  

According to a legal complaint filed in federal court Monday by legal firm Liberty Justice Center, Kleinschmit was fired after criticizing the allegedly discriminatory and unlawful nature of a new university recruitment program that focused on candidates’ race, gender and sexual orientation in its criteria for hiring.

The lawsuit claims that in late 2019, the professor became uncomfortable during meetings about the candidate search for UIC’s new “Bridge to Faculty” (B2F) program. B2F is a recruitment program under the university’s diversity office, which aims to diversify faculty and “attract underrepresented postdoctoral scholars with the goal of a direct transition to a tenure-track junior faculty position after two years,” UIC says.

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RECORDS FROM THE UNIVERSITY OF COLORADO BOULDER SHOW COLLEGE PURSUED RACE-BASED HIRING

Professor Kleinschmit filed a legal complaint against the University of Illinois Chicago, after he claims he was retaliated against for criticizing the school’s unlawful DEI hiring and promotion practices. (Getty Images/Liberty Justice Center)

During these meetings, fellow faculty members “spent an extended period of time discussing the racial characteristics of the candidates and routinely lamented the race and gender makeup of the applicant pool,” the complaint states. 

Kleinschmit came to believe that B2F, and other diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) programs at the public university, were illegal under federal nondiscrimination law. 

He initially hesitated to speak out for fear of “being ostracized and retaliated against” as a non-tenure faculty member. Eventually, he shared his concerns with other members of his department and college administrators, worrying that he could be implicated in participating in what he believed to be illegal activities by the university.

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Kleinschmit’s conversations objecting to the university’s racial hiring practices and political activism over that nearly 4-year period before he was terminated, “were not well received,” the complaint adds. 

The complaint names four other race-based hiring programs at UIC to argue there is “pervasive racial discrimination in employment practices” at the school that has “undermined” its academic integrity.

MASSACHUSETTS UNIVERSITY PROMOTES DEI AND ILLEGAL IMMIGRATION DESPITE TRUMP ADMIN EXECUTIVE ORDERS

"End Racism" sign

The Liberty Justice Center’s lawsuit claims Professor Kleinschmit suffered substantial professional damage after being fired from the University of Illinois Chicago. (iStock)

UIC allegedly said Kleinschmit’s contract was not renewed due to budget cuts. 

The complaint says that five months after his termination, UIC advertised it was hiring for a non-tenure track faculty position with job duties that “significantly overlapped” with Kleinschmit’s prior responsibilities. The job posting encouraged “members of a recognized underrepresented group” to apply. 

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Liberty Justice Center says Kleinschmit was an “exemplary” employee who was promoted early and received positive performance evaluations, merit-driven bonuses and salary increases every year of his 6-year employment at the university.

The professor says he was not notified of his impending layoff until June 2023, leaving him little time for a successful appeal. The late notice also hurt his ability to find another job before the commencement of the academic school year, leaving him unemployed for an entire year, according to the complaint.

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Liberty Justice Center is accusing UIC of racial discrimination and retaliation against Kleinschmit. It asks the court to order the university to halt its racially discriminatory hiring and retention practices and seeks financial damages for the earnings and benefits Kleinschmit lost because of the university’s “illegal” actions.

“The University of Illinois Chicago repeatedly engaged in blatant acts of racial discrimination, then added illegal retaliation to the mix to avoid accountability for its unlawful behavior,” Reilly Stephens, Senior Counsel at the Liberty Justice Center, said. “These actions are unacceptable violations of the right to equal protection under the law, and we urge the court to put a stop to it immediately.”

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Kleinschmit, who is now an instructor at Northwestern University’s School of Public Policy, said, “I was fired for speaking out against illegal behavior by the university. I’m grateful to the Liberty Justice Center for taking a stand against institutional corruption and fighting for my constitutional and statutory rights.”

The University of Illinois Chicago said it does not comment on pending litigation.

CHICAGO CASINO PROJECT ACCUSED IN LAWSUIT OF NOT ALLOWING WHITE MEN TO INVEST: ‘BLATANTLY DISCRIMINATORY’

Donald Trump at White House

President Donald Trump, shown here on Friday, Feb. 7, has instituted sweeping policies to eradicate DEI across the federal government since taking office.  (AP/Alex Brandon)

The lawsuit is the latest example of a public university facing scrutiny for its race-based hiring practices after the University of Colorado Boulder also came under fire in recent weeks.

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In his first slew of executive orders, President Donald Trump launched a federal review of DEI teachings and practices in educational institutions receiving federal funding.

On January 21, Trump issued an order, “Ending Illegal Discrimination and Restoring Merit-Based Opportunity,” that accuses DEI policies of violating civil rights protections. 

The order requires that the attorney general and secretary of education identify potential civil compliance investigations among institutions of higher education with endowments over $1 billion and, accordingly, develop action plans to “deter DEI programs or principles that constitute illegal discrimination or preferences.”

Universities across the nation shuttered their DEI offices last year as Republican lawmakers targeted these policies. Missouri State University and West Virginia University are the latest schools to shut down their DEI programs this year.

Fox News’ Aubrie Spady contributed to this report.

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Sheryl Crow headed to Illinois State Fair Grandstand

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Sheryl Crow headed to Illinois State Fair Grandstand


SPRINGFIELD (WAND) – Nine-time Grammy winner Sheryl Crow is coming to the Illinois State Fair Grandstand on Tuesday, Aug. 12.

The Missouri-native is known for her unique sound, mixing rock, pop, country, folk, and blues.

“Since 1994, Sheryl Crow has been one of the most influential singer-songwriter-musicians in country-rock music,” said Illinois Department of Agriculture Director Jerry Costello II. “Her music lifts people up, brings them together, and we can’t wait for that to happen at the Illinois State Fair.”

Tickets for Crow will go on sale Saturday, February 15 at 10 a.m. via Ticketmaster.

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Ticket Prices:

  • Tier 3 – $40
  • Tier 2 – $45
  • Tier 1 – $50
  • Track – $55
  • Blue Ribbon Zone – $105
  • *A $30 Pre-Show Party ticket is offered as an additional upgrade for all paid concerts.

“We are thrilled to welcome Sheryl Crow back to the Grandstand stage after 29 years,” said Illinois State Fair Manager Rebecca Clark. “Her extensive music catalog will have every generation singing along to her hits.”

The Illinois State Fair runs from Aug. 7 through Aug. 17 in Springfield.



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