© 2026 NPR Illinois
For your right to be curious.
Play Live Radio
Next Up:
0:00
0:00
0:00 0:00
Available On Air Stations
Join the NPR Illinois team!

Community Voices is seeking a co-host/editor to join Jeff Williams and Randy Eccles in getting to know our neighbors and more. Apply by May 25, 5 p.m.

The news department is seeking part-time fill-in anchor/reporters who are available either weekdays from 5:30 to 9 a.m. and/or 3:30 to 6 p.m. Apply by June 5, 5 p.m.

State Week: Employee Pay, Senate Deal, Caterpillar Move

State Week logo
Brian Mackey
/
NPR Illinois

Lawmakers introduced competing plans to make sure state employees can remain on the job even if there's no end to the state budget standoff. Meanwhile, Gov. Bruce Rauner is refusing to say whether he approves of the incipient budget compromise being worked out in the state Senate. And what does it say about the future of the downstate economy that Caterpillar Inc. is moving several hundred top jobs from Peoria to the Chicago area?

Sean Crawford hosts with regular panelists Charlie Wheeler and Brian Mackey, and guest Greg Hinz of Crain’s Chicago Business.

Brian Mackey hosts The 21st Show and formerly reported on state government.
The former director of the Public Affairs Reporting (PAR) graduate program is Professor Charles N. Wheeler III, a veteran newsman who came to the University of Illinois at Springfield following a 24-year career at the Chicago Sun-Times.
Related Stories