WFHB FireHouse Broadcasting

This is a brand-new locally-produced program featuring lectures, town hall meetings, and other public forums recorded on-location at various sites in Monroe County. "Standing Room Only" amplifies voices not adequately represented in mainstream media to help raise public consciousness of issues affecting life in south central Indiana and beyond. In the debut broadcast, an expert on government-corporate-military connections speaks out against war profiteering and Indiana's Military-Industrial Complex. Jim Vallette is research director of the Sustainable Energy and Economy Network at the Institute for Policy Studies. His Bloomington visit was coordinated by the Bloomington Peace Action Coalition and recorded live on location for WFHB at the Monroe County Public Library on Thursday April 21st, 2005.

Former Democratic presidential candidate Al Sharpton spends a lively evening with the Bloomington community. A gifted public speaker since the age of 4, Reverend Sharpton appeared in Bloomington for a speech called "Al on America," which includes a question and answer period. His Bloomington visit was sponsored by IU's Union Board and recorded live on location for WFHB at the IU Auditorium on Thursday April 21st, 2005. "Standing Room Only" is a new locally-produced program featuring lectures, town hall meetings, and other public forums recorded on-location at various sites in Monroe County. This program amplifies voices not adequately represented in mainstream media to help raise public consciousness of issues affecting life in south central Indiana and beyond.

Amy Goodman is host and executive producer of Democracy Now!, a national, daily, independent, award-winning news program airing on over 300 stations including right here on WFHB. She is on a national tour to mark the launch of her first book and her Bloomington lecture focused on the role of alternative media in a landscape of corporate sponsorship. Goodman's Bloomington visit was recorded live on location for WFHB at the Buskirk-Chumley Theater on Thursday May 5th, 2005. "Standing Room Only" amplifies voices not adequately represented in mainstream media to help raise public consciousness of issues affecting life in south central Indiana and beyond.

Dr. Christine Glaser is a founder of Bloomington's Center for Sustainable Living and the innovator behind the annual Simply Living Fair. Her lecture on "Green Cities, Green Economics" introduces a definition of sustainability that has been used by local businesses as well as local government entities to assess their current impact on the environment and to measure their progress towards reducing this impact, and then assesses this approach in the larger framework of economic development. This lecture was co-sponsored by the Center for Sustainable Living and recorded live on location for WFHB at the Monroe County Public Library on April 25th, 2005. "Standing Room Only" amplifies voices not adequately represented in mainstream media to help raise public consciousness of issues affecting life in south central Indiana and beyond.

As part of National Cover the Uninsured week, local physician Rob Stone hosts a lecture and panel discussion on options for solving the US healthcare crisis. Panelists include Mayor Mark Kruzan and Dr. Mary Mahern. This event was recorded live on location for WFHB at the Monroe County Public Library on May 3rd, 2005. WFHB would like to acknowledge the contributions of Byron Bangert of the Poynter Center for the Study of Ethics at Indiana University - due to time constraints we could not air his portion of the program.

A panel discussion on the present and future of Indiana's public land. The focus of this panel is the recently released Hoosier National Forest proposed Land and Resource Management Plan. The public comment period for this plan ends on June 27th. Also discussed are management changes in Indiana's State Forests, including a proposed 100% increase in timber harvest and the sale of sections of each State Forest to private interests. Featured panelists include forest activist Andy Mahler, founder of Heartwood, Karyn Moskowitz, forest economist and Protect Our Woods representative, David Haberman, IU Professor of Religious Studies, and Indiana Forest Alliance Coordinator Joanna Gras. This event was hosted by the Indiana Forest Alliance and recorded live on location for WFHB at the Monroe County Public Library on Wednesday, May 18th, 2005.

Local artists and government officials put their heads together to brainstorm on the future of arts in Bloomington and its surrounding counties. Presented as part of the Artists After Hours series, this open Dialogue on arts and government was made possible by the Bloomington Area Arts Council. Discussion topics include current governmental arts initiatives as well as challenges and opportunities facing artists and arts organizations in our community. Audience members were encouraged to bring questions and issues to the table for a lively discussion facilitated by Indiana Arts Commissioner Sandi Clark. This informal networking session was recorded live on location for WFHB in the John Waldron Arts Center Auditorium on Tuesday, May 24th, 2005.

A Memorial Day gathering honoring the memory of victims of war and demanding an end to U.S. military action. Features Indiana University Professors Purnima Bose, Eva Cherniavsky, and Mike Gasser (all members of IU's Progressive Faculty Coalition) and writer and activist David Keppel. Here on Standing Room Only you have a front row seat as more than 75 people gather in Peoples Park on Kirkwood Ave in downtown Bloomington to demand an end the U.S. occupation of Iraq and to oppose the current military recruitment drive to support the occupation. This event was sponsored by the Bloomington Peace Action Coalition, IU's Progressive Faculty Coalition, and the Bloomington branch of the Women's International League for Peace and Freedom and was recorded live on location for WFHB on Memorial Day, Monday, May 30th, 2005.

Section four of the proposed I-69 begins at U.S. 231 in Greene County and continues northeast to State Road 37 near Victor Pike southwest of Bloomington. Despite the fact that section four terminates well south of Bloomington, local residents turned out in droves to voice their opinions on I-69. This hour of public comment was recorded on-location at the I-69 section four public meeting at the AMVETS post on Bloomington's west-side on June 16th, 2005.

Firsthand accounts of life in modern Afghanistan from four native Afghan professors visiting Bloomington from the University of Kabul. Features Noor Mohammad Ahmadzai, Mohammad Hakim Azimi, Mohammad Zaher Osool and Zarghona Achekzai, with host and moderator Mitzi Lewison, an associate professor in the IU Bloomington School of Education. Recorded on location for WFHB at the Monroe County Public Library on May 23, 2005.

Words of inspiration from women who dared to make a difference. August 26, 2005 marked the 85th anniversary of the passage of the 19th amendment to the US Constitution, the day it become federal law that all women have the right to vote. This day came twelve years AFTER our Monroe County Courthouse was built. Here in Bloomington the Monroe County Democratic Women's Caucus celebrated the anniversary of the end of suffrage by hosting a Women's Equality Day Dinner. The evening included a performance by the WomenSpeak Readers Theater, a showcase of the words of prominent historical figures in the women's suffrage movement read by the women of today ñ the women of Bloomington. Your host for this rousing and sometimes quite dramatic performance is the Vice Chair of the Democratic Women's Caucus, Susan Sandberg.

The Party's Over" - Richard Heinberg is the author of six books including "The Party's Over: Oil, War and the Fate of Industrial Societies." He is a journalist, educator, editor, lecturer, and a Core Faculty member of New College of California, where he teaches a program on Culture, Ecology and Sustainable Community. Since 2003, he has given over a hundred lectures on oil depletion to a wide variety of audiences, from insurance executives to peace activists, from local and national elected officials to Jesuit volunteers. He is prominently featured in the documentary film "The End of Suburbia" and appears frequently on national radio and television. Heinberg's Bloomington lecture was the keynote address at this year's Simply Living Fair, recorded on-location for WFHB at the Buskirk-Chumley Theater on September 14th, 2005.

Dr. Eugenie Scott is Executive Director of the National Center for Science Education, a not for profit coalition of scientists and teachers that works to improve the teaching of evolution, and of science as a path to knowledge. It opposes the advocacy of "scientific" creationism and other religion-based views in our public schools. The day after a well-received public lecture, Scott delivered a more intimate address at Indiana University's Myers Hall as part of the Joan Wood Lecture Series, recorded on-location for WFHB on September 22nd, 2005.

Kwame Jackson thinks street smarts are more important than book smarts. Luckily he has both. Often recognized for his appearance on the popular network television program "The Apprentice," Jackson isn't just another reality tv star. His credentials include a Harvard MBA and prestigious Wall Street experience with sales and marketing roles at Procter & Gamble and, most recently, on Wall Street as an investment manager for Goldman Sachs. Jackson has since co-founded Legacy Holdings LLC, an emerging and diversified holding company positioned to engage in real estate development and other ventures. He appeared in Bloomington as part of a series of events organized by the Kappa Alpha Psi black fraternity and the local chapter of the National Association of Black Accountants. Recorded on-location at Indiana University's Alumni Hall on September 29th, 2005.

Educator Robert Jensen is a prolific contributor to progressive online and print journals, where his media critiques articulate a fine sense of ethics and an appreciation for inclusive democratic processes. A professor of journalism at the University of Texas in Austin, Jensen worked 10 years as a reporter before entering academia, which gives him unique insights into the news "business." So it's no surprise that he's prominently featured in the forthcoming documentary, "Hijacking Democracy: American Extremism & the Politics of Fear", the new project by the Media Education Foundation, makers of the popular documentary "Hijacking Catastrophe: 9/11, Fear and the Selling of American Empire". Jensen appeared in Bloomington to bolster local efforts to raise funds for production and distribution of the film at a sneak preview party organized by local residents Rob and Karen Stone.

Dr. Farid Esack is a world-renowned Muslim liberation theologian who lectures widely on issues of human rights, peace and justice, and world order. Dr. Esack was born in South Africa and did his undergraduate studies in Pakistan. He received his Ph.D.in from the University of Birmingham and served as Commissioner for Gender Equality under South African President Nelson Mandela. Dr. Esack is also the founder of the Cape Town-based organization Positive Muslims, a support, care, and awareness-raising group for Muslims living with AIDS. He will be a distinguished visiting professor at Harvard University beginning in the fall of 2006. His Bloomington lecture offers a progressive Islamic critique of the power dynamics underpinning the post-9/11 joint liberal-conservative project to draw Muslims into dialogue and offers an alternative based on interreligious solidarity and mutual transformation.

Gwendolyn Midlo Hall is a Distinguished Research Fellow of the Southern University System and Professor Emerita of History at Rutgers University. She has spent much of her career studying the history of slavery and cultures constructed by Africans in the new world. For 15 years, she collected data on every Louisiana slave transaction she could locate in state courthouses and in Spanish, French, and Texas archives. This extensive research culminated in her Databases for the Study of Afro-Louisiana History and Genealogy with records on more than 100,000 slaves. The Sunday New York Times featured the project on its front page, proclaiming it "the largest collection of individual slave information ever assembled." Her new book, "Slavery & African Ethnicities in the Americas: Restoring the Links" is newly published by UNC Press. In an odd twist, Hurricane Katrina brought Dr. Hall to Bloomington a little sooner than expected.

Locally-based State Senator Vi Simpson is outraged over budget cuts that she says will affect funding to 142 school corporations across the state while raising property taxes by as much as $850 million. Simpson has worked on the last six state budgets but was removed as a conferee on the new state budget for refusing to sign it. According to Simpson, local governments will now be burdened with the responsibility for paying more for schools. She says the state will now shift liability for school funding back to the local level, forcing school districts to raise property taxes and eliminate teaching and staff positions. Under the budget's new school funding formula, only 1% more money is provided for schools in the first year of the biennium and 1.1 percent in the second. Simpson says this is well short of the 2.75 percent schools will need to keep up with inflation and the costs associated with enrollment growth.

What are the ethical issues surrounding stem cell research? Is the pre-embryo one of us? What rights and responsibilities surround the practice of cloning? Is the distinction between therapeutic and reproductive cloning morally significant? What sorts of reasons are appropriate in arguments that support public policy? William F. May was a member of the President's Council on Bioethics from 2002-2004. He appeared in Bloomington to address these and related questions, drawing on his experience as an authority in bioethics. Professor May is the Cary M. Maguire Professor of Ethics Emeritus at Southern Methodist University, was the founding director of the Cary M. Maguire Center for Ethics and Public Responsibility, and is a founding fellow of the Hastings Center. May is also a former chair of the Department of Religious Studies at Indiana University Bloomington. This lecture by William F.

According to members of Bloomington's Martin Luther King Jr. Birthday Commission, the separation between church and state has been crumbling over the past several years. Perhap's that's why the commission joined forces with the Safe and Civil City Program to host a town hall meeting on this increasingly controversial topic. "What Would Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. Do?" features panelists Valerie Grim, Chair of the Department of African American and African Diaspora Studies at Indiana University; Sheldon Gellar, Political Scientist and Research Associate at the IU Workshop in Political Theory and Policy Analysis, Reverend Tom Ellsworth of Sherwood Oaks Christian Church, and moderator Daniel Conkle from the IU School of Law, an expert in constitutional law specifically regarding what the constitution says about religion in American Government.

The Monroe County Community School Corporation recently held its final public forum on redistricting before the school board votes next week to finalize any changes. The issue at hand ñ option 6A, which would disrupt a decades-old trend of sending children from the Covenanter neighborhood to Bloomington High School South. The new plan, one of three under consideration, would instead route Covenanter kids to Jackson Creek Middle School then on to Bloomington High School North. The area referred to as Convenanter is the region between Third Street and Moore's Pike, bounded by High Street on the west and College Mall Road on the east. This option was only included about two weeks ago, so the following public forum gave priority to comments from residents in the Covenanter neighborhood. This discussion was recorded on location for WFHB at the MCCSC Administration Center on Tuesday, November 22nd, 2005.

Michael McColly was born in 1957 in a small farming community in Indiana. In 1963, his family moved to Marion, where he grew up. McColly studied acting and English at Indiana University Bloomington and graduated in 1980. He moved to New York and later Chicago to begin a career in acting. Disillusioned after a year, he entered the Peace Corps and went to West Africa where he worked as a community organizer in a small farming village in southeast Senegal. Back in Chicago in the spring of 1995, while performing a comic monologue based on a memoir about his life in the Peace Corps, McColly learned that he had contracted HIV. McColly had began studying yoga during a brief stint in divinity school but became devoted to its practice after learning of his HIV infection. In 2000 the International AIDS Society asked him to offer a workshop on the benefits of yoga for people living with HIV/AIDS at the International AIDS conference in Durban, South Africa.

Molly Morgan and Jan Edwards say corporations have more power than human beings have, and these two activists are fighting to abolish that power by taking away the corporate right to "personhood." As representatives of the Womens International League for Peace and Freedom, Morgan and Edwards conduct workshops exploring the ways corporations exploit that power without consequences, and what the WILPF campaign is doing to abolish " corporate personhood." Just as the Supreme Court decided the 2000 Presidential election, the Court in 1886 re-interpreted the 14th Amendment, meant to protect freed slaves, and granted its personhood protections to corporations. Thus, in one grand coup corporations acquired all of the protections the Bill of Rights extends to living citizens. Edwards and Morgan say in subsequent years we have seen a steady rise in corporate power at the expense of our democracy.

A pandemic is a global disease outbreak; an influenza pandemic occurs when a new influenza A virus emerges for which there is little or no immunity in the human population. The virus quickly begins to cause serious illness and then spreads easily person-to-person worldwide. Recently the Monroe County Health Department hosted a public health forum on disease preparedness with a focus on pandemic flu. Tonight's speakers are Dr. Tom Hrisomalos, Bloomington Hospital Infection Control officer, Rachel Miller, Public Health Emergency Response Coordinator for the Monroe County Health Department, Bloomington Hospital Infection Control Coordinator Vickie VanDeVenter, and Dr. Rob Hongen of the Indiana University Health Center. Monroe County Health Department administrator Bob Schmidt serves as host and moderator.

Republican Governor Mitch Daniels is challenging lawmakers to pass a sweeping highway plan, steer more education dollars to the classroom and give local governments more options to raise money in the legislative session that starts today. His wish list and other highly charged issues - from tax relief to gambling - could figure prominently as lawmakers try to score political points in an election year. Daniels won much of his agenda in his first session in 2005, largely because of GOP majorities in the House and Senate. This year, however, he could face lingering resentment from both parties over the decision to close more than 20 state license branches, most of them in GOP districts. Partisan tensions will be high in the House, where Republicans, who have a 52-48 edge, have faced a barrage of criticism from Democrats over property tax increases that some analysts say could top 10% in each of the next two or three years.

David Shuster is a native of Bloomington and a correspondent for NBC and its cable news channel MSNBC. From 1990 to 1994, he was an assignment editor and field producer, helping CNN cover the Persian Gulf war and the 1992 presidential election campaign. Before joining NBC in June 2002, Shuster spent six years as a correspondent for Fox News Channel and led Fox's coverage of investigations of President Bill Clinton and the Senate impeachment trial. Currently based in Washington, D.C., Shuster reports daily for the network's "Hardball with Chris Matthews." As part of "Hardball's" 2004 presidential coverage, Shuster headed up the MSNBC "ad watch team," fact-checking and analyzing more than 150 campaign commercials throughout the course of the election. He covered both national political conventions and all of the presidential campaign primaries, and reported on the invasion of Iraq from U.S. Central Command. Most recently, he has been covering the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina.

Bloomington celebrates the legacy of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. This is an edited version of WFHB's live feed from this year's Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. Community-Wide Birthday Celebration. This event is presented by the City of Bloomington's Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. Birthday Celebration Commission and hosted by Commission Vice-Chair David Hummons. The evening's celebration includes the presentation of the Commission's Martin Luther King, Jr. Legacy Award to Indiana University African- American Choral Ensemble director Dr. James Mumford, as well as recognition of the volunteers who participated in service projects on the federal King Holiday as part of "A Day On! Not a Day Off." The Bloomington Area Arts Council announces the 2006 One Book One Bloomington & Beyond selection, "The Great Gatsby" by F. Scott Fitzgerald.

As the 2006 elections draw closer Indiana University faculty are analyzing previous election results to find out how they can more efficiently bolster progressive politics. IU's Kizhanipuram Vinodgopal is a Professor of Chemistry at Indiana University Northwest. He is active in the American Association of University Professors, a national organization advocating academic freedom and shared governance in institutions of higher learning. In this program, Vinodgopal discusses how Republicans used external political action committee funds to sweep the statehouse races and governor's seat and the crushing blow dealt to faculty governance when newly-elected Governor Mitch Daniels unilaterally eliminated the unionization rights and contracts of approximately 25,000 state employees, effectively shredding agreements that were set to last as late as 2007.

In what promises to become an annual tradition, Bloomington residents gather to celebrate the rich legacy of African-Americans in Bloomington and beyond. Mayor Mark Kruzan says this year's celebration is a culmination of events that not only educate us about our nation's history but creates a welcoming community where diversity is valued. In addition to comments from the mayor, tonight's event features an address by Indiana University law professor Kevin Brown, co-chair of IU Bloomington's Black Faculty and Staff Council. We'll also hear from the City's Commission on the Status of Black Males about a new award honoring the Outstanding Young Black Male of Tomorrow.

How does race factor into our civic understandings and interactions? What opportunities and challenges arise in scholarship informed by race? What civic discourses are deployed when race is introduced into the quest for new knowledge? What varieties within and between groups does the study of race disclose? In tonight's panel presentation three multicultural members of the Indiana University faculty discuss the role of race in their research and intellectual work, identifying opportunities and challenges that arise for scholars who study race relations historically, politically, and culturally. Sponsored by the Poynter Center for the Study of Ethics and American Institutions, the event was organized after the evaluation of IU President Adam Herbert sparked discussion of how race factored into his performance appraisal.

Dr. Elias Blake Jr. is a prominent expert on African-American educational legal issues. Blake is the president of the Washington, D.C.-based Benjamin E. Mays National Educational Resource Center. He works with a fiery passion to reverse inequities in the educational system suffered by minority students during their K-12 years. For Blake the struggle is personal - he grew up in Brunswick, Georgia, where he attended segregated schools. He later broke through racial barriers to earn a Ph.D from the University of Illinois in the 1950s, and has served as a key weapon in the arsenal of the NAACP Legal Defense Fund. He has also worked to promote educational equality through his roles as a university president and an expert witness before Congress. Recently Blake made our local news program when he told WFHB that Indiana University's plans to raise its admissions standards will undercut the school's efforts to enroll more minority students.

Despite its staggering resource endowment and potential for sustainable development, Africa is mired in debt ñ more than $300 billion owed to foreign countries. 291 million people in Africa live on an average income of less than a dollar a day. 124 million people are at risk of dying before age 40. 205 million people on the continent lack access to basic healthcare, and 249 million lack safe drinking water. More than 2 million infants die before their first birthday. Salih Booker is executive director of Africa Action, the oldest Africa advocacy organization in the United States. Africa Action is dedicated to educating and mobilizing Americans and the global community to fight for positive U.S. and international policies toward Africa and to support the African struggles for democracy and social justice. His Bloomington appearance was organized by local advocacy organizations RESULTS and Giving Back Africa, and the African Studies Program at Indiana University.

Offensive cartoons depicting the Prophet Muhammad originally published in a Danish newspaper have reignited debates over free speech and freedom of the press - including the freedom to offend, blasphemy, and the conflicting interpretations of what one can (as opposed to what one should) say about religious ideas, figures, and rituals. In this program a panel of concerned faculty explores these and other issues at a public forum on the Muhammad Cartoon Controversy. Our panelists are Indiana University Art History Professor Christiane Gruber, Arizona State University Political Science Professor Kurt Wenner, IU Anthropology Professor Nazif Shahrani, and host Kevin Jacques, an IU Professor of Religious Studies. "The Muhammad Cartoon Controversy: Testing the Balance between Free Speech and Tolerance" was recorded on-location for WFHB at IU's Woodburn Hall on February 21, 2006.

Intelligent Design is the concept that "certain features of the universe and of living things are best explained by an intelligent cause, not an undirected process such as natural selection. Its leading proponents say that intelligent design is a scientific theory that stands on equal footing with, or is superior to, current scientific theories regarding the origin of life. But an overwhelming majority of the scientific community views intelligent design not as a valid scientific theory but as pseudoscience or "junk science". In the recent case Kitzmiller v. Dover Area School District a federal court judge ruled that intelligent design is not science and is essentially religious in nature. On tonight's program, we'll compare Intelligent Design with mainstream science and compare the pedagogical strategies and approaches that are most common with those that are most effective.

The Hubbert peak theory, also known as "peak oil", concerns the long-term rate of conventional petroleum and other fossil fuel extraction and depletion. It is named after American geophysicist Marion King Hubbert, who created a model of known reserves, and proposed that oil production in the continental United States would peak between 1965 and 1970 and that world production would peak in 2000. United States oil production did indeed peak in 1971, and has been decreasing since then. Global production did not peak in 2000, but given that petroleum is a non-renewable resource, it is inevitable that at some point there will be a peak in worldwide petroleum production. Opinions on the effect of passing Hubbert's peak range from faith that the market economy will produce a solution to predictions of doomsday scenarios of a global economy unable to meet its energy needs. This seriously bothers Dave Rollo, a city councilman and local proponent of sustainability.

Did 9/11 really happen the way we think it did? Not according to Kevin Ryan. Kevin is a chemist and former site manager at Underwriters Laboratories in South Bend. During the post 9/11 investigation Kevin questioned discrepancies between UL's test results on steel components from the World Trade Center and the official account of the buildings' collapse. Days later, he was fired. Now he works tirelessly to debunk what he calls the government's conspiracy theory of the 9/11 tragedy. Ryan spoke to a Bloomington audience as a representative of Scholars for 9/11 Truth, a non-partisan association of faculty, students, and scholars dedicated to exposing falsehoods and to revealing truths behind 9/11. The group's members are convinced their research proves the current administration has been dishonest about what happened in New York and Washington, D.C.

Bloomington native Alice Rivlin is a senior fellow at the Brookings Institute and director of the Greater Washington Research Program, Metropolitan Policy. Her current projects include how to balance the federal budget and how to improve public policy in the Washington metro area. She also is a visiting professor at the Public Policy Institute at Georgetown University. She served as the vice chair of the Board of Governors for the Federal Reserve System under Federal Reserve Chairman Alan Greenspan and was also the director of the White House Office of Management and Budget under President Bill Clinton. Rivlin grew up in Bloomington, and her connections to IU are deep. Her father was a professor of physics at the university and developed its first cyclotron. As a college student, Rivlin took a summer class at IU in economics, which persuaded her to change her major at Bryn Mawr from history to economics.

Anthony Arnove has come a long way from editing the school newspaper at Bloomington High School South. He holds a Ph.D and MA from Brown University, where he studied in the Modern Culture and Media Program, and a BA from Oberlin College, where he studied English and Religion. He worked for seven years as an editor and publisher at South End Press and writes regularly for ZNet. He is also is the editor of "Iraq Under Siege: The Deadly Impact of Sanctions and War" and "Terrorism and War," a collection of post–9/11 interviews with Howard Zinn. His writings have appeared in The Financial Times, The Nation, and Mother Jones among others, and he has appeared on BBC, Alternative Radio, Democracy Now!, CounterSpin, Air America, and public radio programs across the country.

Kirk Bloodsworth was the first death row inmate set free thanks to genetic testing in the United States. A former Marine, he was convicted of sexual assault, rape, and first-degree premeditated murder and sentenced to death in 1984. The ruling was appealed on the grounds that evidence was withheld at trial, and he received a new trial. He was found guilty again and sentenced to two consecutive life terms. After years of fighting for a DNA test, evidence from the crime scene was finally sent to a lab for DNA testing. In 1993, final reports from state and federal labs concluded that Bloodsworth's DNA did not match any of the evidence received for testing. By the time of his release, Bloodsworth had spent nearly nine years in prison, including two on death row. Almost a decade later, the Maryland State's Attorney announced that a DNA match had been made in the nearly 20-year-old case.

Native Hoosier William Ruckelshaus holds a place in history books as one of the victims of the 1973 "Saturday Night Massacre," when President Richard Nixon fired him for refusing to sack Watergate Special Prosecutor Archibald Cox. For many, however, Ruckelshaus' legacy as a public servant rests in his tenure as the first administrator of the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency. Drawing on four decades of experience in both public and private sectors, Ruckelshaus appeared in Bloomington to outline his views on ways to address the country's most pressing pollution. Ruckelshaus cites public distrust of the federal government as a major obstacle to implementing effective governmental policies. He says America must generate a renaissance of trust at all levels so that the government is no longer ‘them' but ‘us' – as it should be in a democracy.

A Community Forum" Bloomington is a peaceful town…isn't it? A recent spate of gun-related crime and violence in our community has perplexed both city officials and our (mostly) peaceful citizenry. Shots fired in Bryan Park, a shoot-out at a party on the City's northside, shotguns fired during a scuffle behind Dunnkirk Square; a shoot-out between two cars racing down College Avenue, a shotgun pointed out the window of a vehicle at another vehicle driver…what is going on? The Bryan Park incident alone triggered enough alarm to precipitate the City of Bloomington to hold an old-fashioned town hall meeting. Organized primarily for residents of the Bryan Park and Elm Heights neighborhoods and parents of Templeton Elementary School but open to all members of the public, the event provided residents with an opportunity for interactive dialogue with the Mayor, the police and other city officials on how we can keep our community safe and secure.

Is the healthcare system in America about people or profit? Is lack of insurance really only a problem of the poor? And how do we spend so much and get so little compared to countries with national health plans? These are just a few of the questions you'll get answers to as local doctors expose the inequities in the system in this community forum on healthcare coverage. First we explore disparities in public health services with Dr. Ed Marshall, an Indiana University-Bloomington Professor of Optometry and Adjunct Professor of Public Health at the IU School of Medicine. He was the founding Chair of the Minority Health Advisory Committee for the Indiana State Department of Health and Vice Chair of the Indiana Public Health Institute. Then we hear from Dr. Rob Stone, a local emergency room physician and medical director of the Community Access Health Program, providing health services to low-income residents. Dr.

Reza Aslan is a native of Iran who fled the country with his family during the Islamic revolution of 1978. Today he is one of the foremost experts on Islam and the Middle East, a scholar and media consultant on issues of religion and politics and the author of the internationally acclaimed "No god but God: The Origins, Evolution, and Future of Islam." Aslan has degrees in religion from Santa Clara University, Harvard University, and UC-Santa Barbara. In 2000 he was named visiting professor of Islamic studies at University of Iowa. In 2003 Reza left his post to concentrate full-time on writing. His work has appeared in the Los Angeles Times, the New York Times, and The Nation, among others. "Islam: Religion, Politics, and the Future" with renowned author and scholar Reza Aslan was recorded on-location for WFHB at the Indiana Memorial Union as part of the Union Board lecture series on April 19, 2006.

Bloomington's Poets of Conscience" - War, violence, and inequality are hot topics at poetry slams in Bloomington and everywhere else, which makes them a perfect setting to explore inequities of social justice and human rights. In 2006 Amnesty International is sponsoring a "Slamming for Human Rights" tour, a friendly competition in which local writers compete for the title of "Poet of Conscience" before moving on to a regional competition in Chicago. Here in Bloomington the contest was organized by Amnesty International activist Christy Campboll and local poet Patricia Coleman. Find out which Bloomingtonian is crowned as our local "Poet of Conscience," then later we'll hear from Amnesty International Midwest Field Organizer Christopher Watson and tour star Kevin Coval. Kevin has appeared four times on HBO's Def Poetry Jam and his wordplay is fierce, frenetic and funny…but these words didn't come to play.

A Murder Victim's Daughter Becomes an Activist for Criminal Justice Reform" - Bloomington's Community Justice & Mediation Center's promotes a civil and just community through mediation, education and restorative justice. Each year this local non-profit holds an annual meeting featuring a speaker from the front lines of the battle for educational or criminal justice reform. This year the keynote speaker was storyteller and activist Ruth Andrews, whose dramatic presentation includes the story of her own mother's unsolved murder over 30 years ago. Ms. Andrews' interest in restorative justice began more than two decades ago when she worked with the Victim Offender Reconciliation Program and the Center for Community Justice in Elkhart, Indiana.

In 2001, Brandon Wilson was working in Student Affairs at Auburn University. That October Wilson was asked to respond to photographs of a campus Halloween party that appeared on the Internet showing white students wearing blackface, sporting Ku Klux Klan regalia, and carrying nooses. His work mobilized the national media and resulted in the creation of the Center for Diversity and Race Relations near the heart of the Auburn campus in 2002. He is now the Outreach Coordinator of the Teaching Tolerance Program at the Southern Poverty Law Center. In this role he heads the Center's college initiative, 10 Ways to Fight Hate on Campus, and is the founder of the 10 Ways to Fight Hate on Campus National Tour. The program is dedicated to ensuring that no college or university has to go without the tools needed to effectively respond to hate and intolerance.

Ronald Green is director of the Ethics Institute at Dartmouth College, a consortium of faculty concerned with teaching and research in applied and professional ethics. He is a graduate of Brown University and received his Ph.D in religious ethics from Harvard University in 1973. In 1996 and 1997, Professor Green served as Director of the Office of Genome Ethics at the National Human Genome Research Institute of the National Institutes of Health. Green's research interests are in genetic ethics, biomedical ethics, and issues of justice in health care allocation. He is the author of six books and over one hundred thirty articles in theoretical and applied ethics. His most recent book, "The Human Embryo Research Debates: Bioethics in the Vortex of Controversy," was published in 2001 by Oxford University Press. In 2005, Professor Green was named a Guggenheim Fellow.

Some people just can't stomach the idea of killing for their country. Bloomington's Colin Schoder-Erie is one of them. Colin is a conscientious objector – someone who refuses to literally fight for their nation. After several of his presentations at a local high school were nixed, Schoder-Erie decided to take his message to what he calls a "more neutral" forum. He enlisted the help of Bloomington's Spirit of St. Paul Catholic Center, Truth in Recruiting, the IU student group Against the Occupation of Iraq, the Green Dove Network, and the Bloomington Peace Action Coalition to put together a public forum on conscientious objection. Are any wars good? Are you willing to be ordered to kill? What happens when you decide to follow your conscience?

At 72 years of age, journalist Nicholas Clooney has dedicated his life to the biggest story of his career – a small African nation where murder and mayhem reign. Nearly three years into the crisis, the Darfur region in Sudan is a humanitarian and human rights tragedy of the first order. 3.5 million people are now hungry, 2.5 million have been displaced due to violence, and 400,000 people have died in Darfur thus far. The international community is failing to protect civilians or to influence the Sudanese government to do so. That's where Nick comes in. Sure, it's true that he is the brother of singer Rosemary Clooney and the father of actor George Clooney. But his famous family aside, Nick Clooney is fighting to save lives the best way he knows how – by taking the message to the media. A regional legend in Cincinnati television thanks to memorable stints as news director and anchor for WKRC-TV, Clooney still writes regularly for the Cincinnati Post.

"Peace, Culture, and the Environment: Mobilizing the Activists of Tomorrow" - In both the environmental movement and peace activist circles, Roland Wiederkehr is an international superstar. A former member of the Swiss Parliament, Wiederkehr was the first director of the World Wildlife Fund, now called the Worldwide Fund for Nature. He founded Green Cross International together with Mikhail Gorbechev in 1993, centered around preventing and resolving conflicts over natural resources, especially energy and water. Green Cross also addresses the environmental consequences of wars and conflicts, promoting remediation of nuclear contamination, and the environmentally responsible destruction of conventional and chemical weapon stockpiles. But above all, they're about promoting value and behavior changes leading to a sustainable future.

Markos Moulitsas is the creator and manager of the web site DailyKos.com, the most popular web blog site in the world. In its first year, Daily Kos attracted over 1.6 million unique visits and about 3 million pageviews. Nowadays, it receives about 20 million unique visits per month. Daily Kos is not a standard blog, but an interactive site powered by the collaborative media application Scoop, which allows all registered members to maintain blogs within the site. Moulitsas and a small group of selected users post entries directly to the front page; other users can post "diaries," whose titles appear on the front page in reverse chronological order. The site is sustained by advertising, mostly for activists, political candidates and books. Daily Kos coexists happily with other liberal blogs like Democratic Underground, even to the point of helping compile progressive blogs by region on its site.

In a representative democracy with an actively participating public, citizens don't merely choose from a menu of options determined by elites, but rather play an active role in guiding the country and political agenda. Some believe we are at a critical point in our nation's history that calls for restoring democratic authority over corporations, reviving grassroots democracy, and revoking the power of money and corporations to control government and civic society. Tonight's speakers are among those true believers. Former Bloomington Mayor Tomi Allison is now an activist and advocate for human rights and social justice. Grant Smith is Executive Director of the Citizen's Action Coalition, promoting public policies to preserve democracy, conserve natural resources, protect the environment, and provide affordable access to essential human services.

Charles Baxter is the author of eleven books, including Saul and Patsy (2003), Believers (1997), Burning Down the House (1997), and the 2001 National Book Award Finalist The Feast of Love. Baxter is known for blending a quiet, sometimes absurdist wit with a profound sympathy for his far-from-perfect characters; his work has been compared to that of Anton Chekhov, William Trevor, Alice Munro and John Cheever. He was born in Minneapolis and now teaches at the University of Minnesota. His Bloomington appearance was organized primarily by the Indiana University MFA Creative Writing Program and the Bloomington Area Arts Council and is part of a series of four evening events bringing award-winning, distinguished and diverse writers from around the country to read from their works together with local musicians and DJs.

Journalist and media analyst Christopher Hitchens is a foreign correspondent and travel writer who has written from more than 60 countries on all five continents. He is the only journalist to have written, since 2000, from Iran, Iraq and North Korea. He has been a columnist for Vanity Fair, The Nation, and Slate and also contributes to the New York Review of Books, the London Review of Books, the New York Times Book Review, Los Angeles Times Book Review, and the Atlantic Monthly, among others. In this program Hitchens shares lessons learned from a man most people know only as a novelist. Contemporary readers are more often introduced to George Orwell through his enormously successful titles Animal Farm and 1984.

Is same-sex marriage good for society? The ongoing debate over civil unions and same-sex marriage often generates more heat than light, and the issue cannot be ignored, as legislators and voters around the country grapple with whether to recognize same-sex relationships and how exactly to do so. Tonight's program offers contrasting viewpoints by two of the nation's leading and opposing voices, delivered with clarity and civility. John Corvino and Glenn Stanton tour the country together, presenting both sides of this divisive topic. John Corvino, the same-sex marriage advocate, is a professor of Philosophy at Wayne State University in Detroit, Michigan, and is the editor of "Same Sex: Debating the Ethics, Science, and Culture of Homosexuality." Glenn Stanton, the same-sex marriage opponent, works for Focus on the Family as the Senior Analyst for Marriage and Sexuality and the Director of Social Research and Cultural Affairs.

As the election draws near, WFHB News is airing a series of candidate forums to help you decide who deserves your vote on November 7th. In tonight's forum, the League of Women Voters of Bloomington – Monroe County provides an opportunity for you to meet candidates for Judge, Sheriff, and Prosecutor. The featured candidates are Republican Carl Salzmann and Democrat Chris Gaal for prosecutor, Republican Brad Swain and Democrat James Kennedy for sheriff, Republican Jeffrey Chalfant and Democrat Teresa Harper for Judge of the Circuit Court Seat 8, and Republican Francie Hill and Democrat Valeri Haughton for Judge of the Circuit Court Seat 3. This forum is moderated by Keith Kline and was recorded on-location for WFHB at the Bloomington campus of Ivy Tech Community College with generous assistance from Cable Access Television Services (CATS) on Thursday October 5, 2006.

As the election draws near, WFHB News is airing a series of candidate forums to help you decide who deserves your vote on November 7th. In tonight's forum, the League of Women Voters of Bloomington – Monroe County provides an opportunity for you to meet candidates for county council. The county council appropriates all funds for county use, adopts the county budget, fixes our county tax rate, and has exclusive power to borrow money for the county. There are four district representatives and three at-large representatives. The at-large representatives are not up for re-election, and district four is an uncontested race going to Democrat Jill Lesh. This leaves us with the first three districts to decide on November 7th. The featured candidates are Republican Sue West and Democrat Vic Kelson for council district 1, Republican Jim Billingsley and Democrat Charles Newmann for district 2, and Republican Marty Hawk and Democrat Mark Stoops for district 3.

As the election draws near, WFHB News is airing a series of candidate forums to help you decide who deserves your vote on November 7th. In tonight's forum, the Monroe County Education Association provides an opportunity for you to meet candidates for MCCSC school board. The school board has authority over the business and management of the local school district. The role of the school board is to make district policy, a function comparable to what Congress or a state legislature does. The following forum featuring candidates for Monroe County Community School Corporation school board is moderated by Bloomington High School North English instructor Mark Helmsing and was recorded on-location for WFHB at Bloomington High School South with generous assistance from CATS Cable Access Television Services on October 11, 2006.

This year WFHB News aired our most ambitious election night coverage ever, built around a live feed from the county clerk's office bringing you the latest numbers literally hot off the printer. In between updates on poll results we took you on-location all night long to local party headquarters and gathering places. Correspondent Nate Johnson hung out with Democrats at their headquarters and also at Player's Pub, and correspondent Ryan Dawes trailed Republican VIPs at their headquarters and at their gathering at the former City Grille building. For those of you who couldn't stick with us for the seven-plus hours of local coverage last night, this program is a neatly packaged medley of these interviews with party candidates and supporters. "Live On Election Night: Inside Party Headquarters" was recorded on-location for WFHB over the course of an entire evening on Election Night, Tuesday November 7, 2006.

When Hurricane Katrina ravaged the U.S. Gulf coastline on August 29, 2005, Americans watched television in the days following the catastrophe with growing dismay. But a year later, as governmental attention and widespread concern have waned, a group of concerned students on the Indiana University Bloomington campus are striving to remind people of the devastation and the ongoing progress — and lack of progress — in solving the human problems resulting from Katrina. This forum features professor Carolyn Calloway-Thomas from IU's Department of Communication and Culture, professor Valerie Grim from IU's African-American and African Diaspora Studies and African-American studies financial aid advisor Cameron Beatty.

Tony Hiss is an independent author, lecturer, and consultant on restoring America's cities and landscapes. He became a staff writer at The New Yorker in 1963, and since 1994 he has been a visiting scholar at New York University. He is also the son of Alger Hiss, one of the most famous victims of America's Communist witch hunts during the Cold War. Hiss uses the "experience of place" to help us understand how profoundly we are affected by the places around us. By bringing together the insights of planners, ecologists, psychologists, and environmentalists, he explores how our experiences in public places can restore our connection to our senses. Hiss uncovers why certain places affect us so mysteriously and so forcefully. In doing so he demonstrates how our society can continue to grow without destroying the places that have nourished it for generations; how we can design changes that, rather than harming us, will enhance our future lives.

Tyler Drumheller is a former chief of the Central Intelligence Agency's European Division and one of the most well respected operations officers in CIA history. His insights on the role of the CIA in providing intelligence support to the president are truly an insider's view rarely available to the public. Drumheller retired from the CIA in 2004 after 25 years with the agency. He maintains that in 2002 and 2003, he and others in the CIA warned officials not to trust an informant known as "Curveball." The information that Curveball provided was later used by then-Secretary of State Colin Powell in talks with the United Nations as justification for war with Iraq. The commission investigating the failed intelligence has since discredited Curveball as a source. Drumheller discusses the mechanisms of U.S. intelligence operations, the role of politics in the current Bush administration's intelligence gathering and the use of intelligence in the current war in Iraq.

Michele Norris is an award-winning journalist with nearly two decades of experience. As both an African-American and a woman she represents groups that are disappearing from mainstream newsrooms, as several recent surveys revealed that there are fewer women and people of color reporting news in the United States. Since 2002 Norris has co-hosted "All Things Considered", public radio's longest-running national program. Before coming to NPR, Norris was a correspondent for ABC News from 1993 to 2002. As a contributing correspondent for Closer Look segments on World News Tonight with Peter Jennings, she reported extensively on education, inner city issues, the nation's drug problem and poverty. She also has reported for The Washington Post, Chicago Tribune and Los Angeles Times. She received a Livingston Award in 1990 and both an Emmy Award and a Peabody Award for her contribution to ABC News's coverage of the 9/11 terrorist attacks.

November was Be United Bloomington, part of the City's Be Bloomington community character campaign. To help carry out this theme, Mayor Mark Kruzan and United Way of Monroe County executive director Barry Lessow "hit the road" to lead an entourage of local community members on a mini-tour via bus to learn more about how United Way donor dollars are used in our community. The four local United Way agencies highlighted on this tour are Monroe County United Ministries, the Hoosier Hills Food Bank, Community Kitchen, and the Boys & Girls Club. WFHB used mobile recording gear to chronicle the tour and we invite you to "get on the bus" to hear about good things United Way donations do for the Bloomington community. This program was recorded on-location for WFHB on November 29, 2006.

Susan Schilling is CEO of New Technology Foundation. Previously manager of Lucas Learning LTD, Susan has a rich history in the development of educational products. For ten years she has worked alongside two foundations in Minneapolis that focus on raising up the next generation of leaders from the inner city. So-called "new technology" high schools integrate technology into both academics and administration while offering a student-centered project and problem-based teaching strategy with a one-to-one student-to-computer ratio. The state of Indiana and the governor's office have identified new tech high schools as a model that aligns significantly with the educational and economic needs of our state. They've awarded $50,000 planning grants to five Indiana communities, including Monroe County, to explore and potentially implement new technology schools.

Daughter of South African cleric and activist Desmond Tutu, Naomi Tutu appeared in Bloomington to speak at Indiana University as part of the campus celebration of the life and legacy of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. She founded the Tutu Foundation for Development and Relief in Southern Africa, which helped South African refugees become self-supporting by providing them with scholarships and other means of support. She continues to work to improve educational and professional opportunities in South Africa. Born in Krugersdorp, South Africa, Tutu has done consulting work in South Africa looking into educational and professional opportunities for black women. She has taught courses at the universities of Hartford and Connecticut and Brevard College and has held administrative positions at Tennessee State University and Fisk University. She has also worked at the University of Cape Town, where she was a program coordinator at the African Gender Institute.

Every other week millions of readers turn to the back page of Newsweek for Anna Quindlen's perspectives on events of the day and issues of family, work, education and social justice. A Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist and best-selling author, Quindlen writes Newsweek's popular column The Last Word. In 1992 her New York Times column Public and Private won the Pulitzer Prize. Quindlen also is the author of several books, including the national best seller, A Short Guide to a Happy Life, which sold more than one million copies. Her first novel, the critically-acclaimed Object Lessons, was followed by the best-selling One True Thing, which was made into a major motion picture. Black and Blue, her third novel, also was a best seller and a selection of the Oprah Winfrey Book Club. Quindlen's newest book, Rise and Shine, was released in August.

The Many Rhythms of African-American Music" - Mellonee Burnim and Portia Maultsby are professors of folklore and ethnomusicology at Indiana University in Bloomington. Together they have created an amazing 706-page chronicle modestly titled "African-American Music: An Introduction". Burnim and Maultsby hope this tome will create greater awareness about black music and its origins while exploring issues distinctive to specific genres. They wrote several of the book's 30 essays, along with 24 other authors, in what they believe is the most comprehensive examination of African-American music, sacred and secular, from the days of slavery to today, exploring the rich heritage of black artists and the voices of those who created the music, who lived it and who continue to live it. "Black History Month Bloomington Style: The Many Rhythms of African-American Music" was recorded on-location for WFHB at Bloomington City Hall on January 31, 2007.

For eighteen years the annual African-American Read-In has helped high school and college students relate to great works by African-American authors. Here in Bloomington the Indiana University celebration is in its fifth year, and organizers didn't let frigid temperatures and the resulting school delay stop the celebration. Hearing great recognized authors is only part of the African-American Read-In. Local high school students also get to share their own work during the event, and you might be surprised at the frank and personal nature of these readings. "Black Love: The Annual African-American Read-In" was recorded on-location for WFHB at IU's Neal-Marshall Black Culture Center on February 5, 2007. The program was organized by Dr. Stephanie Carter and hosted by IU student Steve Gaskin.

As a child, Gladys Devane remembers sitting around her grandfather's pot-bellied stove and listening to him tell stories of the African-American experience. Devane now shares her own gift of narration with the Bloomington community as a storyteller and actress active with the Bloomington Playwrights Project. "From the Mouth of My People" is a one-woman show featuring a series of her favorite stories about the struggle and triumph of African Americans from the slave ships to the present. In the selection featured in this broadcast Devane assumes the persona of John, a slave captured at sixteen and brought to America from Angola. This story is adapted from "The Prowl" by Gregory Frost, and is derived from Mojo Conjure Stories, edited by Nalo Hopkinson.

Meet Shannon, a Bloomington woman and the mother of six boys. "Shannon" (a pseudonym) says that her daughter "Ashley" (also a pseudonym) is a happy member in their large family. Like her five siblings, Ashley was born a male. But unlike her brothers, Ashley never accepted her identity as a boy. When Ashley was eighteen months old and first began to talk and express preferences for toys, it was Barbie, not GI Joe, that drew this toddler's attention. In kindergarten Ashley was introverted and withdrawn, and the family sought counseling. Shannon and her husband finally made a decision to facilitate Ashley's identity as a girl at home. Public appearances were a different matter. Even at the age of 5, Ashley feared the social repercussions, so she continued to present as a boy. The situation escalated this past fall when Ashley began first grade as a boy, and the teasing at school intensified.

As a young kindergarten teacher, Oliver began her work at Broad Acres Elementary in Silver Springs, Maryland in the suburban Washington, D.C. area six years ago. Ninety percent of the students lived in poverty. Three-quarters of the students' families spoke a language other than English. Test scores reflected a school struggling to meet growing state and federal standards. Maryland threatened to restructure the school because of continuing poor scores on standardized tests. Oliver, just 24 at the time, immediately set out to involving the community in shaping the future of her school. She started several programs to promote consistent curriculum, instruction and assessment throughout her struggling school. The results were dramatic. In 2001, Broad Acres surpassed all other schools in the system for test score improvement. Scores met or exceeded "No Child Left Behind" standards in 2003, 2004 and 2005.

Dr. Chester Finn isn't the biggest fan of the federal "No Child Left Behind" Act. But he says alternatives offered so far aren't going to make it better. Dr. Finn is the president of the Thomas B. Fordham Foundation, a Washington, D.C.-based thinktank working to raise educational standards and expand education options for parents and families. Finn does not agree with recommendations recently released by the Commission on No Child Left Behind. The bi-partisan group suggested tougher laws tying teachers and principals to student test scores. Finn says the commission is just adding more rules that further complicate matters. Finn says you can't make them do a good job of something they don't want to do, no matter how many rules you prescribe. Over a 25-year career, Dr. Finn has authored 14 books, including his latest, a critical analysis of No Child Left Behind, co-authored with fellow researcher Frederick Hess.

For more than fifteen years David Agranoff has been an activist working on issues like animal rights, ecology, forest protection, labor, and human rights. David grew up in Bloomington and was active in the campaign to save Lake Griffy. Agranoff was also active in the fight to stop I-69. He has long promoted a vegan, cruelty-free lifestyle. In 2005 he spent time in prison for resisting a grand jury subpoena that required him to name people who attended a lecture he co-organized in San Diego. The grand jury's probe was in violation of the First Amendment's right to free association and belief. David was released after eighty days without answering a single question. Agranoff returned to his home town of Bloomington to recount his constitutional adventure and to promote his short story collection "Screams from a Dying World", a work of politically-charged fiction.

At the ripe age of 30, journalist David Halberstam won a Pulitzer Prize at for his prophetic reporting in the early days of the Vietnam War. Thirty-eight years later his bestseller "War in a Time of Peace" was a runner-up for the Pulitzer. The New York Times called it "a tour de force....likely to stand as the definitive record of the American use of armed force in the decade of the 90's." Perhaps no other writer has so faithfully chronicled the profound changes in America in the second half of the twentieth century and the challenges of the twenty-frst century. His books include "The Powers That Be", about the rise of modern media; "The Reckoning", about the challenge of Japan to the American automotive industry; and "The Fifties", about a decade he regards as seminal in determining what our nation is today. His classic, "The Best and The Brightest", is the definitive book on how and why we went to war in Vietnam.

The Hoosier state is home to the largest concentration of Darfurians in the nation and also boasts a broad coalition of activists calling attention to the genocide in Darfur, Sudan. As many as 400,000 people have been killed in a government-sponsored campaign and the situation has steadily deteriorated. Indiana is one of almost 20 states considering legislation that would require removal of money from companies that operate in Sudan and are complicit in the genocide. As the Sudanese government continues to resist international political pressure to allow an expanded UN peacekeeping mission into the region to protect civilians, many have begun to advocate "targeted divestment" as a way to exert meaningful economic pressure on the Sudanese regime. Foreign companies generate large amounts of revenue for the Sudanese government, and the majority of this revenue is used to fund the government's military operations.

Indiana University currently has a multi-million dollar exclusive contract with the Coca-Cola Company, a corporation accused of flagrant human rights violations around the world. Coca-Cola has been charged with mounting a campaign of violent union-busting tactics in Colombia, including the murders of eight union leaders since 1989. The company has also been accused of a wide spectrum of environmental, labor, and human rights abuses in India, Turkey, and Indonesia. In this program we feature a debate that deals not only with the question of whether IU should cease business dealings with Coca-Cola in the wake of these alleged abuses, but also broader issues of ethical contracting on university campuses.

You could say that George McGovern is best known for his crushing defeat by Richard Nixon in the 1972 presidential election, but that would be missing the point. McGovern's legacy of public service as a senator is only the tip of the iceberg in his inspirational story of a man who has never been afraid to speak his mind. Elected to the U.S. Senate in 1962, McGovern became an outspoken critic of defense spending and was among the first senators to oppose the Vietnam War. In 2001 he became the United Nations World Food Program's first global ambassador on hunger. He is the author of several books, including his latest "Out of Iraq: A Practical Plan for Withdrawal Now". McGovern hopes to inspire today's citizens to get politically active, which made him a perfect guest speaker for Ivy Tech Community College's O'Bannon Institute, an annual event advocating civic engagement.

Polychlorinated biphenyls, or PCBs, are highly toxic and persistent chemicals found in our air, water, soil, food, and even our own bodies. Corporate carelessness has created toxic "reservoirs" that keep on releasing PCBs into local water and air. It's been happening for decades here in Bloomington, and it's still happening. We've got four so-called Superfund sites, top environmental offenders according to the Environmental Protection Agency. But a coalition of local residents says the EPA has failed to protect the public. Local environmental attorney Mick Harrison is handling a federal lawsuit brought by Elizabeth Frey, Kevin Enright and the group Protect Our Woods, charging inadequacies in the PCB cleanup. Harrison recently won a federal court decision establishing that EPA is required by law to conduct a remedial investigation and cleanup feasibility study.

Residents of Indian Creek township turn out in droves to find out why township trustee Linda Hollingsworth is shutting out the township's volunteer fire department. She says the Indian Creek Firefighters are providing poor service with poor equipment, and that the firefighters refused to negotiate a new contract. The firefighters own their equipment and their building, but the township owns the land the building stands on. At a meeting in January the trustee presented a contract supplement that included numerous demands unacceptable to the fire department, including the ability to terminate the contract AND the property lease with only a 30-day notice, and without cause. The ICFF board would not sign, and so in February the trustee sent them a 90-day contract termination notice and then outsourced fire protection to neighboring Van Buren Township.

Immigration policy is perhaps the defining civil rights issue of our time. Right now the debate rages over the criminalization of illegal aliens, forms of legalization and naturalization for those who entered illegally, and a proposed wall along the 2,000-mile border with Mexico. Locally, the Bloomington chapter of the American Civil Liberties Union and the Indiana University Latino Studies program organized a panel forum to discuss these issues. Our featured speakers are immigration attorney Steve Tuchman, IU history professor Peter Guardino, ACLU of Indiana executive director Claudia Porretti, and IU political science professor Russell Hanson. Specific topics include undocumented Hispanic immigrants and their rights, current issues on the Mexican/U.S. border, immigration as a national political issue, and legal defense of Indiana immigrants. Recorded on-location for WFHB at the Monroe County Public Library on February 7, 2007.

Transportation policy issues are a hot topic in Bloomington, where for decades we have struggled to reconcile urban growth with our common desire to maintain a high level of quality of life. One group at the forefront of this issue is Bloomington Transportation Options for People, recently in the news for its downtown parking study that helped convince city administration that we don't need a new parking garage. In the first of the group's 2007 speaker series, B-TOP hosted a local appearance by Dr. Norman Garrick, a professor of civil engineering at University of Connecticut. Garrick has done extensive advising with federal and state transportation agencies and consulting on various aspects of urban design, sustainable transportation, and planning. His career bridges academic studies and real-life applications of transit motorization and urban transformation in rapidly changing cities. Recorded on-location for WFHB at Bloomington City Hall on March 5, 2007.

Indiana University football coach Terry Hoeppner died yesterday morning due to complications from his ongoing battle with brain cancer. Just like on the field, Hep fought cancer with a never-give-up attitude, a characteristic that made the coach a charismatic leader beloved by athletes and fans alike. Those sentiments were clear yesterday among university administrators and athletes as they paid tribute to Hep during a previously-scheduled ceremony marking the beginning of renovation of the north end of Memorial Stadium. IU officials initially moved to cancel the ceremony, but wife Jane Hoeppner told them Terry would have wanted the show to go on. So what was originally intended to be a promotional event for the stadium's North End Zone project and other athletic resource improvements naturally turned into a bittersweet memorial for a fallen hero. Recorded on-location for WFHB at Memorial Stadium on June 19, 2007.

For 67 years, the Indiana University Writers' Conference has attracted both veteran authors and academics and aspiring writers and poets seeking to learn from their more established peers.  The week-long annual conference features faculty-led classes and workshops peppered with a variety of social events, like the popular faculty reading series.  This year the final performance in the reading series featured Heather McHugh, Chancellor of the Academy of American Poets and an author of several books of poetry.  She lives in Seattle, where she teaches at University of Washington.  In the second half of the program we spend time with Ohio State University English professor Lee Martin, author of the novel "The Bright Forever", a finalist for the 2006 Pulitzer Prize in Fiction.  He is the winner of the Mary McCarthy Prize in Short Fiction and fellowships from the National Endowment for the Arts and the Ohio Arts Council.  Recorded on-location for WFHB at the Joh

Tall tales are part of the cultural history in Brown County, where the infamous Liars' Bench has long served as a pulpit for the wildest yarns ever spun in these parts. The 4th annual Tall Tale Tell-Off brought together storytellers from Brown County and beyond to compete for cash prizes and a book deal with the Bloomington publishing firm AuthorHouse. Our five performers are Dan Dillinger, John Sisson, Kristen Kindoll, Robert Luedeman Jr. and and Robert Luedeman Sr. So grab a seat on the Liars' Bench to see if YOU can tell fact from fiction. The 2007 Brown County Tall Tale Tell-Off was recorded on-location for WFHB at the Brown County Public Library on June 23, 2007. Organized by Hank Swain and hosted by Brown County Chamber of Commerce director Jim Smidebush.

An hour-long edit of our Labor Day 2007 special celebrates the life and legacy of a man who "spoke truth to power". You have a front row seat for this gripping dramatic musical narrative by the Bloomington-based Voces Novae chamber choir, paying tribute to Terre Haute native Eugene V. Debs, an eloquent, charismatic socialist railroad worker who ran for president five times on the Socialist Party ticket in the early 20th century and was jailed after organizing the 1894 Pullman Strike in Chicago against the railroad industry. This standing-room-only performance features actors narrating the storyline and reading from Debs' speeches and the choir singing and playing music from the era. Local actor Joe Gaines portrays Debs, and Sally Noble Hager and Jack King narrate. This inspirational performance was recorded on-location at Bloomington's historic Old Woolery Stone Mill on May 19, 2007.

Matt Southworth came from a conservative military family, so it wasn't much of a surprise when he volunteered to serve our country through the armed forces. In 2004 he was an intelligence analyst for the U.S. Army in Iraq. What he saw would change his life forever. Today Matt attends Wilmington College in Ohio and travels the country speaking to students as a member of "Iraq Veterans Against the War". Hear how his firsthand experience led him to oppose the war, as he speaks on the "War on Terror" and how it affects civil liberties at home, the legal black hole of Guantanamo Bay, the Patriot Act and the Military Commissions Act. Oganized by the campus branch of Amnesty International and recorded on-location for WFHB in Woodburn Hall on the Indiana University campus on April 18, 2007.

Candace Gingrich is the sister of former Republican house speaker Newt Gingrich, but don't hold that against her. She's also an out lesbian, a long time gay rights activist, and the senior youth outreach director for the Human Rights Campaign, America's largest civil rights organization working to achieve gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender equality, with an active chapter in Indiana. After the 1994 elections, Newt's zealous promotion of "family values" made little sister Candace a prime media target. The attention she received not only embarrassed Newt and his cronies, it launched Candace on an unexpected career as a political activist. In her autobiography, "The Accidental Activist", Gingrich tells of her rise to fame and how she hopes it will undo the "accident" that put her in the spotlight in the first place. Her message is one of hope as she pursues her mission to engage gay and lesbian youth and the entire community in the fight for equality.

The United States of America functions as a republic under the Constitution, the oldest document still in active use that outlines the self-government of a people. This landmark idea that men had the inalienable right as individuals to be free and live their lives under their own governance was the impetus of the American Revolution. Today, the Constitution stands as an icon of freedom for people around the world. It is perhaps unfortunate then that the weeklong commemoration of America's most important document is one of our country's least known official observances. Here in Bloomington, the local campus of Ivy Tech Community College hosted a discussion of the U.S. Constitution featuring an unlikely pairing - opposing candidates for mayor of Bloomington. Democrat incumbent Mark Kruzan and Republican challenger David Sabbagh are political adversaries, but this is not a debate - although you may detect subtle swipes at one another and plenty of old-fashioned electioneering.

The weekly political magazine The Nation is America's oldest weekly magazine.  Its editor and publisher, Katrina vanden Heuvel, is the only woman in America who holds such a title.  She says the line between news and entertainment is no longer blurred…it's been forever obliterated.  In this program vanden Heuvel leads a panel discussion also featuring her husband Stephen Cohen, a professor at New York University and a contributing editor to The Nation, and Indiana University Telecommunications assistant professor Julia Fox, who recently concluded that network television news is no more substantive than Comedy Central's Daily Show with Jon Stewart.  Recorded on-location for WFHB at the Indiana University School of Journalism on September 6, 2007.

As the election draws near, WFHB News is airing a series of candidate forums to help you decide who deserves your vote on November 6. In this forum, the League of Women Voters of Bloomington – Monroe County provides an opportunity for you to meet candidates for city council. As the legislative body of the City, the Council is a link between the citizens of Bloomington and their government. The Council may pass legislation for the government of the City, the control of the City's property and finances and for the appropriation of money. Spend an hour with District Two candidates Brad Wisler and Jillian Kinzie, and District Six candidates Steve Volan and Marjorie Hudgins. District Five candidate Isabel Piedmont attended the event but was not allowed to participate according to the forum's rules because her opponent Alicia Graves was not present.

Poverty. As much as people like to sing the praises of our community, we are living a tale of two cities. While many in Bloomington are comfortable and content, many others have trouble paying their bills for basic necessities. The demand at food pantries is going up. There’s a growing need for affordable housing. Some face challenges in heating their homes. The Shalom Center, Bloomington's downtown daytime facility for local people struggling with homelessness and poverty, hosted an election forum on these issues, featuring candidates for mayor of Bloomington. City policies can have an impact here. Do candidates Mark Kruzan and David Sabbagh understand that, and what would they do about it? Find out in this hour-long program recorded on-location at the First United Methodist Church in Bloomington, Indiana on October 9, 2007.

As the election draws near, WFHB News is airing a series of candidate forums to help you decide who deserves your vote on November 6. In this forum, the League of Women Voters of Bloomington – Monroe County provides an opportunity for you to meet candidates for city council at-large and mayor of Bloomington. Spend an hour with at-large candidates Cliff Meadows, Susan Sandberg, Tim Mayer, and Andy Ruff, and mayoral candidates David Sabbagh and Mark Kruzan. Recorded on-location for WFHB at Ivy Tech Community College with generous assistance from Community Access Television Services on October 11, 2007.

As the election draws near, WFHB News is airing a series of candidate forums to help you decide who deserves your vote on November 6. In this election forum, the NonProfit Alliance of Monroe County grills council candidates on issues that impact the local non-profit sector and the organizations, clients, and stakeholders they serve. Hear from city council candidates Brad Wisler, Jillian Kinzie, Isabel Piedmont, Alicia Graves, Steve Volan, Marjorie Hudgins, Cliff Meadows, Susan Sandberg, Tim Mayer, and Andy Ruff. Recorded on-location for WFHB at the Monroe County Public Library with generous assistance from Community Access Television Services on October 30, 2007.

This year WFHB News aired extensive local election night coverage, built around a live feed from the county clerk's office bringing you the latest numbers literally hot off the printer. In between updates on poll results we took you on-location all night long to local party headquarters and gathering places. Correspondent Lauren Taylor hung out with Democrats at their headquarters, and correspondent Eleanor Lissitzyn trailed Republican VIPs at their gathering at the Fountain Square Ballroom. Featured speakers are Mark Kruzan, David Sabbagh, Jillian Kinzie, Brad Wisler, Isabel Piedmont, Alicia Graves, Susan Sandberg, Andy Ruff, Cliff Meadows, Mike Satterfield, Marjorie Hudgins, and Franklin Andrew. For those of you who couldn’t stick with us for the five-plus hours of local coverage last night, this program is a neatly packaged medley of these interviews with party candidates and supporters. Recorded on-location over the course of an entire evening on Tuesday November 6, 2007.

The Dalai Lama may travel the world as an inspirational spiritual figure, but Bloomington has a special and unique connection to his life and legacy. His older brother, retired Indiana University professor Thubten Jigme Norbu, is a longtime Bloomington resident who founded our local Tibetan Cultural Center. And it was the Dalai Lama who bailed out that very same center when it recently teetered on the brink of financial ruin, bringing in new director Arjia Rinpoche to stabilize operations. In October the Dalai Lama once again visited Bloomington for a series of teachings and a public address, raising hundreds of thousands of dollars for the center and giving it a new name - the Tibetan Mongolian Buddhist Cultural Center. Recorded on-location at Assembly Hall on October 27, 2007 in a sold-out public address with a simple theme: "Be more compassionate."

Temperatures are dropping sharply, and fuel prices are rising just as fast. Bloomington has plenty of older homes with poor energy efficiency, but there ARE ways to cut your heating costs and slow global warming at the same time. Carbon emissions are largely responsible for increases in global temperatures from burning coal for electricity generation and from burning petroleum and natural gas. 35% of greenhouse gas emissions come from the buildings in which we live and work. Matt Wysocki is Housing Director for the South Central Community Action Program, which offers a variety of assistance programs for low-income residents in the WFHB listening area. In this program he shows you how to shave hundreds of dollars off your winter heating bills. Recorded on-location at the Monroe County Public Library on November 27, 2007.

The board of the Monroe County Health Department has unanimously agreed to ask county officials to ban smoking in cars with children under thirteen as passengers. This would take our local smoking ban beyond public places and into private property. Such an ordinance would mean you would get a ticket for smoking in your own car if a kid is present. There's no question secondhand smoke kills, but where is the line between personal property rights and public health? Hear from county health board president Dr. Carol Toloukian, health board members Dr. Lloyd Kolbe and Dr. David Byrne, and the lone voice of dissent, Indiana University public health student Ashley Skoogland, who points out that enforcement of such an ordinance is tenuous, as is the legal precedent it sets. Recorded on-location at the Monroe County Public Library on December 10, 2007.

Ali Abunimah is author of "One Country: A Bold Proposal to End the Israeli-Palestinian Impasse". Abunimah is a Palestinian-American journalist and writer and the co-founder and editor of the Electronic Intifada, the leading Palestinian portal for information about the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and its depiction in the media. He spoke in Bloomington on his bold ideas to go beyond partition, expulsion and apartheid for true peace and justice in Palestine/Israel. Recorded on-location in Indiana University's Ballentine Hall on October 4, 2007.

Six years after the 9/11 attacks, David Cole argues that the U.S. has become LESS secure against terrorist attacks, despite the sacrifice of civil liberties in the war on terror. Cole is the legal affairs correspondent for The Nation magazine and a professor of law at Georgetown University. His new book is a scathing critique of the Bush administration's "preventive paradigm" in fighting terrorism. He contends that the administration has failed to bring terrorists to justice while prompting the formation of new terrorist groups with the war in Iraq, and that the administration has undermined basic American ideals with CIA "black sites" and warrantless wiretapping of citizens. Cole is a volunteer staff attorney for the Center for Constitutional Rights, a regular contributor to the New York Review of Books, and a commentator on National Public Radio's "All Things Considered." Recorded on-location at the Indiana University School of Law on October 4, 2007.

In his short life, Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. was instrumental in helping us realize and rectify unspeakable flaws tarnishing the name of America. Black Americans needed a Martin Luther King, but above all America needed him. It was the right prescription for our country, and it was right on time. Every year the city of Bloomington celebrates the King legacy, sponsoring a coordinated effort to support service projects honoring King ideals like peace and justice and equality. This year as usual the local observance of the holiday culminated in the Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. Community-Wide Birthday Celebration, presented by the City of Bloomington's Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. Birthday Celebration Commission and hosted by Commission Vice-Chair David Hummons. This s a radio edit of the original live program broadcast on-location for WFHB on January 21, 2008 from the historic Buskirk-Chumley Theater in downtown Bloomington.

This year our mayor delivered his 2008 State of the City Address with a little help from his friends. The usual speech is peppered with appearances from several city staff leaders - housing and neighborhood development director Lisa Abbott, city planning director Tom Micuda, and public works director Susie Johnson. Find out what's going on with the Certified Technology Park, the B-Line Trail, local neighborhood development, and more in this neatly-packaged one-hour edit, taken from the original live feed from WFHB's remote transmitter inside City Hall. The 2008 State of the City Address with Bloomington Mayor Mark Kruzan was recorded live on-location on January 24, 2008.

(PART ONE of a TWO-PART SERIES)
"One More River to Cross" was originally written in the 1990s by Dr. James Mumford, former director of the Indiana University African-American Chorale Ensemble. Through song, poetry, and powerful narrative, Mumford and co-producer Dr. Gladys DeVane guide us along the journey from Africa, through slavery, to Emancipation and the Civil Rights Movement. It's a vivid, engrossing and fast-paced experience that celebrates the richness and diversity of black voices throughout history. At the end of part one DeVane, Mumford and other castmembers join us in the studio to reflect on this labor of love in the first of our special two-part series. Recorded live on-location before a sold-out audience at the Bloomington Playwrights Project on February 2, 2008.

(PART TWO of a TWO-PART SERIES)
"One More River to Cross" was originally written in the 1990s by Dr. James Mumford, former director of the Indiana University African-American Chorale Ensemble. Through song, poetry, and powerful narrative, Mumford and co-producer Dr. Gladys DeVane guide us along the journey from Africa, through slavery, to Emancipation and the Civil Rights Movement. It's a vivid, engrossing and fast-paced experience that celebrates the richness and diversity of black voices throughout history. This final edition in our special two-part series was recorded live on-location before a sold-out audience at the Bloomington Playwrights Project on February 2, 2008.

(PART ONE of a TWO-PART SERIES)
Bill Cosby, Hurricane Katrina, and the "blackness" of Barack Obama…all fair game for biting social and cultural commentary from Dr. Michael Eric Dyson, who appeared in Bloomington for the student-run Union Board's annual Black History Month lecture. Dr. Dyson is one of the most sought after speakers in the country. Often referred to as "the Hip-Hop Intellectual", Dyson has written 14 books on the issues relevant to the African American community. Dyson is a professor at Georgetown University, where he teaches Theology, English and African American Studies. He easily captivated a Bloomington audience for nearly three hours, and tonight we bring you part one of a two-part program: Recorded on-location in Alumni Hall at the Indiana Memorial Union on February 19, 2008.

(PART TWO of a TWO-PART SERIES)
Bill Cosby, Janet Jackson's nipple, and the "blackness" of Barack Obama…all fair game for biting social and cultural commentary from Dr. Michael Eric Dyson, who appeared in Bloomington for the student-run Union Board's annual Black History Month lecture. Dr. Dyson is one of the most sought after speakers in the country. Often referred to as "the Hip-Hop Intellectual", Dyson has written 14 books on issues relevant to the African American community. Dyson is a professor at Georgetown University, where he teaches Theology, English and African American Studies. He easily captivated a Bloomington audience for nearly three hours, and tonight we bring you the second installment of a two-part program: Recorded on-location in Alumni Hall at the Indiana Memorial Union on February 19, 2008.

Democratic U.S. Representative Baron Hill is running for re-election in southern Indiana's 9th District, setting up a likely fourth consecutive race between Hill and Republican Mike Sodrel, assuming Hills fends off the three challengers to his party nomination in Indiana's May 6 primary. Last month Baron Hill hosted a public forum in Bloomington to hear about the issues that matter most to voters in the 9th district. We spend most of this program listening to your friends and neighbors talk about the politics they care most about, but in the first segment Congressman Hill recounts the triumphs and failures of the current Congressional session. A WFHB radio exclusive recorded on-location at City Hall on February 16, 2008.

For the first time in forty years, Indiana could help decide the Democratic presidential nominee. A close race means our 72 delegates are suddenly worth courting. Inside the span of one week New York Senator Hillary Clinton and Illinois Senator Barack Obama are both visiting Indiana in a scramble to woo Hoosier voters. Thousands of people packed a high school gym west of Indianapolis to hear Senator Obama deliver what supporters say is a message of change you can count on. Obama spoke to a crowd of more than 3,000 people in Plainfield, Indiana, about race, politics, the war in Iraq, healthcare, education standards, energy policy, and more. Tickets to this free event were gobbled up in less than ninety minutes, but you've got a seat in the front row as we go "On the Campaign Trail with Barack Obama", recorded on-location at Plainfield High School on March 15, 2008.

On March 14 state lawmakers wrapped up the 2008 session of the Indiana General Assembly with a major property tax relief and restructuring plan. Homeowners' tax bills will be capped at no more than 1 percent of your home’s assessed value, with a 2 percent limit on rental property and a 3 percent cap on business property. State sales tax is going up April 1 to make up for some of the lost property tax revenue, but there are plenty of uncertainties about how the changes will affect taxpayers, schools and local government, particularly in counties that depend heavily on property tax revenue. Local state senator Vi Simpson and local state representative Matt Pierce spoke candidly about the triumphs and failures of the latest session in a forum sponsored by the local League of Women Voters. Recorded on-location at the Monroe County Public Library on March 22, 2008.

In January area residents observed Meth Awareness Week next door to Bloomington in Greene County, where small clandestine drug labs are tucked into the rural landscape and ravage the lives of ordinary people. County commissioners signed a proclamation on January 8 officially designating Meth Awareness Week to foster community awareness that methamphetamine still has a staggering grip on the community. In this program you'll hear the tragic but hopeful story of Tony, a local resident and former methamphetamine junkie, speaking in Bloomfield at the "Meth is Death" Candelight Vigil. We'll also hear from the man who put Tony behind bars - county prosecutor Jarrod Holtsclaw, along with Greene County Sheriff Terry Pierce and Nancy Cummings, president of a grassroots volunteer group called Greene United Against Meth, or GUAM. Recorded on-location for WFHB at the Bloomfield First Baptist Church on January 28, 2008.

The local jail reform advocacy group Citizens for Effective Justice hosted an election forum for candidates in county races in the upcoming primary. Citizens for Effective Justice was formed in response to the tragic, untimely death of James Borden, who died on the floor of the Monroe County jail in 2003 after being Tasered. CEJ looks for ways to reduce overcrowding in the jail and create opportunities for those incarcerated to re-enter the community as productive members of society. In the next hour we'll hear what candidates for county commissioner, county council, and circuit court judge plan to do to improve county corrections. And just so you don't think we edited anybody out, please note: all Republicans running for these offices WERE invited, but none showed up…except for Judge Kenneth Todd, who is running unopposed for re-election to the circuit court bench. Recorded on-location for WFHB at the Monroe County Public Library on April 5, 2008.

Vernon Jordan, Jr. is a venerated figure in the civil rights struggle, one of a vanishing group of people who were actually there for the historic events that shaped social reform. A lawyer and former presidential advisor, Jordan has served as a field director for the NAACP, executive director of the United Negro College Fund, and executive director of the National Urban League. He was recently featured on the cover of Black Enterprise Magazine. He also has ties to the Hoosier state as a 1957 graduate of DePauw University in Greencastle. Indiana University's School of Public and Environmental Affairs and the Neal-Marshall Alumni Club teamed up to bring Vernon Jordan to Bloomington for a captivating lecture on fifty years of a public life spent fighting racial injustice. Recorded on-location for WFHB at the Indiana Memorial Union on March 27, 2008.

Our final candidate forum for the 2008 local primary election takes us to the fairgrounds for an open event hosted by the local Farm Bureau. This forum is not organized by race; signups to speak were first-come, first-served, so there's no particular rhyme or reason to the order. A note to listeners: this program ran about three-and-a-half hours long, and on this program we only have time for the first hour. Recorded on-location for WFHB at the Monroe County Fairgrounds on April 7, 2008.

The Monroe County Asset Building Coalition is currently hosting a series of community conversations about using random drug testing in our public schools. Not for all students, just those participating in extra-curricular activities. In 2002 the U.S. Supreme Court just barely upheld a similar program. Tonight we'll hear the entire first forum on this issue, featuring MCCSC Healthy Schools Coordinator Jennifer Staab, Edgewood High School Principal Dirk Ackerman, Indiana University's Dr. David Lohrmann, Dr. Jeannie Alter from the Indiana Prevention Resource Center, and Mooresville High School Teacher Greg Silver. Recorded on-location for WFHB at Bloomington High School North with generous assistance from Community Access Television Services (CATS) on April 30, 2008.

Cliff Kindy is an organic farmer from northern Indiana. He's a pacifist and longtime member of Christian Peacemaker Teams. Cliff has spent nearly two of the last five years living in Iraq for an eyewitness perspective of life under U.S. military occupation. Indiana Students Against War and Bloomington Peace Action Coalition brought Cliff to Bloomington for an evening of education and inspiration. What's really going on in Iraq? How can we move forward on resolving the conflict? Recorded on-location at First United Church in Bloomington, Indiana on April 24, 2008.

John Prendergast is a U.S.-based human rights activist who has witnessed firsthand the devastating effect of genocide in the Darfur region of Sudan. Prendergast is a co-founder of the Enough Project, an initiative to end genocide and crimes against humanity. It's a joint initiative of the International Crisis Group and the Center for American Progress. He is co-author of the book "Not on Our Watch: The Mission to End Genocide in Darfur and Beyond", taking a stand for the tens of thousands of murdered Darfuris and millions more left homeless to wander the desert. Recorded on-location at the Indiana Memorial Union in Bloomington, Indiana on February 19, 2008.

As the Beijing Olympics approach, the spotlight on China grows more intense. Protests against Chinese rule in Tibet have turned violent as Chinese security forces clash with Buddhist monks and other ethnic Tibetans. Nearly all foreigners are barred from entering and Tibetans essentially have no freedom. The protests began March 10, the anniversary of a failed 1959 Tibetan uprising against Chinese rule. Bloomington, Indiana has long been a hotbed of Tibetan culture, due in large part to regular visits from the Dalai Lama to see his eldest brother, longtime Bloomington resident Thubten Jigme Norbu. The Dalai Lama personally appointed the current director of the local Tibetan-Mongolian Buddhist Cultural Center, Arjia Rinpoche, who appeared on a panel forum on Sino-Tibetan relations sponsored by the campus chapter of Students for Free Tibet.

The Local Council of Women founded Bloomington Hospital over one hundred years ago and still effectively controls it. On Monday the council will vote on whether the hospital will be allowed to merge with Clarian Health Partners. The Bloomington City Council asked the hospital administration to make a presentation at last week's council session, a discussion which lasted more than two and a half hours and included more than a few tense moments. Council vice-president Andy Ruff thinks that the hospital merger plan is inextricably linked to a separate proposal to move Bloomington Hospital’s main campus out of city limits. He worries that these plans will result in a loss of local control of the hospital, make access by the public more difficult, and cost the city lost property tax revenue. The first half of this program features Bloomington Hospital CEO Mark Moore and board president Dan Peterson, outlining the case for a merge.

The Local Council of Women founded Bloomington Hospital over one hundred years ago and still effectively controls it. The Local Council of Women voted 403 to 149 to approve bylaw changes paving the way for a merger with Clarian Health, a non-profit organization that operates three medical centers in Indianapolis. Local interest in the issue prompted a drastic increase in the council membership - growing by more than 450 members in the past few weeks, bringing total membership to 676 on the day of the meeting. Public frustration at the meeting had no place to go within the bounds of the meeting rules, as questions were only taken through pre-submitted index cards, and the panelists and moderator were all openly in favor of the merger. No open comment was allowed until AFTER the vote had been taken. In this program you'll hear voices of dissent who think the process was flawed and rushed.

Jeffrey St. Clair is an Indianapolis native who lived in Brown County in the 1980s and formed the seminal Indiana environmental group ForestWatch in response to off-road vehicles and clearcutting in the Hoosier National Forest. Working for the Hoosier Environmental Council, he wrote the Conservationists' Alternative, which became the foundation for that forest's management for decades. Today St. Clair lives in Oregon and is co-editor of the online political newsletter CounterPunch with columnist Alexander Cockburn from The Nation magazine. St. Clair and Cockburn have co-authored numerous books, including End Times: The Death of the Fourth Estate. His new book "Red State Rebels" is a collection of stories about grassroots resistance in the Heartland. It includes a chapter written by Bloomington Alternative editor Steven Higgs and another by environmental activist John Blair from the Evansville-based Valley Watch.

"Failure to cooperate" is a phrase you don't want to hear if you're poor or disabled. It means the end of the line for someone trying to secure food stamps or Medicaid through the Indiana Family and Social Services Administration. Under the new automated benefits system outsourced to IBM, client benefits are being denied or eliminated, and local caseworkers have been replaced by a call center. The mess has even spawned a lawsuit filed by the American Civil Liberties Union seeking class-action status. The state's contract with IBM to provide intake and eligibility services for Hoosiers in need of health and welfare support is worth more than a billion dollars to the corporation, but what's it worth to your friends and neighbors?

The Bloomington utilities service board recently approved expanding Bloomington's water treatment plant, following earlier approval of a second water line from Lake Monroe. The proposal now goes to the Bloomington city council. The two-phase project would raise water rates by 46%, only on the water portion of your bill, not wastewater, about a seven dollar per month hike for the average customer. The consulting firm Black and Veatch says the plant can handle 24 million gallons a day and they project that we could be hitting that maximum as early as 2010. The local chapter of the Women's International League for Peace and Freedom recently held a forum on the pros and cons of both conservation and expansion, and how both approaches could be used together.

Why don't we have recycling programs for apartment buildings and retirement homes? Where does our trash and recycling go? The League of Women Voters of Bloomington-Monroe County held a forum in Bloomington on waste management policy and recycling issues, to look at how solid waste and recyclables of the city and county are handled. Our panelists are Hoosier Disposal manager Dan Gajus, Monroe County Solid Waste Management District executive director Larry Barker, and city councilman Steve Volan. This WFHB radio exclusive was recorded on-location at the Monroe County Courthouse on March 19, 2008. Most of this program is a Q & A with questions from the audience read by moderator George Hegeman.

This summer the Bloomington Project School was officially chartered by the Ball State Charter Office as Bloomington's first charter school. In 2006, a small group of local public school educators and education reformers began a discussion about the current state of education and what they believed should be happening in schools. As the group began to articulate their vision, the concept for the Bloomington Project School was born. The school will open in the fall of 2009, offering kindergarten through seventh grade in multi-age classrooms with a "team teaching" approach. Just a few days prior to the official charter, representatives of this new charter school held a public forum to outline its form and function. It will be completely separate and autonomous from the Monroe County Community School Corporation, and several MCCSC board members have expressed strong opposition, including board president Teresa Grossi, who has sharp words for Project School staff later in this program.

As the cost of health care increases, more Americans are concerned with the security of their families. In the midst of a presidential election, health care reform is on the minds of many. Students for a Commonsense Health Plan is the student branch of Hoosiers for a Commonsense Health Plan, whose mission is to educate the public and the legislature about the benefits of a single-payer health insurance plan. In this program we ponder solutions to the American healthcare crisis with Dr. Rob Stone, a Bloomington Emergency Room physician and co-founder of Hoosiers for a Commonsense Health Plan. We'll also hear from Dr. Eric Wright, a sociology professor at Indiana University actively engaged in the IU Health Care Reform Study Group. A WFHB exclusive recorded on-location on the campus of Indiana University Bloomington on April 1, 2008.

September 11, 2001. The worst terrorist attack ever on US soil...nearly 3000 dead in New York, Washington and Pennsylvania. But did the events of that fateful day really unfold the way we've been told? The Bloomington 9/11 Working Group has filed dozens of Freedom of Information Act requests with numerous governmental agencies concerning many issues pertaining to 9/11, and on Labor Day 2008 the group brought professor emeritus and noted theologian David Ray Griffin to Bloomington. Griffin is considered the leading investigator and author in the movement for 9/11 truth and accountability. He's the author of several books that question the official account of 9/11, including "The New Pearl Harbor", "The 9/11 Commission Report: Omissions and Distortions", and "Debunking 9/11 Debunking: An Answer to Popular Mechanics and Other Defenders of the Official Conspiracy Theory". Recorded on-location on the Buskirk-Chumley Theater in Bloomington, Indiana on September 1, 2008.

The Monroe County Board of Commissioners have a wide range of executive and administrative authority, including auditing and authorizing claims against the county, receiving bids and authorizing contracts, controlling, maintaining, and supervising county property like the courthouse and the justice building, supervising construction and maintenance of county roads and bridges, appointing members of boards and commissions, and planning and implementing strategies for solid waste handling as members of the Monroe County Solid Waste Management District. In this program WFHB partners with the League of Women Voters and Community Access Television Services (CATS) to give you a chance to meet the commissioner candidates. In district two, Democrat Mark Stoops and Republican Jeff Schemmer are vying for the seat soon to be vacated by Joyce Poling in her bid for county council.

The position of County Auditor maintains the official ledger of the county. This person tracks all county funds and grants, makes bond payments, oversees tax abatements, makes sure county numbers are in compliance with the state, and handles many other accounting functions. County treasurer is responsible for accepting and handling all monetary income to the county. Treasurer also sends out tax statements. County coroner is charged with determining a person's official medical cause of death and gathering evidence for presentation in a court of law. You don't have to be a medical doctor to be a coroner, but new state rules do require that all newly-elected county coroners pass a certification exam. In this program WFHB partners with the League of Women Voters and CATS Community Access Television Services to give you a chance to meet the candidates in these local races.

The Monroe County council appropriates all funds for county use, adopts the annual county budget, fixes our county's tax rate, and has exclusive power to borrow money for Monroe County. The county council is comprised of seven representatives. Four of them represent the county's four districts, and the other three are "at large" candidates, meaning they are elected to represent the interests of the entire county. All three at-large seats are up for grabs this year, with six candidates vying for those three seats: Republicans Don Francis, Jeff Huston, and Joyce Poling, and Democrats Warren Henegar, Geoff McKim, and Julie Thomas. In this program WFHB partners with the League of Women Voters and CATS Community Access Television Services to give you a chance to meet the candidates in this local race. Recorded on-location on Ivy Tech Community College in Bloomington, Indiana on September 24, 2008. Ivy Tech's Keith Kline is our moderator.

The local circuit court seat 5 is a criminal court run by Judge Kenneth Todd, who is running unopposed for re-election. The local circuit court seats 6 and 9 are civil courts, not criminal courts, handling issues like child custody, divorce proceedings, and small claims cases. Candidates for seat 6 are Democrat Valeri Haughton and Republican Joby Jerrells. Republican Christine Talley Haseman currently holds seat 9 by appointment of the governor and is seeking to defend her spot on the bench from a challenge by Democrat Elizabeth Cure. In this program WFHB partners with the League of Women Voters and CATS Community Access Television Services to give you a chance to meet the candidates in these local races. Recorded on-location on Ivy Tech Community College in Bloomington, Indiana on October 6, 2008. WFHB's Will Murphy is our moderator.

More than three thousand free tickets were given away to a debate in Bloomington among candidates for our state's highest office, but only about a thousand people actually showed up for this third and final showdown with Governor Mitch Daniels, Democrat challenger Jill Long Thompson, and Libertarian Andy Horning. In this program WFHB gives you a chance to meet the candidates for our state's highest office. Recorded on-location at the Indiana University Auditorium in Bloomington, Indiana on October 14, 2008. Former Indianapolis broadcast journalist Tom Cochrun is our moderator.

On Election Night 2008 WFHB News aired extensive local election night coverage, built around a live feed from the county clerk's office bringing you the latest numbers literally hot off the printer. In between updates on poll results we took you on-location all night long to local party headquarters and gathering places. Correspondent Joy Laughter hung out with Democrats at their headquarters and at Rachael's Cafe, and correspondent Lauren Taylor trailed Republican VIPs at their gathering at KRC Catering. Occasionally we checked in with Nate Johnson and Marie Bertrand at the Indiana University Union Board student election party. For those of you who couldn't stick with us for the five-plus hours of local coverage last night, the following program is a neatly packaged medley of these interviews with party candidates, supporters, and of course voters! Recorded on-location for WFHB over the course of an entire evening on Tuesday November 4, 2008.

Media critic and election reform advocate Mark Crispin Miller is perhaps best known for his tireless work on election fraud over the last eight years, especially in the 2004 presidential race. Miller is a Professor of Media Ecology at New York University specializing in the politics and practices of elections. He exposes what he calls a lethal combination of old-fashioned vote suppression and high-tech election fraud that he believes has derailed fair voting practices in this country, and what he sees as a broad unwillingness throughout the political establishment, the media included, to face the facts about election fraud and the real and present danger that it poses to U.S. democracy. He has also been a frequent commentator on NPR and major networks, but Miller says his criticism of major media means his phone is ringing less often these days. A WFHB radio exclusive recorded on-location in Woodburn Hall at Indiana University in Bloomington, Indiana on October 2, 2008.

Bloomington mayor Mark Kruzan and Herald-Times editor Bob Zaltsberg recently went on a strict diet as members of a panel of prominent Bloomington citizens taking the Food Stamp Challenge. Kruzan, Zaltsberg, newly-elected circuit court judge Valeri Haughton, Middle Way House fundraiser Charlotte Zietlow, real estate broker Jim Regester, Community Foundation CEO Shari Woodbury, and peace activist Anne McLaughlin and her family pledged to live for seven days on a food budget of just $21 as part of National Hunger and Homelessness Awareness Week. Twenty-one dollars per week is how much an individual living on Food Stamps gets to take to the grocery store. Cathy Harris knows exactly what that's like; as an actual current recipient of food stamps, the Food Stamp Challenge is really a Food Stamp Reality for her. Harris, Kent Johnson, and Dorothy Axsom appear in this program not as challenge participants but as people who are living the Food Stamp Challenge every day.

On a trip back from the Middle East, Iraqi blogger and activist Raed Jarrar was not allowed to board a flight at JFK because he was wearing a T-Shirt that said "We will not be silent" in English and Arabic. Airport security forced him to change, saying wearing it was like going to a bank with a T-Shirt reading "I am a robber".  A frequent contributor on the program Democracy Now!, Jarrar is now an Iraqi political analyst living in Washington D.C. Ken Mills is from Fort Wayne, Indiana and served in the US Marine Corps from 2003 to 2007. He was deployed to Fallujah, Iraq twice and fought in the 45-day battle at Fallujah in November 2004. He describes this experience as a turning point in his military career when he realized he no longer agreed with the war. Upon his return, he found himself a changed man and joined Iraq Veterans Against the War where he currently serves as the President of the Fort Wayne chapter.

The local volunteer group that worked to elect Barack Obama is continuing their grassroots efforts within our community. Volunteers for Change has chosen to first address the pressing need for food security; how to feed our hungry neighbors while caring for our earth. The U.S. Department of Agriculture defines food security as access by all people at all times to enough nutritious food for an active, healthy life. Volunteers for Change: The Food Campaign hosted a public meeting on food security and local food production with Indiana University professor Richard Wilk, editor of "Fast Food/Slow Food: The Cultural Economy and Global Food System". Wilk is a professor of anthropology and gender studies at IU and is directing efforts to establish food studies in the university's anthropology department. We also hear from Maggie Sullivan, director of Bloomington's Local Growers Guild.

At the end of 2008 the Monroe County Criminal Justice Coordinating Council hosted a series of four forums on the future of our local criminal justice system. Community corrections is a hot topic, with some county officials advocating for a new jail and a juvenile center in a proposal for construction of a new corrections campus in Bloomington. In the first of three programs produced by WFHB from the four forums, Monroe Circuit Court Judge Ken Todd offers an insider's perspective on our current system. How does it work? Who's in the jail and how they did get there? What programs are effective or ineffective in providing alternatives to incarceration? A WFHB radio exclusive recorded on-location at the Monroe County Public Library in Bloomington, Indiana on November 6, 2008.
(PART ONE of a THREE-PART SERIES)

At the end of 2008 the Monroe County Criminal Justice Coordinating Council hosted a series of four forums on the future of our local criminal justice system. These forums were part of the public input process for PMSI, the consulting firm hired by county commissioners to assess whether current and future criminal justice facilities can meet local needs. The firm is advocating construction of a new corrections campus in Bloomington, including a new jail and a juvenile center. In the second of three programs produced by WFHB from the four forums, Monroe County Sheriff Jim Kennedy and jail commander Bill Wilson offer insider perspectives on the dangerously crowded local jail. Built for 126 inmates, the facility is bursting at the seams with a population now topping 300. You'll also hear plenty of comment from the public, including criminal justice reform advocacy groups like New Leaf New Life and Decarcerate Monroe County.

At the end of 2008 the Monroe County Criminal Justice Coordinating Council hosted a series of four forums on the future of our local criminal justice system. These forums were part of the public input process for PMSI, the consulting firm hired by county commissioners to assess whether current and future criminal justice facilities can meet local needs. The firm is advocating construction of a new corrections campus in Bloomington, including a new jail and a juvenile center, on 80 acres of the old Thompson property south of Allen Street and west of Rogers. In the final installment of three programs produced by WFHB from the four forums, PMSI consultant Bill Shepler unveils a working blueprint for the proposed corrections campus. We'll also hear from consultant Al Bennett, an advisor to PMSI, local architect Steve Smith of Smith Neubecker, and plenty of comment from the public, the overwhelming majority of which expresses clear opposition to expansion of local jail facilities.

Every year the city of Bloomington celebrates the legacy of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., sponsoring a coordinated effort to support service projects honoring King ideals like peace, justice and equality. This year as usual the local observance of the holiday culminated in a community celebration presented by the City of Bloomington's Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. Birthday Celebration Commission and hosted by Commissioner David Hummons. This year's keynote speaker is Bishop Woodie White, the first top executive of the United Methodist Commission on Religion and Race. Every year Bishop White writes a letter to MLK, and no letter has been filled with as much joy as the 2009 letter, delighting in the promise of new hope with the election of our nation's first black president. This program is a one-hour edit of our original live broadcast on January 19, 2009 from the historic Buskirk-Chumley Theater in downtown Bloomington and includes White's full keynote address.

Growing up in the 1960s in Jacksonville, Florida, Charles Sykes learned about the rhythm and blues meccas of Memphis, Philadelphia and Detroit through local AM radio station WOBS, 1530 on the radio dial. While high-powered AM stations are often credited with influencing Sykes' generation of music lovers, it was this local station serving the black community which exposed him to the Motown sound. Today, as director of the African American Arts Institute at Indiana University Bloomington, Sykes teaches a course that he developed as the first for-credit college course on the Motown Record Company. This is music that has transcended generations. Sykes reports that once his students are shown how the study of this music fits within the history of our country, they find that the social issues coursing through the Motown sound are still relevant today. As part of this year's local observance of Black History Month, Dr.

As part of Black History Month 2009, the city of Bloomington, Indiana hosted a panel forum reflecting on the meaning of community and how African-Americans fit into the big picture. Education professor Stephanie Carter, AME Church elder E. Anne Henning Byfield, sociology professor Quincy Stewart, Ivy Tech administrator Gregory Scott, and grad student Stephanie Davis deconstruct notions of community, race and culture. How are African-Americans faring in the struggle to find their sense of place? What is black community - why the adjective, why the distinction? And how do we improve the black condition? These are the questions our panel will tackle in "A Sense of Place: The State of the Black Community in Bloomington and Beyond", a WFHB radio exclusive recorded on-location at City Hall in Bloomington Indiana on February 10, 2009.

George Taliaferro has had a wonderful life, and he'll tell you so himself.  But it hasn't always been an easy life.  This Gary native and longtime Bloomington resident played on Indiana University's only undefeated football team, back in 1945.  As a student athlete at Indiana University, he assisted President Herman B Wells in ending segregation in the city of Bloomington.  He went on to become the first African-American drafted by the National Football League.  After his football career was over, Taliaferro continued to break down racial barriers.

The title of tonight’s program is based upon that of a book and several speeches by Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. in which he called for America to concentrate more on helping the poor. Although best known as the leader of the civil rights movement, Dr. King was also an ardent champion of decent living conditions and economic justice. The City of Bloomington Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. Commission sponsored a panel forum to discuss the causes and consequences of the current economic crisis. Commission member Sheldon Gellar wonders if we’re any better off today than in King’s time. Bloomington business professor Martin McCory ponders ideas on pathways to economic justice. Longtime county councilman Warren Henegar gets personal with reflections on his own struggle to survive and the historical prevalence of poverty in Monroe County.

As the Wall Street financial crisis sparks heated debate on the shortcomings in the US economy, a a founding father of the modern social reform movement in Mexico examines lessons from economic projects in the country’s indigenous communities. Since the 1970s Jorge Santiago has been developing economic alternatives in over 200 indigenous communities in Chiapas, the southernmost state of Mexico. Santiago is a leader in the “solidarity economy” movement that advocates an alternative to the neoliberal model of economic development. Fifteen years after the North American Free Trade Agreement went into effect, Jorge reflects on alternative economic development initiatives in indigenous communities and the broad historical context of indigenous resistance. Recorded on-location at Indiana University in Bloomington, Indiana on April 9, 2009 with translation provided by Stuart Schussler of the Chicago-based Mexico Solidarity Network.

Mayor Mark Kruzan delivers his 2009 State of the City Address in a full-length recording of WFHB's live feed from our remote transmitter inside City Hall. After the address Will Murphy and Chad Carrothers gather impressions from city councilmembers and Murphy goes one-on-one with Kruzan for follow-up questions.

With the mainstream media running all kinds of scary and sensational stories about an imminent swine flu pandemic, it’s time for some real answers from people in the know. The name “swine flu” is misleading. The proper name is North American Influenza A, or very scientifically, H1N1. It’s actually a virulent hybrid of human flu, swine flu, and bird flu. The Indiana State Department of Health reports 28 confirmed cases of the H1N1 Influenza A in Indiana as of May 6, 2009. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention says available data does not indicate that H1N1 is any more severe than normal seasonal flu, but it is likely to circulate widely in our communities, if not now then almost certainly in the fall. We go on-location to the Monroe County Public Library for a public forum on the H1N1 outbreak with Dr.

As our country struggles to pull itself out of an economic recession, local labor unions come together to rally support for workers and their families. More than half a dozen labor advocacy groups converge to talk about the Employee Free Choice Act, workers’ wages at Indiana University, healthcare reform, and more. Peter Kaczmarczyk is President of the Communications Workers of America Local 4730, representing support staff at IU. Carven Thomas is head of the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers Local 2249, with an update on the situation at the Bloomington General Electric plant, where closure has been imminent for nearly a year with hundreds of jobs hanging in the balance. Milton Fisk represents Hoosiers for a Common Sense Health Plan, speaking on healthcare reform for working families. Keynote speaker Ken Zeller is President of the Indiana AFL-CIO.

Volunteers run WFHB, and the same can be said of many local non-profits. The City of Bloomington Volunteer Network honors those working to make a difference in our community with the first-ever “Be More” Awards, honoring local volunteerism in nine different categories. The Be More Awards fill the gap left by the retirement of the annual Heart and Hand Awards, which ended its seven-year run in 2007. The Be More Awards is a trademarked program of PBS, and the Volunteer Network partnered with WTIU to produce this community-wide celebration of volunteerism. More than 100 volunteers were nominated in categories like “Be More Collaborative” and “Be More Creative”. Hear the stories of just a few incredible people and their extraordinary efforts to make our community the best it can be. Hosted by Joe Wrenn of WTIU and recorded on-location for WFHB at the Buskirk-Chumley Theater on April 21, 2009.

Monroe County’s three state legislators hosted a public forum this week to get local input on the new state budget to be considered during a special session later this week. The June 11 budget session will be the first required special session since 1997. The state constitution mandates that the legislature pass a budget and the end of the fiscal year is June 30. Bloomington is represented in the Indiana General Assembly by three local Democrats: House Representatives Peggy Welch and Matt Pierce, and State Senator Vi Simpson. These three local lawmakers have much to say on the battle ahead over the governor’s new budget proposal, but in this program it’s their constituents who do most of the talking. Recorded on-location for WFHB at the Monroe County Public Library on June 8, 2009.

Laura Grover is a self-professed public radio fanatic. In particular she loves to listen to stories, like those she hears on her favorite radio program, “The Moth” on public radio WNYC. Her love of storytelling compelled her to create the Bloomington Storytelling Project and its first community storytelling event. There were only two rules for story submissions: they must be less than fifteen minutes long, and they must be true. Recorded live on-location for WFHB at Rachael’s Café in Bloomington, Indiana on June 13, 2009.

Sean Meyer is a nuclear weapons policy expert and project manager of the U.S. Nuclear Weapons Policy Initiative with the Union of Concerned Scientists. Meyer is invigorated by what he calls the renewed and urgent national bipartisan discussion of the role and future of nuclear weapons. President Barack Obama has made ratification of the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty his highest arms control priority. Indiana should have a critical role in this discussion through Senator Richard Lugar and Senator Evan Bayh and their votes on whether to ratify the test ban treaty. 148 nations have ratified the treaty, but it cannot be enforced without U.S. ratification. Nuclear weapons have become a global liability, and Meyer says the U.S. should take urgent yet practical steps to reduce the nuclear threat on a path to a nuclear weapons-free world. A WFHB radio exclusive recorded on-location at the Monroe County Public Library in Bloomington, Indiana on May 18, 2009.

Jamsheed Choksy is a professor of Central Eurasian studies, history and religious studies and a member of the National Council on the Humanities. He thinks the outcome of current events in Iran should matter to everyone, globally and locally, from Tehran to Bloomington. He says a cultured yet tormented nation's freedom hangs in the balance. With it swing practical considerations such as oil prices, peace in the Middle East and even nuclear proliferation. More importantly, what happens in the coming weeks will determine if Iranians regain inalienable rights of life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. Jamsheed Choksy was part of a panel of Indiana University faculty and students who hosted a forum on the recent elections and protests in Iran. Joining him will be Daniel Beben, a Ph.D.

It’s Bloomington’s most unfortunate legacy; decades of contamination of local air, water and soil from PCBs, a toxic byproduct from electrical capacitors at Bloomington’s former Westinghouse plant. Prior to 1990, the facility was owned and operated by Westinghouse Electric Corporation, now doing business as CBS. In 1990 another company, ABB, became the sole owner and operator. CBS cleaned up areas outside the plant, removing 37,000 tons of contaminated material, and the facility closed in 1998. A remediation workplan is moving forward this summer to continue the cleanup, with plans to remove another 34,000 tons of contaminated material. In this program Tom Alcamo and Dave Novak from the Environmental Protection Agency outline the specific details of the cleanup, with help from consultant John Bassett in a WFHB radio exclusive.

Why pay someone to haul away our recyclables when we can sell them and keep the money ourselves? That’s one reason the board of the Monroe County Solid Waste Management District voted on Thursday to give its blessing to district director Larry Barker to explore a partnership among the city, county, and Indiana University for running a “materials recovery facility”(MRF), where all local recyclables could be packaged for sale on the commodities market. Currently we pay Hoosier Disposal for both trash and recycling, and Hoosier then sells the recycling for their own profit, with only a modest kickback to us. But that contract is up, and it’s now possible to hire another trash service, Rumpke, for trash hauling, and for recycling Barker proposes creating a local facility where we could package our own recycling and sell it on the market ourselves.

Senior Indiana senator Richard Lugar was the guest speaker at the 2009 Federal Focus Luncheon, hosted by the Greater Bloomington Chamber of Commerce. WFHB went on-location to document Lugar’s remarks, which include his opposition to healthcare reform legislation currently in debate on Capitol Hill. Lugar says he will vote against any major changes to our current system. He’ll also talk about U.S. foreign policy in the Middle East as part of an extended question and answer session. Recorded on-location at the Indiana University Auditorium on August 10, 2009.

The United States Postal Service plans to shut down local processing of outgoing mail and move those operations to Indianapolis. A public comment period is in effect now through September 3, with a final decision in the next thirty to sixty days. Bloomington postal workers say customer service would suffer, but postal official Lynn Smith, district manager of the greater Indiana area, promises that delivery times of local mail would NOT change. He also promised that the fifteen local people currently processing outgoing mail would NOT lose their jobs. Smith says USPS would save $1.1 million per year with the move, but members of the public who spoke against the plan told him it’s not worth it. In this WFHB radio exclusive you’ll hear those voices of dissent, engaging Smith in vigorous debate on the fate of the Bloomington mail processing plant. Recorded on-location at the Bloomington Convention Center on August 19, 2009.

Evann Smith grew up in Bloomington, went to Bloomington High School South, and is now a PhD student at Harvard. Evann spent the 2008-2009 academic a year studying Arabic in Egypt, and in May she traveled to the Middle East as an organizer of a United Nations-sponsored student delegation to Gaza. During her week-long visit she learned from her Gazan peers, met with UN officials and government representatives, and challenged her own presumptions on the conflict in the Middle East. She returned to Bloomington to share her newly-informed perspective on Gaza. A WFHB exclusive recorded on-location at the Monroe County Public Library on August 13, 2009.

Baron Hill said at the start of his recent town hall meeting that he did not want it to turn into an episode of the Jerry Springer Show, a reference to the cacophony of shouting and bullying other congressman have dealt with at other forums on healthcare reform. Hill kept tight control of the meeting as more than 800 people filled the auditorium of Bloomington High School North, almost evenly divided between advocates of healthcare policy reform and those opposed to it. It’s hard to say how many of those in attendance were local residents, as we do know that there were entire busloads of anti-reform activists brought in from outside Bloomington proper. The audience was not allowed to record the event, but accredited media like WFHB were granted full access to record both audio and video. Lots of cheers, lots of boos, and plenty of opinions. Recorded on-location on September 2, 2009.

The Dalai Lama’s personal representative to the Americas visited Bloomington this summer to speak of the Tibetan leader’s new angle on resolving the conflicts his people suffer. This approach is to the Chinese people themselves, with outreach and education about the suppression of Tibetan culture and education inside their native country. Lobsang Nyandak also dropped some big news for Bloomington - the Dalai Lama will once again visit our town in May of next year. The Dalai Lama may travel the world as an inspirational spiritual figure, but Bloomington has a special and unique connection to his life and legacy. His older brother, the late Thubten Jigme Norbu, was a longtime Bloomington resident who founded our local Tibetan Cultural Center.

At only thirty-two years of age, Jessica Jackley is revolutionizing the world of small business as the co-founder of Kiva.org, the world's first person-to-person micro-lending website. Named as one of the top ideas in 2006 by the New York Times Magazine, Kiva.org lets Internet users lend as little as $25 to specific developing world entrepreneurs, providing affordable capital to help them start or expand a small business. In its first three years, Kiva.org has helped to raise more than $61 million and connected thousands of people across 120 countries. Jackley spoke to a crowded house in Bloomington on microfinance as a means to eliminate poverty in this WFHB exclusive recorded on-location at Indiana University’s Neal-Marshall Black Culture Center on September 24, 2009.

The Indiana advocacy group Hoosiers for a Commonsense Health Plan says the debate going in Washington over healthcare reform doesn’t go far enough. Its members support a complete overhaul that dumps private insurance and expands Medicare to cover all U.S. residents in a single payer national health insurance program. HCHP founder Dr. Rob Stone cites a new study released by Harvard University claiming that one person dies in America without health care every twelve seconds - more than 45,000 people each year. Joining Stone on tonight’s program are local family doctor Mary Mahern, Bloomington Hospital social worker Mavis Anderson, local League of Women Voters president Sally Hegeman, Middle Way House director Toby Strout, Monroe County Council president Vic Kelson, and city Health Projects Director Nancy Woolery.

Bystanders might have thought there was a rock concert going on at the Indiana University Auditorium based on the line to get in, which snaked around Showalter Fountain and down the street to the HPER building. But no, it wasn’t Bob Dylan - it was evolutionary biologist, author, and atheist Richard Dawkins. An event organizer says as many as a thousand people were turned away because the auditorium was filled to capacity. Dawkins is author of “The Greatest Show On Earth: The Evidence for Evolution”, challenging creationism and Intelligent Design with a comprehensive set of evidence for the scientific theory. Dr. Dawkins' book and lecture come at a time when the validity of evolution has come under attack by creationists attempting to undermine the status of science in classrooms and in the public sphere, despite the fact that evolution is accepted as a strong scientific theory by all reputable scientists.

In April 2009 the Indiana Atheist Bus Campaign attempted to purchase advertising space on Bloomington Transit buses. Bloomington Transit rejected the advertisements, arguing the sign’s phrase “You can be good without God,” was too controversial, but eventually acquiesced after months of negotiation and an ACLU-supported lawsuit. The controversy has captured local, state, and national attention, raising questions about free speech, religious tolerance, and the foundations of morality. WFHB presents the first and only public debate on the notion of being good without God, featuring Dan Barker, a former minister who is now co-president of the Freedom From Religion Foundation, and Reverend Dan Waugh, pastor of Adult Ministries at Evangelical Community Church.  Recorded on-location in IU’s Woodburn Hall on October 19, 2009.  This is the hour-long version - click HERE for the full unedited audio.

Several times a year WFHB partners with the Bloomington Storytelling Project to host a live storytelling event, featuring local stories read by the people who experienced them. There are only two rules for story submissions: they must be less than fifteen minutes long, and they must be true. Our latest event ran nearly two hours long, which means tonight we can share only about half of the submissions. You can get a copy of the entire unedited event audio online for free by clicking here. After selecting the best stories for this broadcast, we realized that except for one lone gentleman, tonight’s storytellers are all women, and so we call this program "Girls Rule But One Fool", the Bloomington Storytelling Project recorded live on-location for WFHB at The Bishop Bar in Bloomington, Indiana on October 24, 2009.

"They hang the man and flog the woman that steal the goose from off the common but let the greater villain loose that steals the common from the goose." That’s a folk poem from the mid-eighteenth century, but somewhere some corporation is probably trying to copyright it as theirs. It's possible says David Bollier, a policy strategist and journalist whose work focuses on reclaiming the commons. The idea of “the commons” is the concept of public resources that are owned by EVERYone and not by SOMEone…like folk tales, or even the Internet. David Bollier is a Senior Fellow at the Norman Lear Center at the University of Southern California Annenberg School for Communication.  Bollier studies how digital technologies are changing democratic culture and how citizen action can stand against the excesses of intellectual property law. Recorded live on-location at the Unitarian Universalist Church in Bloomington, Indiana on October 10, 2009.

Rick Bragg is an acclaimed Southern storyteller and Pulitzer Prize-winning author. He is best known for his autobiographical trilogy: “All Over But the Shoutin’”, “Ava's Man”, and “The Prince of Frogtown”. As a journalist Bragg has covered stories from Central Asia to the Caribbean, but his signature stories are about economic and social upheaval in the United States, and the plight of real people in bleak situations, always with an eye to hope and the triumph of the human spirit. The authenticity of Bragg’s work comes from the experience of pain and deprivation in his own childhood. He is currently a professor at the University of Alabama and has been recognized with more than forty writing awards, including Alabama's 2009 Harper Lee Award. In this program Bragg reads from his books and reflects on his time covering the stories of real people and his own journey of self-discovery.

Dozens of local non-profits provide services for the homeless, but resources are sorely lacking for homeless families. That message was made clear by those who attended a public forum on affordable housing and shelters for the homeless, hosted by the Bloomington Community and Family Resources Commission. In this program we hear from two captains on the front lines of the battle, Joel Rekas from the Shalom Community Center and Lisa Abbott from Bloomington's Housing and Neighborhood Development. In our extended final segment we hear from other housing advocates and members of the public sharing emotional and sometimes very personal stories about their own struggle with poverty and homelessness. Recorded on-location at City Hall in Bloomington, Indiana on October 20, 2009 and moderated by city councilwoman Susan Sandberg.

2009 sucked, and 2010 couldn’t possibly be much worse. That’s the gist of the annual economic forecast presented by experts from the Indiana University Kelley School of Business. Some have declared that the national recession is over, but the IU Business Outlook Panel says the economy is on the ropes, and it will likely take three to five years to really bounce back. In Indiana, 2010 will be a tough year, but not tougher than the nation as a whole, according to Jerry Conover, director of the Indiana Business Research Center. Our other panelists are retired professor Bill Witte on the national and global outlook, Indianapolis finance professor Rob Neal, and economics professor Kyle Anderson. Together they are “The Fight Doctors”, recorded on-location at the Columbia Club in Indianapolis on November 5, 2009.

Local First Indiana is a new chapter of a national network of grassroots non-profits focused on supporting locally-owned independent businesses and local economies. Local First Indiana launched in Bloomington in November 2009 with a visit from Michelle Long, executive director of the Business Alliance of Local Living Economies. Long was formerly the director of Sustainable Connections, a local business network in Bellingham, Washington, which has grown over the past seven years to be the most effective economic development driver in that region. She says local economies survive and even thrive in economic downturns when local populations shift even a small percentage of their spending to locally-owned businesses rather than chain stores.

After a full day covering local service projects honoring the King holiday, WFHB capped off our extensive coverage with a live broadcast of Bloomington’s official 2010 Martin Luther King, Jr. Birthday celebration. Although it was a free event, tickets were required to ensure that the Buskirk-Chumley Theater was not filled beyond its capacity of around 600. Tickets were gone in less than 48 hours due to overwhelming interest in this year's keynote speaker, Reverend Jesse Jackson. Event organizers said Jackson is a dream guest for the MLK celebration, a respected figure who talked the talk and walked the walk right beside Dr. King in the 1960s at the height of the civil rights struggle. Light over dark, character over color, and plenty of football analogies pepper his speech in this WFHB radio exclusive recorded on-location at the Buskirk-Chumley in Bloomington, Indiana on January 18, 2010.

January 12, 2010. The island nation of Haiti is struck by a 7.0-magnitude earthquake, causing unimaginable death and destruction. Haiti's interior minister says at least 100,000 people were killed, and the final death toll may be double that. Relief efforts face significant obstacles including the nearly complete loss of infrastructure. Millions of Haitians are now refugees in their own country, where basic services like water and electricity have been wiped out. The earthquake in Haiti has captured international attention, but how much do we really know about this place? It’s among the poorest nations in the Western Hemisphere, but it’s also the first independent black republic in world. Tonight we learn about Haiti and its proud people in a campus forum featuring Indiana University’s top experts on Haitian politics and culture. Geology professor Michael Hamburger explains what happened below the surface.

The John Waldron Arts Center is run by the Bloomington Area Arts Council. Council board members say they must close the Waldron if they cannot raise $120,000 by March 1. On January 27 the arts council laid off its entire paid staff, the latest development in an ongoing financial crisis that has galvanized the local arts community. Public outcry rose to a fevered pitch when rate hikes for performance groups using the Waldron threatened to make the space too expensive for many of its users. The crisis prompted mayor Mark Kruzan to appoint an eight-member study group to help figure out how to protect the Waldron and its galleries, theaters, and classroom spaces. The study group has organized itself into three teams evaluating the building’s functionality, the cost of operations and a fair fee structure, and the legal aspects of its disposition.

February is Black History Month, and local celebrations include a series of events sponsored by the city called “Black History Month Bloomington Style”. This year’s theme is perfectly suited for radio: “Conversations”. A panel of local African-American commentators engage with an active audience on an examination of black imagery in popular media, the achievement gap in black education, and paths to a more equitable future. Our panelists are Ghangis Carter, director of recruitment and retention at the Indiana University School of Education; Monroe County circuit court judge Valeri Haughton; Gene DeVane, retired from Cook Incorporated; and Reverend Anne Henning Byfield, presiding elder 4th Episcopal district AME Church.

Joel Salatin may be certifiably insane. Or he may be the smartest farmer on the planet. Or both. Salatin is the irreverent and passionate voice heard in author Michael Pollan's bestseller "The Omnivore's Dilemma". This Virginia farmer and food activist runs Polyface Farm and was keynote speaker at the 2010 Bloomington Eats Green conference. Salatin wrote his own book, "Holy Cows and Hog Heaven: The Food Buyer's Guide To Farm Friendly Food". This charismatic lunatic farmer talks a mile a minute about how people need a deeper understanding of where their food comes from. Salatin is definitely NOT a vegetarian - his farm produces mainly animal products. As Michael Pollan said in "The Omnivore’s Dilemma", animals at Polyface have many good days and one bad day.

With a cut in state funding compounding an already serious financial shortfall, the board of the Monroe County Community School Corporation has voted unanimously to cut five point eight million dollars from the local school budget. With personnel accounting for ninety percent of expenses, local jobs are lost - the equivalent of 88 full-time positions, mostly teachers but also librarians, athletic coaches, and many more. The cuts include closing Aurora High School, Bloomington’s alternative high school, and incorporating its program into a facility at Bloomington High School North. Local elementary schools are taking the biggest hit. More than four hours of desperate pleas from parents, teachers, and students had no effect on the final cuts, which were passed almost exactly as originally proposed. Superintendent J.T.

Several times a year WFHB partners with the Bloomington Storytelling Project to host a live storytelling event, featuring local stories shared by the people who experienced them. There are only two rules for story submissions: they must be less than fifteen minutes long, and they must be true. In its third edition, the Bloomington Storytelling Project went to neighboring Brown County, where storytelling is an integral part of the local culture. Brown County is famous, or perhaps infamous, for storytelling, but according to project rules the Brown County folks had to stick to true stories instead of their usual "tall tales". A beer-drinking horse, a bully gets his comeuppance, and a little brother who likes to pee on things are all on the menu in this one-hour edit of a live event recorded on-location at the Muddy Boots Café in Nashville, Indiana on March 6, 2010.