On March 31, 2025, at 3:34 p.m. Gibson County Deputy Eric Powell conducted a traffic stop on US 41 near County Road 800 South after observing a Gray in color Ford Edge failing to maintain its lane of travel. Upon approaching the vehicle Deputy Powell identified the driver as 40 year old Carla Embry of Harrisburg, Illinois. While speaking with Ms. Embry Deputy Powell detected multiple clues that drug activity was or had recently taken place in the vehicle. At that point Deputy Powell asked for Sgt. Loren Barchett and his K9 partner Duke to come to the scene to assist in a roadside drug investigation. At the conclusion of the investigation Ms. Embry as well as 46 year old Paul Abshear of Henderson, Kentucky were taken into custody and transported to the Gibson County Jail.
Upon arriving at the jail 40 year old Carla Embry was charged with Possession of Methamphetamines, Possession of Paraphernalia, and Operating a Vehicle While Intoxicated. 46 year old Paul Abshear was charged with Possession of Methamphetamines and Possession of Paraphernalia.
Assisting Deputy Powell in his investigation were Deputies Wes Baumgart, Sgt. Loren Barchett, and his K9 partner Duke.
All criminal defendants are to be presumed innocent until, and unless proven guilty beyond a reasonable doubt in a court of law.
Delays In Monday's Big Trash Pick Up
There’s been a hiccup in the Spring big trash pickup in Mt. Carmel. At yesterday’s City Council meeting, garbage commissioner Susan Zimmerman said some areas in Mt. Carmel may see their trash picked up later than usual this week…
And, if you forgot to set your big items out, Zimmerman said you’re out of luck if the truck has already been past your house…
The electronics recycling day in Mt. Carmel is coming up on Saturday, May 3rd.
City Council Adopts 1% Sales Tax
With no discussion, the Mt. Carmel City Council has unanimously passed a 1% sales tax to help pay for the new city pool. The 1% sales tax will replace the property tax increase that city voters overwhelmingly approved last November. At yesterday’s City Council meeting, Mayor Joe Judge said there are some items that won’t be covered by the additional 1%....
Yesterday’s meeting was moved up to noon so that the ordinance could be passed and mailed before the March 31st deadline. The new sales tax will go into effect July 1st. Judge said the sales tax is similar to the one voters approved several years ago for District #348.
Drone & K-9 Help Apprehend Suspect
On 3.31.25 at 12:18 a.m. Wabash County 911 received a complaint from 12041 Highway 1, who stated that his step-son was intoxicated and being belligerent. Caller further stated the step-son, Lewis Wade Linder, 36, was armed. It was then reported that Linder had discharged a .45 handgun inside the residence. Next the caller stated that Linder had gone out to is vehicle, a white Audi. It was then reported that the caller had heard another "shot" outside.
When the deputy arrived a .45 caliber handgun was located in the Audi, and the deputy observed a person running from the garage into the backyard of the residence. The MCPD K9 unit arrived to assist and began to track the Linder. K9 Eleven tracked some 800 yards circling back into the thick wooded area behind the residence. The Wabash County Drone was deployed and helped pin point Linder's position which allowed the K9 unit and Sheriff's Office to take Linder into custody without incident.
Lewis Wade Linder was transported o the Wabash County Jail and issued a statement of charge for Reckless Discharge of a Firearm (class 4), Aggravated Assault -discharging a firearm (Class A), Resisting Arrest (class A), and Possession of Firearm no FOID - FOID revoked (class 4) and issued a court date of 04/14/25 at 09:00. Linder is currently held at the Wabash County Jail pending detention determination.
The use of the Wabash County Drone and the assistance of MCPD K9 Eleven and Officer Nelson were a direct result to a swift and safe resolution to this incident. We cannot thank our community partners enough for their willingness to support our work.
Mt. Carmel Woman Arrested For DUI
On 3/31/25 at approximately 4:30 a.m. Wabash County 911 received a call about a vehicle that was parked in the southbound lane of the roadway in the area of 18421 Friendsville Ave.
While en route, the deputy was notified by dispatch that additional callers advised that the vehicle had drifted into the ditch and the driver was asleep in the driver's seat.
Upon making contact with the driver, 20-year-old Alexis K. Lewis, of Mt. Carmel , a roadside investigation was conducted. That investigation resulted in Lewis being taken into custody for driving under the influence and illegal consumption by a minor. Lewis was taken to the Wabash County jail and charged with the above offenses. Lewis was processed and later released.
Illinois governor moves to slash cover crop funds despite rising demand
Farmers and environmental advocates warn conservation efforts could stall without it.
By JENNIFER BAMBERG
Investigate Midwest
jennifer.bamberg@investigatemidwest.org
SPRINGFIELD — When Steve Stierwalt studied agriculture at the University of Illinois in the 1970s, soil health wasn’t commonly taught or discussed. Faculty often told their young farming students to put all their faith in commercial fertilizers.
But over his 40 years as a corn and soybean farmer in Champaign County, Stierwalt said soil erosion, which can cause fertilizer and manure runoff to end up in nearby rivers and streams, has become an increasingly serious problem.
“When we plowed, we plowed pretty much everything,” except for a row near the fence line, Stierwalt said. “The grass near the fence row kept getting taller, it seemed to me. I came to understand that it wasn’t the fence row getting taller, it was the soil in the fields that was getting shorter.”
In the early 2010s, Stierwalt started experimenting with cover crops, which can help hold soil in place and reduce runoff pollution.
“This valuable resource that we take for granted, we were letting it get away,” Stierwalt said. “We have some of the best soil in the world here, and we have to protect it.”
Six years ago, Illinois became the second state in the nation to offer subsidies to farmers for planting cover crops in the fall, an effort to reverse its status as one of the worst states for agriculture runoff. Demand for the Fall Cover for Spring Savings program — which offers a $5 per acre discount on the following year’s crop insurance premiums — has outpaced state funding every year since.
However, despite the program’s popularity and calls from environmentalists and farmers for its funding to increase, Gov. JB Pritzker has proposed a 31% funding cut.
Pritzker, a Democrat, recently proposed an overall $2 billion increase to next year’s state budget. But he also recommended cuts to several programs, including reducing the cover crop insurance credit budget from $960,000 to $660,000.
Pritzker’s office did not comment but the governor referenced program cuts in a recent address.
“I have made difficult decisions — including to programs I have championed, which is hard for me,” Pritzker said during his State of the State and budget address in February.
Two state lawmakers introduced bills this legislative session to increase the program’s annual funding to $6.1 million. They say it’s crucial to support the practice, which will benefit communities in Illinois and beyond.
The bills did not clear a recent committee deadline. However, lawmakers can still negotiate funding for the program as they continue to work to pass a budget by the end of May.
Illinois is one of the leading states for farm fertilizer runoff and one of the top contributors to the Gulf of Mexico’s dead zone, a barren area of around 4,500 square miles of coastal waters deadly to fish, shrimp and other marine life. It costs the region’s fishing and tourism industry millions annually.
Runoff from Illinois farms has only worsened, according to a 2023 state study. From 2017-21, average nitrate-nitrogen loads increased by 4.8%, and total phosphorus loads increased by 35%, compared to the 1980-1996 baseline.
Nutrient levels were highest between 2016 and 2020 before declining slightly. The improvement was attributed to regulatory permits on wastewater treatment plants, which also pollute waterways.
However, nitrate levels remain well above the state’s reduction goals.
Less than 6% of Illinois farmland uses cover crops
The soil in Illinois is famously fertile and much of the land is flat. The soil isn’t highly erodible like soil on a slope or a hill might be. But when fields are left bare after harvest, the soil can easily blow away in the wind or wash away in storms, depositing fertilizers and chemicals into waterways.
Cover crops, which include winter wheat, crimson clover, cereal rye, oats or radish, are planted after harvest and before winter. The crops can reduce soil erosion, break up compacted soil, provide a habitat for beneficial insects and wildlife, and prevent latent fertilizer from leaching into rivers and streams.
Since the Fall Cover for Spring Savings program began in 2019, the Illinois Department of Agriculture has received more applications than the program can fund.
This year, the program sold out in two hours.
Under current funding levels, only 200,000 acres are available, which advocates say is too small.
“At the rate conservation is being invested in right now for agriculture, it would take 200 years to hit the goals under the Nutrient Reduction Strategy. And that’s assuming … there would be new adopters,” said Eliot Clay, executive director of the statewide Association of Soil and Water Conservation District.
The Nutrient Loss Reduction Strategy (NLRS) is a statewide, multi-agency effort to reduce the amount of nutrients in Illinois waterways and the Gulf of Mexico. The policy working group’s latest report, produced in 2023, found that to meet just half of its goals of reducing runoff, nearly all of Illinois’ corn and soybean farmers would need to adopt cover crops.
“It doesn’t mean the state won’t meet the goal,” a spokesperson for the NLRS team at University of Illinois Extension said in an emailed statement to Investigate Midwest. “There is quite a bit of variability of riverine nutrient loads at watershed scales for nitrogen and phosphorus.”
However, the spokesperson added that more research, data acquisition, and planning are needed at watershed scales.
Out of the state’s 26.3 million acres of farmland, an estimated 3% to 6% grew cover crops in 2022, according to USDA data.
Kristopher Reynolds, Midwest director for American Farmland Trust and a fifth-generation farmer in Nokomis, said Illinois needs to see cover crop adoption of at least 15% and more state and federal incentives are needed.
The Gulf Hypoxia Task Force, a federally funded program through the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, has provided additional funding to supplement the cover crop program. However, the Trump administration’s freeze of some federal grants might put those funds at risk.
Earlier this year, the Illinois Department of Agriculture was awarded a $25 million grant from the EPA to support conservation practices for the next three years.
“We don’t know the status (of the grant),” said Jerry Costello II, director of the Illinois Department of Agriculture, while speaking to the House Appropriations Committee on March 12. “Last that we’ve heard, things looked good. But that’s been a while.”
“We’ve got two and a half months left in this process in Illinois, right?” added Costello, citing the time the state has to finalize its 2026 budget, which begins in July 2025. “Two and a half months plus or minus. So surely we’ll have some guidance … we certainly hope so.”
Because of the sheer scale of the agriculture industry, government regulations requiring conservation practices can be difficult to carry out, said Clay, the executive director of the Soil and Water Conservation District.
Farmland covers 75% of the entire state of Illinois, and even if all farmers employed precision sensors to track runoff points, it would cost billions, Clay said.
There would also need to be an army of workers to track and enforce regulations.
However, “industry self-regulating usually doesn’t work, and it hasn’t worked in ag, because that’s basically what they’ve been doing for the most part,” Clay said. What’s needed, he added, is more public-private partnerships.
Stierwalt, the farmer in Champaign County, helped develop STAR, or Saving Tomorrow’s Agricultural Resources, which gives farmers a five-star score based on their conservation practices.
The state adopted the framework in 2023 to support the state’s nutrient loss reduction goals.
Stierwalt said the goal is to get companies to purchase agricultural commodities based on the rating system.
If the public and industries that rely on agricultural goods for ethanol or food products want sustainably raised crops, then the farmers will grow them, he said.
Cover crop barriers include both cost and culture
Cover crops have long-term benefits but can be expensive and require extra work. Crop yields may even decrease during the first few years.
Cover crops cost roughly $35 to $40 an acre, and farmers don’t make a direct profit from it. The crops are planted in the fall and aren’t harvested. Instead, as the plants die and decompose, they provide nutrients back into the soil for the new commodity crop. Some farmers terminate the crops with chemical herbicides.
But the $5 an acre from the Fall Cover for Spring Savings program acts as an incentive for doing the right thing, which will pay off later, said Ed Dubrick, a small pasture poultry farmer in Cissna Park who also farms vegetables with his wife.
“It’s an investment because you know you’re doing right by the environment,” Dubrick said. “You know you’re doing right by your land, and long term, you’re going to build your soil health, and that will impact your bottom line.”
There are also cultural barriers to planting cover crops. Row crop farmers often pride themselves on tidy, neat rows, and cover cropping and no-till can leave fields looking messy.
Walter Lynn, a retired certified public accountant and farmer in Springfield, said farmers sometimes only cover crop fields that are out of sight from their neighbors or the road because they’re afraid they’ll be judged.
At a recent soil health conference in Omaha, Lynn said he met a farmer who believes he can’t openly discuss his practices with his equipment dealer, saying, “There’s a vulnerability that ag doesn’t deal well with.” But at the conference, Lynn said the farmer found a welcoming atmosphere: “It’s so good to come to this space at this meeting … I feel like I’m a member of the cover crop witness protection.”
This article first appeared on Investigate Midwest and is republished here under a Creative Commons license.
Investigate Midwest is an independent, nonprofit newsroom. Its mission is to serve the public interest by exposing dangerous and costly practices of influential agricultural corporations and institutions through in-depth and data-driven investigative journalism. Visit online at www.investigatemidwest.org
Soybeans planted in cereal rye cover crop. Planting cover crops can reduce soil erosion, break up compacted soil, provide a habitat for beneficial insects and wildlife, and prevent latent fertilizer from leaching into rivers and streams. (Photo by Jennifer Jones, Illinois Extension)
Wabash County Continues To Have Lowest So. Illinois Unemployment Rate
Wabash County began 2025 tied with Richland County with the lowest jobless rate in southern Illinois. According to the latest figures from the State’s Department of Employment Security, Wabash and Richland Counties both had 3.7% unemployment. For Wabash County, that number is the same as January of last year. For over a year, Wabash County has consistently had either the lowest southern Illinois rate or one of the lowest.
Other area rates declined in January including Lawrence County dropping to 4.9%; Edwards County down half a point to 4.1%; White County to 4.3%; and Wayne County fell to 4.4%. The statewide January rate stood at 5%.
Personal injury accident leads to arrest of Mount Carmel woman for OWI
On March 29, 2025, at 10:15 a.m. Gibson County Central Dispatch received a 911 report of an accident with injuries near the intersection of State Road 64 and State Road 65 north of Owensville. Upon arriving Deputies opened an accident investigation where during the course of the investigation Deputy Eric Powell detected clues that the driver of one of the vehicles may be under the influence of an unknown intoxicant. At that point Deputy Powell began a roadside OWI investigation. At the conclusion of his investigation he placed that driver 32 year old Lauren Smith of Mount Carmel into custody and transported her to the Gibson County Jail. Upon arriving at the jail Ms. Smith was charged with Possession of Methamphetamines, Possession of Marijuana, Possession of a Schedule Drug, Possession of Paraphernalia, and Operating a Vehicle While Intoxicated.
Deputies on scene determined that Ms. Smith’s Gray 2019 Jeep crossed the center of the roadway while traveling eastbound on State Road 64 and struck a trailer being pulled by pickup truck that was traveling westbound.
Assisting Deputy Powell in his investigation were Deputies Michael Bates and U.B. Smith.
All criminal defendants are to be presumed innocent until, and unless proven guilty beyond a reasonable doubt in a court of law.
Texas woman arrested for traveling 101 mph on Interstate 69
On March 30, 2025, at 4:21 p.m. Gibson County Deputy Wes Baumgart observed a White Honda Sedan traveling at 101 mph on Interstate 69 near the 34 mile marker. Upon stopping the vehicle Deputy Baumgart observed that there were six passengers in the five seat vehicle. Deputy Baumgart requested additional units and began a roadside investigation. During the investigation Deputy Baumgart identified the driver as 20 year old Aniya Ivory of Glenn Heights, Texas and placed Ms. Ivory into custody for Reckless Driving. At the conclusion of the investigation Ms. Ivory was transported to the Gibson County Jail where she was charged with Possession of Marijuana, Neglect of Dependent, and Reckless Driving.
Assisting Deputy Baumgart in his investigation were Deputies Wyatt Hunt and Sgt. Loren Barchett.
All criminal defendants are to be presumed innocent until, and unless proven guilty beyond a reasonable doubt in a court of law.
Intellectual and developmental disability services brace for potential Medicaid cuts
Large proposed budget cuts on the federal level could impact disability services in Illinois
By ERIN DRUMM
Medill Illinois News Bureau
news@capitolnewsillinois.com
SPRINGFIELD — Intellectual and developmental disability service organizations are bracing for potential cuts to Medicaid and Medicare from the federal government under congressional Republicans and President Donald Trump.
About 3.9 million Illinoisans are enrolled in Medicaid. Of that total, 44% of Medicaid recipients are children, 9% are seniors and 7% are adults with disabilities, according to the Illinois Department of Healthcare and Family Services.
“We’re very concerned. We don’t see what the path is right now,” Illinois Association of Rehabilitation Facilities CEO Josh Evans CEO said. “And so our mission is to continue to educate our members of Congress that this is not just a program that is ripe with payments, it’s serving people.”
IARF is an association of community-based providers that serve children and adults with intellectual and developmental disabilities and serious mental illnesses in Illinois. Community providers focus on inclusion in a smaller community that offers more independence when providing care and some community providers help their residents find employment.
“I'm going to do whatever it is that I can do, but I can't come up with $8 billion to keep a federal program going in my state,” Gov. JB Pritzker said in an interview with The Contrarian last week. “I can spend hundreds of millions of dollars to try to provide free healthcare for people who are most acute, but people are going to die because of what they’re doing.”
Prtizker proposed increased funding in the developmental disabilities division at the Department of Human Services, DHS, in his proposed 2026 fiscal year budget. This would include funding to continue placements of individuals who qualify and want to live in community-based settings and for new placements under a 2011 federal court order the state has struggled to comply with.
Read more: Federal judge rejects Illinois’ bid to end court oversight of disability programs | Illinois faces backlash over bid to end oversight of disability services
The Ligas Consent Decree requires states to provide care options in integrated community settings for Illinoisans with intellectual and developmental disabilities who request community-based services.
Despite Trump’s claim that he would not make cuts to Medicaid, congressional Republicans’ budget resolution would almost certainly result in shrinking funding for the program.
Read more: Pritzker calls $55.2B budget ‘responsible and balanced’ – but warns Trump policies could upend it | State lawmakers brace for possible federal cuts to Medicaid
Trump has vowed not to cut Medicaid benefits, but he has also said his administration will go after “waste and fraud” and cited tens of billions of “improper payments” in entitlement spending as the target for trims.
“You need to be careful in terms of how you're looking at Medicaid, whether it's focused on ways you can try to eliminate fraud, abuse and improper payments, which we all support, by the way, (but) major substantive changes to Medicaid will have a downstream impact on disability services,” Evans said.
Service providers worry the budget cuts proposed in a United States House budget resolution could jeopardize access to medical care for people with disabilities in Illinois and across the United States who rely on Medicaid. The budget proposal calls for $2 trillion in budget cuts, making it likely that Medicaid and Medicare will be impacted, Evans said. All 14 Illinois Democratic House members of Illinois’ congressional delegation voted against the resolution.
“I think some people assume that the cut automatically equals cost savings, but that isn't necessarily the case,” said Kelly Berardelli, CEO of southwest suburban-based disabilities nonprofit Sertoma Star Services. “Just because the funding is cut doesn’t mean the need is gone, and a lot of people we serve are from the most vulnerable populations, so they’re going to still need services and supports.”
250328 Dev Disabilities Medicaid photo 1.jpeg
Sertoma Star Services serves more than 1,500 children and adults with intellectual and developmental disabilities in the Chicago area and Northwest Indiana. The organization receives most of its funding from Medicaid, and many of the people using their services rely on Medicaid for access to care.
“Any cuts to Medicaid have the potential to reduce the quality of life for the people we serve,” Berardelli said.
Evans agreed.
“Disability services in Illinois are primarily exclusively funded through Medicaid,” he said. “There’s no private pay, there’s very little to no Medicare. It’s all Medicaid.”
If access to community-based care is slashed by Medicaid cuts, people will seek care through institutionalized facilities, which tend to be large facilities run by the state with a focus on medical care, or in some cases, be hospitalized. This could cause Illinois to further violate the Ligas Consent Decree.
According to Berardelli, people with intellectual and developmental disabilities living at home could lose access to respite care if Medicaid funding is decreased in Illinois. Respite care is temporary care from a professional who is not the recipient’s primary caregiver, which is usually a couple of hours in a day or week.
More than half of those who receive care from Sertoma Star Services live with a family member over the age of 55, making the threat to respite care particularly concerning, Berardelli said. If these people cannot get respite care, they may not be able to live at home and will have to be placed in institutionalized facilities, more full-time care away from home.
While some may seek placements at community providers, there are already long wait times and a shortage of community providers of care for people with intellectual and developmental disabilities.
“Cuts to Medicaid would, I think, inevitably increase that waiting list,” Berardelli said. “Progress has been made over the past several years, and we would definitely see that progress reversed if there were cuts to Medicaid.”
250328 Dev Disabilities Medicaid photo 2.jpeg
Behavioral health services would also be impacted as Medicaid helps both to fund service providers in addition to insurance coverage for services such as mental health care and addiction treatment.
"The majority of our member organizations who provide behavioral health services are straight Medicaid,” IARF senior vice president of behavioral health policy and advocacy Emily Miller said. “Very few accept private insurance and so you would decimate the community with these drastic cuts that are being proposed to the Medicaid program."
Cutting federal funding would also cause many health industries to compete with one another for funding. If there is a more limited pool of funding for health provider programs, not every specialized program would get the funding they need.
In the state fiscal year that ended in June, Illinois received over $20 billion in federal Medicaid funding, which made up about 62% of the total funding for Medicaid programs in Illinois, according to HFS.
“If there’s a major change where we see a dramatic loss of dollars, that means we’re going to have to be lobbying against one another in the healthcare and human services space for a more limited amount of resources,” Evans said. “We cannot be put in that position.”
Erin Drumm is a graduate student in journalism with Northwestern University's Medill School of Journalism, Media, Integrated Marketing Communications, and a fellow in its Medill Illinois News Bureau working in partnership with Capitol News Illinois.
Capitol News Illinois is a nonprofit, nonpartisan news service that distributes state government coverage to hundreds of news outlets statewide. It is funded primarily by the Illinois Press Foundation and the Robert R. McCormick Foundation.
Adults served by Sertoma Star Services having a creative outing at Tinley Park-based studio Hawaii Fluid Art during the summer of 2024. (Photo courtesy of Sertoma Star Services)