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Some top Illinois officials are celebrating President Joe Biden’s new executive actions to protect undocumented immigrants from deportation. Christopher Columbus Elementary School in Ukrainian Village will soon be Ruth Bader Ginsberg Elementary School. Northwest Indiana is under an air quality alert until midnight.

On Chicago’s West Side, crews used the Juneteenth holiday to help seniors whose basements flooded last July. Many homeowners still need help to remove mold. Nine community organizations based in Cook County are receiving grant money to help the populations they serve manage diabetes and prediabetes. A new art project places the portraits of noteworthy Chicagoans on bus shelters across the city.

The Illinois Department of Public Health is urging caution as confirmed cases of COVID-19 are rising in emergency rooms. Unions representing journalists at WBEZ and the Sun-Times are calling for the ouster of the Chicago Public Media CEO. A Planned Parenthood clinic in Peoria is up and running after it was fire-bombed over a year ago.

Chicago is getting a new task force to study reparations for Black residents. The watchdog for Chicago City Hall is calling out Mayor Brandon Johnson for failing to act on a campaign promise to rid cops who joined two extremist groups. Illinois lawmakers approved a measure aimed at expanding access to fentanyl testing strips.

The Chicago area is under an air quality alert. Today is the first day for candidates to file petitions to run for Chicago’s first elected school board. Three famed Wrigleyville Rooftops could face the wrecking ball.

Yman Huang Vien is a former refugee who emigrated to Chicago with her family over 40 years ago, moved to Uptown and quickly co-founded the Chinese Mutual Aid Association, in order to serve low-income, immigrant and refugee communities across Chicago.

Today, she’s one of six community members whose portrait and profile you might run into in a Chicago bus shelter for a project called “Unsung Heroes of Uptown: Art of People ON the Streets IN the Streets.”

In today’s episode, The Rundown podcast host Erin Allen talks to Huang Vien about her journey to Chicago, as well as the creator of the project, Hana Bleue Chaussette, about why she’s putting profiles of community leaders in bus shelters.

Editor's note: A previous version of this episode incorrectly identified the number of portraits on display and the country of origin of the company JCDecaux.
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