SIUC Cinema and Photography has organized a visit by this Los Angeles/New York based collective Ultra-Red this semester. Ultra-Red will be in residence at SIU for a week to work intensively with students to prepare a new iteration of their ongoing performance series SILENT/LISTEN," a sound performance that live-mixes sound and interviews regarding the ongoing AIDS/HIV crisis. The piece seeks to explore questions like "Where has the AIDS crisis been?" and "Where might it be going?" by listening to the voices of people who have themselves been affected by the pandemic and the shifting politics surrounding it or active in confronting them. Ultra-Red has conducted iterations of the project across the U.S. and Canada and we are excited to welcome them to SIU.

The Jackson County Board and several local politicians believe that the people of Jackson County are ignorant enough to pay for mandates from Springfield that the Administrative and Legislative branches decided not to fund. They feel that we citizens should pay an additional .25% sales tax each time we make a purchase. Obviously, the sales tax is the most regressive method of raising public funds. Like the Carbondale street paving tax, the working class, the poor, and the itinerant students pay for it, in other words, this will impact most upon the poorest citizens.

The press releases about the tax claim it will be utilized to hire six additional road deputies and one investigator at a cost of $650,000 over a period of three years. The cost includes pension payments, benefits, contractual pay raises that may be incurred and a fully equipped patrol vehicle per officer. An additional telecommunicator will be hired for $47,493, which includes the same fringe items as the patrol officers. Over a period of two years, the sheriff is hoping to hire two new jail officers at a cost of $162,468, including benefits. Additionally, the department hopes to hire one part-time civil process server for $14,107. Finally, the department would like to expand its jail, because it claims to continually operate at its capacity of 117 inmates. A dollar figure has not yet been assigned to this expansion, but is being studied by an engineering firm. Interestingly enough, this is the same firm that is doing a reexamination of the EPA study of the Koppers Wood Treatment site in Carbondale. Does this firm have a bit of clout? Also, this is the jail that has been sinking into the landfil it was built on since its creation.

These Press releases sound quite well and good but they do not reflect the discussion that occurred at the actual Board meeting. Breton O'Neill, chairwoman of the county board's judicial and law committee, who is pushing for the tax, said the committee involved the community through meetings with township governments, civic group meetings and editorial boards to better educate the public about the need for the tax.

However, this same County Board Member during the committee meeting regarding the tax said that Jackson County Sheriff Bob Burns talked about the "unfunded mandates" for the sheriff's department that are coming out of Springfield, adding he said, "the department is severely understaffed and under-equipped to handle those mandates". So, what is the real purpose of the tax? Isn’t it simply to pay for those mandates?