Good morning, DuPage! It's going to be a lovely Wednesday with scattered clouds, as today's high reaches a warm 70°F and the low settles at 57°F. Time to enjoy that spring air!

In January 1969, an oil well off the coast of Santa Barbara, California, suffered a massive blowout. Over 3 million gallons of crude oil spewed into the Pacific, creating an 800-square-mile slick that turned white-sand beaches into black sludge and killed thousands of seabirds and dolphins.

Senator Gaylord Nelson of Wisconsin, a lifelong conservationist, flew over the disaster area. Looking down at the blackened coastline from his airplane window, he felt a surge of "outraged frustration." He had been trying for years to get the environment onto the national political agenda, but the public was focused elsewhere—on the Vietnam War, the Civil Rights movement, and the Space Race.

On April 22, 1970, the organizers expected a few thousand people. Instead, 20 million Americans took to the streets—roughly 10% of the entire U.S. population at the time.

The sheer scale of the first Earth Day achieved a "rare political alignment." By the end of 1970, the momentum led to the creation of the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) and the passage of the Clean Air Act. The Clean Water Act and the Endangered Species Act soon followed.

What started as a "frustrated idea" in a Senator's head over the Santa Barbara Channel became the catalyst for the modern environmental movement

The DuPage County Board has officially greenlit a $661.5 million budget for the 2026 fiscal year. For homeowners, the lead story is the flat property tax rate, which remains at 2%—meaning a resident with a $350,000 home will pay roughly $129 in county taxes this year. The budget includes a $71.5 million levy aimed at "future-proofing" the area through critical infrastructure investments and the DuPage Sustainability Initiative, which addresses food insecurity and housing innovation without increasing the burden on local taxpayers.

As we move deeper into the spring construction season, Metra is ramping up its 2026 Capital Program. Commuters on the Union Pacific West (UP-W) line should keep an eye on the Prospect Avenue crossing in Clarendon Hills and the Loomis Street crossing in Naperville, both of which are slated for modernization and equipment upgrades this year. These improvements are part of a broader $105 million effort to replace aging ties and upgrade signal technology across the regional rail network to improve morning commute reliability.

See our Calendar of Events Here!

On this day in 1970, the very first Earth Day was celebrated, kicking off a global movement to protect our planet!

The waterway that winds through Addison and much of eastern DuPage County wasn't always named Salt Creek. In the early 1800s, maps labeled it the Little Des Plaines River. According to local legend, the name changed in the mid-19th century after a heavy wagonload of salt spilled into the water during a transport mishap.

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