Stories by Heather Cherone

Aldermen on Wednesday endorsed Mayor Lori Lightfoot’s plan to use federal money to create a $20 million fund to offer grants to Chicagoans struggling to pay their rent and mortgages because of the pandemic.

Chicagoans who did not get financial help from the federal government during the coronavirus pandemic can apply for $1,000 grants from the city, Mayor Lori Lightfoot announced Wednesday.

Mayor Lori Lightfoot will ask aldermen to approve an ordinance designed to minimize the number of evictions across the city as the coronavirus pandemic eases, officials said.

The dire financial picture for Chicago comes after Mayor Lori Lightfoot insisted through mid-April that the city was well-prepared to weather the economic storm whipped up by COVID-19.

The Chicago City Council is one step away from creating a commission to study whether — and how — the city should pay reparations to Chicagoans who are the descendants of enslaved African Americans.

City officials announced Saturday they were prepared to spend as much as $1.2 million to hire 100 private security guards to patrol the South and West sides to protect businesses from a second weekend of looting and damage.

As peaceful protests entered their ninth day in Chicago, the police department announced it had arrested 1,258 people in three days during the unrest that swept the city after the death of George Floyd.

Chicago officers struck Chicago Police Board President Ghian Foreman five times on his legs with their batons during a protest on Sunday in Hyde Park that turned violent, Foreman told WTTW News.

As unrest swept the city Sunday, aldermen pleaded with Mayor Lori Lightfoot to help them protect their communities from roving bands of criminals clashing with police and looting businesses.

“We will not tolerate that kind of abusive, offensive conduct on the part of police officers, period,” Mayor Lori Lightfoot said Friday.

Efforts to put an elected board of Chicago residents in charge of the Chicago Police Department — stalled by the coronavirus pandemic — could get new life amid a renewed nationwide push to hold police officers accountable for misconduct.

An increasing number of complaints that Chicago officials decided to protect downtown at the expense of neighborhoods on the South and West sides are “not true and illogical,” Mayor Lori Lightfoot said Wednesday.

Looting and unrest has largely subsided in Chicago as large peaceful protests against police misconduct continue, Chicago Police Supt. David Brown told reporters Wednesday.

Mayor Lori Lightfoot said plans to lift some restrictions in Chicago on Wednesday designed to stop the spread of COVID-19 may be delayed after violent protests sparked by the death of George Floyd swept the city.

Following an increasingly chaotic scene in the Loop on Saturday evening sparked by outrage over the death of George Floyd while in the custody of Minneapolis police, Mayor Lori Lightfoot imposed a curfew on Chicago residents from 9 p.m. to 6 a.m.

A planned demolition of a building at the former Crawford Power Plant will take place June 5, after being delayed nearly three weeks after protests erupted and the local alderman objected, company officials announced Friday.

The stay-at-home order put in place on March 21 by Gov. J.B. Pritzker officially expired Friday. Here’s what is now open — and what will be different in Chicago as compared with the rest of the state.

Mayor Lori Lightfoot called the president’s statements about those protesting the death of George Floyd “profoundly dangerous” and were part of an effort to stoke racial tensions for his own political benefit.

Ride-hailing giant Uber will allow customers to book its cars and drivers by the hour in Chicago starting Tuesday as the coronavirus pandemic continues to reduce demand for one-way trips.

Mayor Lori Lightfoot offered new Chicago Police Superintendent David Brown her “unflagging support” on Thursday — even as she once again called his strategy for Memorial Day “a fail.”

Mayor Lori Lightfoot has announced that Chicago will start to cautiously reopen next Wednesday as the peak of the coronavirus pandemic in Chicago appears to have passed.

Lawmakers will not get a pay raise as part of the newly approved state budget — even though state law requires that members of the Illinois House and Senate get an annual boost, Comptroller Susana Mendoza said Wednesday.

With city officials preparing to cautiously reopen Chicago’s economy as the peak of the coronavirus pandemic appears to have passed in Illinois, one-third of the city’s workforce could head back to their jobs early next month.

As of Wednesday afternoon, the coronavirus death toll in Illinois stood at 5,038 people. “These are real people whose lives came to an end because of this pandemic,” Gov. J.B. Pritzker said, speaking from East St. Louis.

Gov. J.B. Pritzker said Tuesday he would extend the ban on evictions in Illinois past Friday, when the latest version of his stay-at-home order is scheduled to expire.

Illinois appears to have passed the peak of the coronavirus pandemic, with the rate of confirmed cases of the coronavirus dropping significantly, Gov. J.B. Pritzker said Tuesday.