Stories by Alex Ruppenthal

The structures, which look like doghouses without doors or windows, rest atop 12-foot stilts and can accommodate as many as 2,000 bats. Is this the year the bats will move in?

District officials will hear from Near South Side community members this week about a proposal to expand the attendance boundary for the new high school CPS is planning to phase in at the National Teachers Academy.

From decreasing access to opioids, to identifying patients at risk of addiction: A look at what local hospitals are doing in the fight against opioid addiction.

A new law aims to make it easier for state agencies in Illinois to donate leftover food, which advocates say will help reduce waste and feed hungry residents.

After a daylong hearing featuring hours of expert testimony and competing surveys, it remains to be seen where the trial of Chicago police Officer Jason Van Dyke will be held.

More than 200 medicinal plants grow in a garden on the city’s Near West Side, including species that have led to the development of treatments for cancer and congestive heart failure.

Eddie Arruza and guests discuss the warning from top U.S. intelligence and security leaders over continued Russian attempts to influence American elections.

An anti-violence march takes over Wrigleyville. Battle lines are drawn over Chicago police reforms. And a state lawmaker accused of “catfishing” resigns.

Even if family separations are temporary, “the psychological effects of separation reverberate throughout the community for a long time,” said Dana Rusch, assistant professor at the University of Illinois at Chicago. 

Watch the Aug. 2, 2018 full episode of “Chicago Tonight.”

Protesters on the North Side of Chicago shut down all four lanes of Lake Shore Drive during rush hour Thursday to draw attention to gun violence in the city.

There’s a shortage of male teachers in Illinois classrooms, particularly those who are African-American and Latino. How the University of Illinois at Chicago is hoping to change that. 

A studio performance with harmonica hero Howard Levy and Chicago folk legend Bonnie Koloc.

Once upon a time in Chicago, so many people fished to feed their families that there were bait shops up and down the lakefront. The oldest one has been owned by the same family for 60 years.

By almost every measure, the U.S. economy is on a bullet train to prosperity. But are there warning signs among the surging data?

Some have called the Leopold and Loeb case “the murder that wouldn’t die.” A new book fans the flames of our obsession with this baffling and sensational crime. A conversation with author Nina Barrett.

In a joint statement released Thursday, attorneys general from nearly 20 states, including Illinois, said weakening the so-called clean car rules would cause Americans to breathe dirtier air and pay higher gas prices.

Residents who come across young animals in the city often think they’ve been abandoned. But that’s rarely the case. Learn how to respond when you spot kittens or other baby animals on your block. 

Watch the Aug. 1, 2018 full episode of “Chicago Tonight.”

East meets West in an art show that began with a collection of photos found at an estate sale 27 years ago.

Chicago residents logged more than 50,000 complaints last year about rats, according to a new survey that ranks the city as the “rat capital” of the U.S. We separate rat fact from fiction.

Protesters are poised to take over Wrigleyville on Thursday. Organizers of the march are here to tell us why.

Broken souls grasp for meaning and connection in Samuel D. Hunter’s intense play that unfolds in a dreary church basement in the small town of Idaho Falls, Idaho.

A watchdog group takes action against the Chicago mayoral candidate’s campaign for behavior they believe is unethical and improper.

National Teachers Academy parents want a Cook County judge to step in and halt Chicago Public Schools’ plan to transform their elementary school into a high school.

A local institution holds handwritten lyric sheets belonging to the biggest-selling music artists of all time. We get a peek at this collection of cultural artifacts.