Stories by WTTW News

Derek Chauvin is found guilty of murder. City Council debates police reform. Combating misinformation on social media. Music venues prepare to reopen. And Technicolor textiles at the Art Institute.

History, music and photography are all stitched together in a show at the Art Institute of Chicago. We visit the pandemic-delayed exhibition “Bisa Butler: Portraits” to get the story behind these Technicolor textiles.

Four aldermen say the guilty verdicts will likely avert large protests and civil unrest in Chicago — while acknowledging they have much more work to do to reform the Chicago Police Department, particularly in the wake of the police shooting death of 13-year-old Adam Toledo.

Unfounded rumors erupted on social media over the weekend about the alleged resignation of Mayor Lori Lightfoot. We talk about how rumors spread on social media and how journalists should cover them.

A recent bungled federal aid rollout worth 16 billion dollars for music venues and theaters across the country is adding more strain to a stressful situation.

More than 3,000 National Guard soldiers, along with police officers, state police, sheriffs deputies and other law enforcement personnel have flooded the Minnesota city in recent days. It leaves many wondering: How much is too much?

Aldermen on Tuesday advanced a plan designed to boost the number of affordable homes across Chicago by requiring developers that get special permission from the city or a subsidy to build more units and pay higher fees.

Latino lawyers and community leaders on Tuesday will ask the Department of Justice to investigate the fatal shooting of a 13-year-old boy by a Chicago police officer. 

“We need to send out the alarm to everyone that make sure that Black South Siders understand: You must get the vaccine. It is safe,” Mayor Lori Lightfoot said Tuesday after touring the city’s mass vaccination site at Chicago State University.

Chicago police are seeking information about a black vehicle after someone opened fire on a North Side police station over the weekend. No one was injured in the incident, but the station itself was struck “several times,” police said.

President Joe Biden said Tuesday that he is “praying the verdict is the right verdict” in the trial of former Minneapolis Police Officer Derek Chauvin and that he believed the case, which has gone to the jury and put the nation on edge, to be “overwhelming.”

One of the state’s top tourist attractions will soon begin reopening its doors after closing for eight months due to the coronavirus pandemic.

Visitors to Chicago from Wisconsin no longer have to quarantine for 10 days or record a negative test for COVID-19, city officials announced Tuesday, but Indiana could be added in two weeks.

Chicago is prepared to handle protests and unrest that might be triggered by the verdict in the trial of Derek Chauvin, the former Minneapolis police officer charged with murder in the death of George Floyd, Mayor Lori Lightfoot said Tuesday. “Don’t test us, because we are ready,” she said.

“Wild Color,” making its debut in October, will immerse visitors in all the colors of nature, while returning fan favorite “Biomechanics: The Machine Inside” will explore the engineering behind the bodies of humans and animals.

As Chicago reeled — again — from the police killing of a teenager recorded on video, Inspector General Joseph Ferguson offered aldermen a way to reverse what he called the city’s “long history” of covering up police misconduct. “We are out of runway with respect to the public’s patience and beliefs that we care to reform,” he said.

Lutheran Child and Family Services says its anti-racism approach has made a big difference in outcomes for the children they serve.

People who have stayed away from public transit because of the coronavirus pandemic say they expect to return to buses and trains, but the shift toward working from home is likely to change when, why and how often people ride, according to a just-released survey.

The fourth quarter of the school year has begun for Chicago Public Schools. And on Monday, nearly 26,000 high school students were expected to return to their classrooms to resume in-person learning for the first time in more than a year.

Protesters took to the streets this weekend — both in Little Village and other parts of the city — after the Civilian Office of Police Accountability released videos of the fatal police shooting of 13-year-old Adam Toledo. We speak with neighborhood organizations working to help residents.

The murder case against former Officer Derek Chauvin in the death of George Floyd went to the jury Monday in a city on edge against another round of unrest like the one that erupted last year over the harrowing video of Chauvin with his knee on the Black man’s neck.

With temperatures expected to dip below freezing, gardeners who jumped the gun might want to consider covering tender vegetation, according to experts.

Friends of Illinois Nature Preserves was founded last year to increase support for and restoration of the state’s most precious lands, which boast more biodiversity than the Grand Canyon and are more endangered than the Great Barrier Reef.

Gov. J.B. Pritzker announced he has activated the Illinois National Guard at the request of Mayor Lori Lightfoot “to support the Chicago Police Department with a verdict expected in the trial of Derek Chauvin,” the former Minneapolis police officer charged in connection with the death of George Floyd.

NASA’s experimental helicopter Ingenuity rose into the thin air above the dusty red surface of Mars on Monday, achieving the first powered flight by an aircraft on another planet.

A new deal for a facility for electronics maker Foxconn is in its final stages. Crain’s Chicago Business reporter Danny Ecker has details on that story and more.