Stories by WTTW News

Watch the May 14, 2020 full episode of “Chicago Tonight.”

Approximately 4,500 small businesses on the South and West sides applied for $5,000 emergency grants to help them stay afloat during the coronavirus pandemic, city officials announced Thursday.

A day after celebrating its 90th birthday, the Adler Planetarium laid off 120 part-time and full-time employees. The “difficult decision” was made “in order to help the Adler survive,” spokesperson Jennifer Howell said in a statement to WTTW News. 

Whistleblower Dr. Rick Bright warned on Thursday that the U.S. lacks a plan to produce and fairly distribute a coronavirus vaccine when it becomes available.

The Pritzker administration says the federal government has promised Illinois 600,000 swabs to be used in COVID-19 tests. But this week, Illinois got what appeared to be 23,000 cotton baby swabs — and officials aren’t sure they can be used.

The bridge, which spans the Chicago River at Michigan Avenue, paved the way for development of Chicago’s Magnificent Mile. Tune in at 7 p.m. Thursday to celebrate its past and present.

Keeping buses and trains running is costly, but public transit agencies in Chicago have yet to see money from the federal stimulus package that passed in late March.

Ald. George Cardenas, 12th Ward, says he doesn’t agree that Chicago businesses and restaurants should be forced to stay mostly closed during the COVID-19 pandemic.

Since 2018, residents of McKinley Park have raised concerns about the MAT Asphalt plant in their neighborhood. Now, several environmental groups say the COVID-19 pandemic has exacerbated the issue. 

An environmental dispute in the Southwest Side neighborhood of McKinley Park has loomed large in the community’s response to the pandemic. 

The state’s stay-at-home order is still in effect. Restaurants are still closed — and so is the lakefront path. Illinois hospitals are once again welcoming non-coronavirus patients — and the revenue they bring.

The office designed to help aldermen keep tabs on how the city spends tax dollars is set to get a new leader after nearly a year without anyone at the helm.

Illinois has set a new record for the number of coronavirus-related deaths in a single 24-hour period: 192. To date, the 3,792 deaths in Illinois are linked to the virus and 84,698 people have tested positive for it, according to health officials.

In a 12-page ruling, the judge said the Elim Romanian Pentecostal Church in Albany Park and Logos Baptist Ministries in Niles “provided no evidence” that Gov. J.B. Pritzker’s stay-at-home order targeted religion.

The global economic shutdown has impacted industries across the board, but hospital supply chains have been hit especially hard — and months into the pandemic, it remains a day-to-day challenge.

After weeks of delay, Chicago’s Department of Streets and Sanitation will begin its street sweeping season on May 18. But residents won’t get tickets for cars parked along cleaning routes as long as the stay-at-home order remains in effect.

The lakefront will not reopen during the third phase of the plan to reopen Chicago, Mayor Lori Lightfoot said Wednesday during a speech to the Economic Club of Chicago. 

Watch the May 13, 2020 full episode of “Chicago Tonight.”

Cook County Board President Toni Preckwinkle backed an effort Wednesday to give property owners a bit of financial “breathing room” by waiving late fees on second-half property tax bills due Aug. 3.

Members of the Illinois General Assembly will meet May 20 for the first time since the coronavirus hit “to conduct the critical work of state government in this unprecedented pandemic.”

Advice from the top U.S. disease control experts on how to safely reopen businesses and institutions during the coronavirus pandemic was more detailed and restrictive than the plan released by the White House last month.

The COVID-19 pandemic and shutdown has hit hard in Chicago communities that have historically suffered from disinvestment and crime, including the Far South Side communities of Roseland and Pullman.

The U.S. government’s top infectious disease expert issued a blunt warning Tuesday that cities and states could “turn back the clock” if they lift coronavirus stay-at-home orders too fast. U.S. Sen. Dick Durbin weighs in.

Over the past year, the 9th Ward alderman has emerged as a staunch critic of Mayor Lori Lightfoot. Now, he says Lightfoot has downplayed the negative impact the pandemic is having on the city’s budget.

Big wedding blowouts aren’t happening, but people are still getting hitched. How some couples are making it happen during the pandemic.

He’s a familiar face, thanks to his PBS program “Mexico: One Plate at a Time.” And his food is familiar too, thanks to his multiple restaurants. Chef Rick Bayless talks about what the industry needs to stomach the pandemic.