Stories by Paris Schutz

Chicago’s mayor and aldermen are vowing to take strict action on vaping while welcoming the sale of cannabis. Those two vices dominated the discussion during Wednesday’s City Council meeting.

International artists, lucha libre wrestling, craft brews and cool jazz usher in the weekend. Here are 10 things to do in Chicago.

President Donald Trump on Wednesday named Robert O’Brien, his chief hostage negotiator and an established figure in Republican policy circles, as his new national security adviser.

Watch the Sept. 18, 2019 full episode of “Chicago Tonight.”

The new report illustrates that abortions are decreasing in all parts of the country, whether in Republican-controlled states seeking to restrict abortion access or in Democratic-run states protecting abortion rights. 

The nation’s Republican state attorneys general have, for the most part, lined up in support of a tentative multibillion-dollar settlement with OxyContin maker Purdue Pharma, while their Democratic counterparts have mostly come out against it, decrying it as woefully inadequate.

Dillinger’s family first applied to exhume the remains in July as part of a planned History Channel documentary. The deadline to exhume and return the remains was Sept. 16, and the exhumation did not occur.

How some West Side residents are hoping to change the narrative of their community with a new safe space in the form of a museum.

As Ken Burns’ latest series “Country Music” airs on PBS, a look at Chicago’s role in the history of country music with local band Big Sadie.

Water line repairs can be a costly mess. But what if there was a way to fix old water mains without tearing up streets, and old trees? There actually is, and Chicago is dipping into the waters of this technology with a pilot program. 

The Lightfoot administration makes its first moves to regulate the recreational marijuana industry, releasing guidelines on where the new businesses can locate. And here’s the catch: they’re all outside the city’s central business district.

At a City Council hearing on Tuesday, committee members discussed a proposal to raise the city’s minimum wage to $15 an hour by 2021. Activists say it’s long overdue. But could it hurt small businesses? We debate the issue.

A new partnership between the Cook County State’s Attorney’s Office and a nonprofit could help clear tens of thousands of low-level marijuana convictions from Cook County records. State’s Attorney Kim Foxx explains.

In 2010, Cheryl Strayed rather reluctantly agreed to write an unpaid online advice column under the name of “Dear Sugar.” Those columns come to life in this beauty of a show, artfully adapted for the stage by Nia Vardalos (“My Big Fat Greek Wedding”).

The Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Chicago has paid $80 million to victims of sexual abuse by clergy represented by a single law firm alone since 2000, the Minnesota-based attorney who heads the firm told reporters.

Pat Lohenry has loved miniatures for as long as she can remember. And as a teenager, she went from playing with them to making them. Today, her basement is full of her creations.

Watch the Sept. 17, 2019 full episode of “Chicago Tonight.”

Cokie Roberts, the daughter of politicians who grew up to cover the family business in Washington for ABC News and NPR over several decades, died Tuesday in Washington of complications from breast cancer. She was 75.

Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez is making her first endorsement of a liberal challenger to an incumbent House Democrat, backing Marie Newman in the primary against eight-term Rep. Daniel Lipinski in Illinois.

The first sexual experience for 1 in 16 U.S. women was forced or coerced intercourse in their early teens, encounters that for some may have had lasting health repercussions, a study suggests.

Indiana’s attorney general said Monday that he will work with his Illinois counterpart to investigate what he called the “grisly discovery” of more than 2,000 medically preserved fetal remains at the Illinois home of a late doctor who performed abortions in Indiana.

A longtime scrap metal recycler reaches a deal with the city to close up shop at its location next to the Lincoln Yards site and move operations to the Southeast Side. But not everyone is happy about it.

If Asian carp invade the Great Lakes, experts say the fish would have a devastating effect on the marine food chain and the region’s $7 billion fishing industry. We get a look at efforts to keep them out of Illinois waterways.

A new resolution on reparations is scheduled to be introduced in City Council this week. Alds. Roderick Sawyer (6th Ward) and Nick Sposato (38th Ward) weigh in on the topic.

Playwright Lauren Yee possesses a special gift for animating and personalizing history, and for penning exceptionally dynamic dialogue. And although not a single basketball is dropped into a hoop during “The Great Leap,” the sport comes to life.

The retail giant is roughly doubling the number of employees in its Loop office. But these aren’t warehouse jobs – the new hires that will work in fields including cloud computing, advertising and business development.