The Avondale Restorative Justice Community Court program offers those charged with nonviolent offenses a chance to turn their lives around. Rather than serving time, people are given another option.

City Council approves the mayor’s $16.6 billion budget. We’re one on one with the city’s budget director. And Chicago has a pension problem — WTTW News explains.

Donors receive state income tax credits for their contributions to the Invest in Kids program, which helps some 9,600 students across Illinois attend private and trade schools. But barring last-minute legislative action, authorization for the program runs out at the end of 2023.

Students at private schools across Illinois are at risk of losing their scholarships. Why food insecurity is on the rise. And how the Grandyman is giving back to local kids.

According to the Greater Chicago Food Depository, one in five households in the Chicago area is facing food insecurity. A national report found that 17 million households were food insecure at some point in 2022.

Curtis “The Grandyman” Granderson spent 16 seasons playing Major League Baseball. Now he’s passing down those years of experience to the next generation of players and inspiring them to pursue college.

City Council blocks a vote to transform a vacant lot into a migrant shelter. Why it takes so long for wrongfully convicted people to get legal representation. And Cook County’s state’s attorney on the elimination of cash bail.

It’s been more than a month since Illinois became the first state to eliminate cash bail entirely. Cook County State’s Attorney Kim Foxx said her office was preparing for almost 18 months before the Pretrial Fairness Act went into effect.

More than 3,300 wrongfully convicted people have been exonerated in the U.S. since 1989, according to the University of Michigan’s National Registry of Exonerations. That time on the inside adds up to more than 30,000 years unjustly spent in prison for many of those people.

Mayor Brandon Johnson and the Chicago Police Department say they’re moving into a “new age of policing” while rebuilding the department. They are also asking for more money, patience and time.

The death rate for breast cancer in the United States dropped 43% between 1989 and 2020, according to the American Cancer Society. Despite this hopeful news, breast cancer mortality rates still remain 40% higher for Black women than White women. 

The U.S. House has a new speaker after three weeks. Why Black women are more likely to die from breast cancer than White women. And reaction to the mayor’s proposed police budget.

Deronis Cooper said getting his hands in the dirt helps him cope with the challenges of being a police officer. What started with four planters has grown into more than 50 plant species in his backyard.

Black Theatre United is an organization aimed at creating more diversity and inclusion in theater. With the help of that group, actress Vanessa Williams is making her producorial debut for the new musical “A Wonderful World.”

We sit down with Chicago’s newly appointed police superintendent. A look at the impact of residents boycotting CPS’ segregationist policies — 60 years later. And a new musical on jazz legend Louis Armstrong.

This Sunday marks 60 years to the day nearly 250,000 Chicago Public Schools students skipped school to boycott CPS. Students and their parents flooded the streets of Chicago in what’s known as Freedom Day, a massive protest of the segregation in CPS and the superintendent at the time, Benjamin Willis.