WBEZ News

Dec 10 2024 2082 ep. 4 mins 55

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The latest news and featured stories from WBEZ Chicago.

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December brings a dizzying number of classic holiday things to do around Chicago.

Dec 10 2024 3 mins

Add up the Nutcrackers and Scrooges alone, and you’ll get about a dozen. WBEZ arts reporter Courtney Kueppers joined host Lisa Labuz to sort through the options HOST: DIXON

Chicago closes its largest tent city and moves most residents into apartments and shelters

Dec 09 2024 4 mins

After months of work and warnings, Dec. 6 is the day that city officials pledged to clear Humboldt Park of all tents and homeless people. The vast park on the Near Northwest Side has been home to Chicago’s largest tent city. It's one of many encampments that have gone up in Chicago in recent years. Since summer, city officials and advocates have been connecting people th

More Muslim girls are playing youth sports and celebrating their religion while doing it

Dec 09 2024 3 mins

Basketball leagues for young Muslim girls are springing up around the Chicago area. They’re encouraging more girls to get into sports while celebrating their Muslim identity. WBEZ’s Anna Savchenko picks up this story from the sidelines. HOST: DIXON

Chicago and Illinois have sanctuary laws to protect undocumented migrants

Dec 06 2024 3 mins

Chicago is a sanctuary city — that means local law enforcement can’t collaborate with federal immigration officials when they try to enforce immigration laws, including deportations. Illinois has a similar policy. But there are limitations. WBEZ’s immigration reporter Adriana Cardona Maguigad joins me to explain what sanctuary laws actually do and what they don’

This Chicago one-woman show makes a ‘mixtape’ with the audience

Dec 05 2024 4 mins

Chicago has its flashy Loop theaters, but the city is also known for its gutsy neighborhood storefronts. WBEZ’s Araceli Gomez-Aldana visited one in Chicago’s Back of the Yards neighborhood on the south side. It’s where she discovered a show that connects to its audience through a sense of place. HOST: DIXON

Chicago is closing its biggest tent city but comes up short on promised apartments

Dec 04 2024 6 mins

This Friday, Chicago officials plan to clear out what remains of the city’s biggest homeless encampment. They say they’re providing rent-free apartments to most people in Humboldt Park’s tent city … and offering shelter beds to the rest. As encampments have grown across Chicago, the scale of the housing effort is unprecedented. But the people not getting an apartme

D-Composed wants audience members to “come as you are.”

Dec 04 2024 4 mins

Before Bridgerton’s string quartet renditions of pop songs, D-Composed was performing chamber music Beyoncé covers in Chicago. The Black chamber music collective rarely charges for tickets, and they want audience members to “come as you are.” That goes for the ensemble’s musicians, too. Cellist and founding member Tahirah (tuh-HEE-ruh) Whittington and artistic direct

Bears head coach Matt Eberflus fired

Dec 03 2024 4 mins

WBEZ sports contributor Cheryl Raye-Stout discusses what's next for the team. Reporter: Noah Jennings

A new exhibit in Springfield is dedicated to the late Chicago sculptor Richard Hunt

Dec 03 2024 3 mins

The Black artist from the South Side used his art to express grief, racial trauma and liberation. Reporter: Mawa Iqbal; Host: Mary Dixon

A culinary queen talks food and feels at Friendsgiving

Nov 26 2024 4 mins

Thanksgiving can feel like a fraught time for some folks… whether it’s complicated relationships or tense political conversations. The last thing you want is for dietary restrictions and preferences to also get in the way while you’re creating that welcoming environment. Jordan Wimby, also known as “The Melanin Martha,” is a chef and culinary preservationist.