Sarah Nardi

Unit 5 Superintendent Kristen Weikle announced Wednesday night a planned return to in-person learning, saying the district hopes to bring students back to the classroom beginning in October “assuming that the metrics are such that we’ll be able to do so.”

The McLean County Board of Health began its meeting Wednesday night with a barrage of public comment.

The demolition of Central Illinois Regional Airport’s old terminal building is slated to begin this month.

The site is the former location of CJ’s Restaurant, which closed in 2018.

In a virtual meeting with the Bloomington-Normal Airport Authority on Tuesday, CIRA Deputy Director Javier Centeno said work will begin on Sept. 14 and is projected to last 85 days.

Wednesday's Unit 5 school board meeting got off to an emotional start when some parents expressed their frustration with remote learning. 

The McLean County Health Department is gearing up to expand contract tracing efforts in response to rising cases of COVID-19.

In a virtual meeting on Tuesday night, the Normal Human Relations Commission heard a presentation from Prairie State Legal Services about fair housing issues.

Attorney Emily Petri outlined the protections guaranteed to renters and homebuyers under the federal Fair Housing Act, the Illinois Human Rights Act, and local ordinances.

Designed to protect people from unfair housing practices, the laws prohibit discrimination on the basis of characteristics like race, religion, sexual orientation, family status, and disability.

Unit 5 says government trade restrictions will delay the arrival of Chromebooks and tablets it planned to distribute to elementary students to help with remote learning.

Not In Our Town (NIOT) hosted a virtual event on Monday evening designed to spur community conversations around race.

This story was produced in partnership with the Pulitzer Center. For more stories about the effect of COVID-19 on museums, please visit the Prairie State Museums Project at PrairieStateMuseumsProject.org.

In a meeting with the Bloomington City Council Monday night, Connect Transit board chair Ryan Whitehouse pledged the public transportation service will become completely ADA compliant by 2024.

On Thursday night, the Bloomington-Normal chapter of the NAACP began its monthly town hall meeting with a sobering statistic.

UPDATED 11:50 a.m. | The Bloomington City Council voted Monday night to approve the reappointment of a Connect Transit board member, though not without discussion, with alderman Jeff Crabill moving to exclude the selection of Ryan Whitehouse.

This story was produced in partnership with the Pulitzer Center. For more stories about the effect of COVID-19 on museums, please visit the Prairie State Museums Project at PrairieStateMuseumsProject.org.

As violent images of the recent deaths of black citizens proliferate the media, some scholars and activists sense an opportunity to pursue lasting change.

“You probably don’t know this, but a broken tail light is a black man’s biggest fear.”

Around the table, people were silent as Otis Evans Jr. described what it’s like to be a black man in America.