WGLT will debut a new multimedia project this month ‒ including WGLT’s first-ever video documentary ‒ chronicling what it’s like to be unhoused in Bloomington-Normal during the cold winter months.
Frozen and Forgotten: An Unhoused Winter in Bloomington-Normal was reported by WGLT’s Melissa Ellin and Emily Bollinger. They spent several days with street outreach teams from two Bloomington-Normal organizations that serve the community’s unhoused people. Their reporting documents what’s changed ‒ and what hasn’t ‒ following the dispersal of a large homeless encampment near downtown Bloomington last fall.
You can watch or listen to the project in several ways:
- Listen to the audio series starting Feb. 17 on WGLT’s newsmagazine Sound Ideas, airing at 5 p.m. each day. Listen on 89.1 FM or stream on WGLT.org or the NPR App. Companion written stories will be published each day on WGLT.org.
- Join us in person at 6 p.m. Feb. 26 for the debut screening of the 30-minute video documentary Frozen and Forgotten, followed by a panel discussion with some of the organizations and unhoused people featured in the documentary. This event will be held at the Bloomington Public Library, 205 E. Olive St., in Community Room 2.
- The entire series, including the documentary, will be available at WGLT.org/Frozen.
Many thanks to God's Mission Ministry and Home Sweet Home Ministries for their assistance with this project.
WGLT, Bloomington-Normal’s Public Media, is part of the NPR Network licensed to and operating from Illinois State University in Normal. WGLT is McLean County’s leader in local news, and also provides the highest quality national and international news via the NPR Network. Award-winning local news is featured in the weekday morning podcast The Leadoff, and in the weekday evening newsmagazine Sound Ideas. WGLT champions independent nonprofit journalism as our public service duty with on-air and digital content freely available to all who want it at 89.1 FM, WGLT.org, the NPR App, Facebook and Instagram.