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City Cast Chicago

We ask local movers and shakers the essential questions.

The final season of “Sex Education” drops Thursday. While the Netflix show follows high schoolers educating each other through an underground sex therapy clinic, a group of Chicagoland students are working to teach peers and revamp sex education in schools.

Ava Gonzalez and Anna Yang, a senior and junior at the Illinois Math & Science Academy in Aurora, are co-directors of the 

This interview has been edited for length and clarity.

Ava: “I would say they range from what seems like common knowledge to stuff you would have never heard before. People have asked me, ‘What is contraception?’ … It’s interesting to see that people don't really even know what a condom is or different types of birth control.”

“Shattering the Taboo” workbooks for middle

Anna: “We've continued to reach out to libraries across Illinois, especially those who may not have the best access to sex ed and sex ed books.”

Ava: “We have one installation of a sex ed podcast where we talked to different health officials and professors about what their perspective was on sex ed during different time periods — like the middles ages and 2000s.”

Will SEI influence what you do after high school?

Anna: “Although I'm not thinking of going into direct sex ed advocacy, I want to pursue a career in health care. … [This knowledge] is something I want to pass down to my little siblings and my future kids.”

Know a Chicago student who’d want to get involved? 

🎧 What to know about Illinois' sex ed

Ava Gonzalez and Anna Yang are co-directors of the Sex Ed Initiative.

How Chicago Students Are Teaching Sex Ed

3 Questions With

With Illinois Secretary of State Alexi Giannoulias set to testify in front of the U.S. Senate Judiciary Committee today about the state’s ban on book bans — the first in the country — we’re revisiting a conversation with 

Book Riot’s Kelly Jensen about how you can get involved

“A book ban or a challenge is when a book is taken off shelves or from classrooms and made unavailable to anybody who might wanna access them. There's also updating curriculum, something book banners have been using as argument for why they should be able to ban books. So a good example is we're seeing ‘To Kill a Mockingbird’ no longer being taught. Instead, a book by a Black author about racial justice is being used. … And it's not that ‘To Kill a Mockingbird’ is no longer available — it is, often as recommended reading — but it isn't being pulled from [the school].”

Who are the people most hurt by book bans?

“The people who are most hurt and most challenged by these book bans are the very people these books are by and about: It is queer people, it is people of color, and it is particularly those who live in an environment that is not supportive of them.”

What are actions that can be taken to fight book bans?

“If you can show up to a [school or library board] meeting, show up to a meeting. Bring a friend or two and make it a social event because that is what the people who are banning books are doing. Plan to show up and speak. If you can't go in person, write to school board members. They might not respond, but that doesn't mean that they don't hear you.”

The Chicago-based American Library Association’s 

Plus, more on local book ban attempts

With Illinois officials set to testify before U.S. senators about the state’s ban on book bans, we’re revisiting a conversation with Book Riot’s Kelly Jensen.

Will US Ban Book Bans Like Illinois Did?

Poet laureates from the Chicago area and across the country will be 

 Thursday — including avery r. young, the city’s inaugural poet laureate. The Austin native sat down with the City Cast Chicago podcast earlier this year to 

share his background and dish on the city’s poetry scene.

How does Austin and your Chicago experience show up in your work?

“There's so much that I absorbed as a young person growing up — walking on the avenue where there's a liquor store, a storefront church, the tavern, another church, the restaurant that's bumping GCI, and coming home to Millie and Mahalia Jackson playing upstairs and the other one playing downstairs. How can I not go through these streets of the city and not absorb all that stuff? … There's things that happen in Chicago that give Chicagoans a certain language.”

What do you think makes Chicago’s poetry scene so unique?

“When you live in a city like Chicago that is a hub for blues and gospel and hip-hop and dance and all of this vibrant culture … the streets spill poems or poetry every day. The poetry of the city is a linking community."

Where can new Chicago poets go to share their work?

“The library or a bookstore. Read first. Find out what you like, who you like, what poetry resonates with you, and then begin to do what moves that type of work forward. When you get into a poetry venue, present that work like you really, really care. And anybody that's listening should really, really care enough to listen to what you gotta say.”

🎧 Plus, his hopes as poet laureate

3 Questions With Chicago’s Poet Laureate

What is going on with the Sox? That’s the question on every Chicagoan’s mind as players seem checked out, executives have been fired, and owners contemplate a move. 

, co-host of the CHGO White Sox podcast, breaks down the drama and whether fans should hit the panic button.

conversation with City Cast Chicago host Jacoby Cochran:

Is this all smoke or is there a real chance the Sox can leave?

“They have six years left to make that decision on their lease because that's when it runs out, I believe in 2029. But the White Sox have pulled this move in the past before where they threatened to move.

[In] the late ‘80s, Jerry Reinsdorf, who is still the owner of the White Sox, threatened to move the team to Tampa and it was a last-minute, actually some say [an] effort by the governor at that time Big Jim Thompson, to make sure the White Sox stay in Chicago.”

What do you think, ultimately, the White Sox owners are prioritizing? Is it a new stadium somewhere else? Is it development around Sox Park? Maybe selling the team?

“I think Reinsdorf is looking for somebody to pay for his stadium, so that's why he floated Nashville, so he can get the negotiations going with the City of Chicago so they can give him a sweetheart of a deal like they did with Guaranteed Rate.”

How would you sum up the White Sox season so far?

“Disappointing is not strong enough a word.

“And I don't know if it's going to get better because the latest moves that Jerry Reinsdorf has made, or at least rumored that he's going to be making, don't leave any White Sox fans with any confidence that it's going to get better.”

How do you feel about the Sox potentially leaving Guaranteed Rate Field?

🎧 Why there’s still hope

As players seem checked out, executives have been fired, and owners contemplate a move, Herb Lawrence, co-host of the CHGO White Sox podcast, breaks down the drama and whether fans should hit the panic button.

Could the White Sox Leave Chicago?

With city budget season around the corner, we're diving into one of Chicago's thorniest financial issues: how to fund pensions for city workers.

DePaul University’s Amanda Kass studies the city’s pensions and broke it down on the City Cast Chicago podcast.

What are the four major pensions? How are they funded? 

The city of Chicago is only responsible for four pension systems for police officers, firefighters, municipal employees, and laborers. There’s somewhere between 50,000 and 60,000 current employees. But then there's also retirees that are members of the pension system. 

At a basic level, the way that you fund a pension system is through three sources of revenue. A portion of employees’ salaries and money from your employer gets pulled together and invested. A combination of employee and employer contributions and investment returns is supposed to create a pot of money.

Chicago's combined four systems are only about 24% funded. A true crisis happens if the pension system completely runs out of assets. We're not in that situation right now.

When pension systems are underfunded, it requires more money from the employer, which is the city of Chicago. That creates a budget crunch for the city's overall finances.

Why should everyday Chicagoans care about pensions?

The pension systems pay for the benefits for city employees. So we should view this as part of the overall cost of city services. 

There’s a huge social cost to not funding retirement benefits. There’s a moral question to that: Have we just created an impoverished elderly population in our city?

🎧 So what are the city's options?

With city budget season around the corner, we're diving into one of Chicago's thorniest financial issues.

What You Need to Know About Chicago’s ‘Pension Crisis’

Wondering what to do with end-of-summer visitors? Take them on a neighborhood tour with 

, where locals have volunteered to show tourists around for more than 20 years.

Sharyne Moy Tu has been giving tours in Chinatown and the Loop to visitors from across the U.S. and more than 30 countries for five years.

About 95% of my guests want to experience a neighborhood outside of downtown and take the L. So I take them on the Red Line, and we tour Wentworth Avenue — the bakeries, the square, the library, and go for dim sum because most folks have not heard of or tried it.

I customize tours to the visitors’ interests and where they’ve been in the city. I go on other tours — 

 — to learn more. And, I get a lot of exercise, too.

How have you changed visitors’ minds about Chicago?

Chicago is not on the top of the list for most international visitors — it’s usually New York City or San Francisco or LA. They don’t realize how great our city is. And so we show them around, and they’re amazed that Chicago is so clean, that the lake looks like an ocean, and we have great public transit.

What’s something surprising that has come out of the tours?

I have made many lasting friendships. Some I keep in touch with through Instagram. There was a family from Argentina who came last year and returned this year.

 to give tours in Chatham, South Shore, West Ridge, Garfield Park, and Rogers Park. Bonus points if you speak another language.

📍 Plus, Hey Chicago neighborhood guides

Wondering what to do with end-of-summer visitors? Take them on a neighborhood tour with Chicago Greeter.

How This Tour Guide Changes Visitors' Minds About Chicago

As Cook County reaches record levels of opioid overdoses, a husband and wife are setting up booths at music fests across the country to provide concertgoers with nasal naloxone with their nonprofit, 

Ahead of Lollapalooza, co-founder and chemical dependency counselor William Perry, who is also in recovery, shared tips about administering the overdose reversal drug and where their booth will be in Grant Park this weekend.

We give out Kloxxado, which has twice the potency of a Narcan dose. As far as administration goes, peel open the package and put it up one nostril. Turn the person on their side in case they potentially vomit. Stand back, and wait 30 seconds to three minutes to see if they wake up. Call for paramedics because this will only keep them safe for 60–90 minutes.

Last year, we did eight fests and handed out under 11,000 kits. This year, we're doing 28 fests and handing out north of 30,000 kits.

Aside from medication, what are other tips for staying safe?

There should always be the caretaker friend.

[A substance] can have a non-deadly level of fentanyl, but drinking on top can have a synergistic effect that changes that.

Never ever tell somebody that they should sleep it off, especially if they are showing signs of drowsiness and unresponsiveness.

How could an organization like this have helped you?

Nearly all of the friends I grew up [using] with are gone due to an overdose. I wish there was somebody that had a non-judgmental talk [with us] about what we were getting into. I can't go back and change that. Hopefully, we can keep that from happening in someone else's life.

As Cook County reaches record levels of opioid overdoses, a husband and wife are setting up booths at music fests across the country to provide concertgoers with nasal naloxone with their nonprofit, This Must Be the Place.

Learn About Overdose Prevention at Lollapalooza

While the Cubs and Sox face off in this summer's first Crosstown Classic on the South Side today, we’re looking at a different part of Chicago baseball history: the Negro Leagues.

“The League” is a new documentary exploring the history and legacy of the Black baseball leagues in the first half of the 20th century.

Byron Motley co-wrote the book the film is based on with his dad Bob, a Negro Leagues umpire. Motley shares his experience telling his late dad’s story and Chicago’s contributions to the leagues.

“Hearing my father’s stories since I was a child, I thought, ‘Wow, there's a lot of great information he has to share with the world and baseball fans.’ So I convinced him to work on writing this book. He told me the stories, and I handled the writing. We called probably 10 times a day.”

“Whenever he was promoting the book, he said I wrote the book and I said, “But you lived the book — these are your stories.’”

What was Chicago’s biggest contribution to the Negro League?

“Without a doubt, the East West All-Star game, which began in Chicago in 1933. The white leagues started around the same time. But the Negro Leagues audiences outdrew the major league’s All-Star games. One player once told me they filled the stands with 70,000 people in the ballpark. White and Black crowds came to watch Black baseball players. It was a big deal.”

How has the Negro Leagues affected the game today?

“The way the players play the game is a little more stylish and with a bit more spirit than 40 or 50 years ago — and a lot of that comes from Negro League baseball, like the style of high fiving. There's an influx of players today that are from the Dominican Republic, Cuba, Latin American countries, and Japan. Black players were the first to take baseball to those countries.”

What Was Chicago's Role in the Negro Leagues?

Between street and music fests, Summertime Chi is packed. But don’t sleep on block parties. Lakeview resident Joel Simon planned block parties for years and Beverly resident Ashley Rayner is planning her second one now.

Why’d you start planning block parties?

: “[I used to] get home from work and ask myself, ‘Whose porch are we gonna be sitting on?’ There'd be the people who cluster around, hang out, and chit-chat. A bottle of wine would come out. Somebody [finally] said, ‘Hey, we should formalize this. Let's do a block party.’”

: “After the pandemic, people were just trying to get to know each other. And [a block party] was a way to bring the block together.”

. … And that was sort of the only official hurdle that we had before he offered the permit. [The alder] sent some arts and crafts for the kids, 

, the fire truck, a piñata, and maybe even a popcorn machine. Everything else is really do it yourself. Put a couple of garbage cans at the top of the street, and give everybody warning of when it's gonna be so they can move their cars.”

: “Flyers are a good way to advertise. If you have food, music, and people who wanna get to know each other, those are the main elements you really need.”

What’s the difference between a block party and street fest?

: “Nobody's making any money. This is all a sort of a community activity as opposed to a transaction or a commercial enterprise.”

: “A block party is definitely less of an entrepreneurial vibe. We're just like, ‘Hey, we got some stuff together. Let's all sit outside, block off the streets, and get to know each other.”

Between street and music fests, Summertime Chi is packed. But don’t sleep on block parties. We spoke with Lakeview resident Joel Simon and Beverly resident Ashley Raynor on their tips for planning your best block party.

Two Experts on Planning a Chicago Block Party

3 Questions With Chicago Block Party Planners

As the planet’s daily temperature reaches new highs, we’re looking at why some Chicago neighborhoods are hotter than others. Tribune’s Sarah Macaraeg investigated the disparities due to our built environment.

“In general, you see a lot of overlap with places that are more industrialized. There's a huge belt on the Southwest Side that is among the hottest. And whenever we say hottest, [that means] places that are hotter than 90% of the rest of Chicago. We certainly see a part of the Northwest Side with a pocket with a lot of heat. There are outliers on the Southeast Side.”

“A climatologist said the lake is a ‘climate forcing element’ so it does impact our local weather. But [if you look at the map], you see little clusters closer to the lake are hotter than places further. So the pattern does not hold.”

“Parks, like many other interventions experts talk about, have proven research behind them. Researchers found that painting roofs white, which reflects the sun rather than sort of absorbing and radiating heat, made more of a difference than introducing trees, which isn’t to say you have to choose. The other part of that equation is what do the people who live there want.”

The city is still looking for volunteers to help map heat disparities

🎧 Plus, what YOU can do

Tribune's Sarah Macaraeg investigated why some Chicago neighborhoods are hotter than others. 