The Gateway

In about a month, the longtime arts center in Alton will be moving from its current building — with no official plan to return. What’s led to the departure of the Jacoby Arts Center from that building has some Metro East residents worried about what’s to come.

St. Louis Public Radio’s Will Bauer reports on the uncertainty for a staple of downtown Alton.

The police killing of Michael Brown Junior and the Ferguson uprising that followed inspired music, visual art, and poetry, including this untitled poem from Ferguson inspired word artist Pacia Elaine Anderson.

On Wednesday afternoon, supporters of Marcellus Williams were relieved. A deal reached with prosecutors meant he would not be executed for a 1998 murder they believed he did not commit. But the deal fell apart in less than 24 hours. That means Williams could be executed on September 24th. St. Louis Public Radio’s Rachel Lippmann and Jonathan Ahl lay out the legal twists and turns in the case.

When a Ferguson police officer shot and killed Michael Brown ten years ago, it brought policing in the city under scrutiny - and federal oversight. A familiar face is now in charge of the path forward. St. Louis Public Radio's Rachel Lippmann has this profile Troy Doyle.

The Missouri Legislature expanded a tax credit for people who donate to crisis pregnancy centers right around the same time that the Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade. The resulting prohibition of nearly all abortions in Missouri led those pregnancy centers to take on a new tactic: taking their efforts to other states. St. Louis Public Radio’s Jonathan Ahl spoke with Jeremy Kohler of ProPublica who investigated how these taxpayer subsidized groups are operating.

Latino immigrant farmers in the Midwest face many obstacles starting their own business, especially when it comes to finding financial assistance. Federal grants from the U.S. Department of Agriculture can help, but those can be challenging to access. As Isa Luzarraga from the Midwest Newsroom reports, nonprofit organizations are stepping in to help.

In February, twenty-five Kansas City Chiefs Fans went to Union Station to celebrate the Super Bowl victory, and left with bullet wounds. Nearly half of them were under 18. Countless more children experienced the trauma first-hand. More than 6 months later, these kids continue to endure fear, anger, sleep problems, Peggy Lowe reports, as part of ongoing coverage of the aftermath of the parade shooting, produced by KCUR and KFF Health News with reporter Bram Sable-Smith.

Science has been studying the growing of crops for a long time, but the study of soil is relatively new. Researchers are finding that there’s a lot to be learned about how farming has impacted soil over the decades. As Harvest Public Media’s Jim Meadows reports, that research could be greatly helped by the discovery of soil samples over a century old.

Poet Carl Phillips taught at Washington University for 30 years before winning the Pulitzer Prize in Poetry last year. He retired at the end of the school year. His new collection is out now. It’s called “Scattered Snows, to the North” and it includes poems about memory, sex and the natural world.

St. Louis Public Radio’s Jeremy Goodwin asked Phillips how his prestigious award affected his writing.

Keeping the 300,000 who visit the small town of Sedalia for the Missouri State Fair requires a big, temporary, volunteer fire department.