This is the WFHB Local News for Wednesday, July 29th, 2026.

In today’s newscast, Correspondents Elena Bai and Ben Sharpe took to the streets of Bloomington to ask residents about how they feel about students coming back to the city in a few weeks. More in today’s feature report.

Also coming up in the next half hour, “Real Estate or Fake Estate” on Better Beware – your weekly consumer watchdog segment hosted and produced by Richard Fish. More following today’s feature.

Featured Segments:

Photo by Jessie Grubb.During public comment at the Bloomington City Council meeting last Wednesday, county commissioner Jody Madeira urged the council to reconsider the Hopewell neighborhood as a potential new site for the jail and justice center.

“The county considered the Hopewell property in 2022-23, although at the time we had a design that was limited to only a jail,” said Madeira. “The council declined to support the request at that time. We recently reviewed our scoring matrix from years ago, and Hopewell came up as a preferred site.”

Commissioner Julie Thomas continued to make the case that Hopewell could be an adequate space for the new jail.

“Because the city has expressed an interest in assisting us. We are returning now to repeat our request for consideration,” said Thomas.

Meanwhile, City Councilmember Isabel Piedmont-Smith wrote a letter to Commissioners Madeira and Thomas, saying the Hopewell neighborhood should be reserved for affordable housing purposes. WFHB News spoke with Piedmont-Smith earlier today by phone about that letter. We turn to News Director Kade Young for more.

https://wfhb.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/07/20260729-dln-interviews_isabel-piedmont-smith_hopewell.mp3(Photo by Kade Young).Townie summer is coming to a close. In a few short weeks, IU students will come back to Bloomington. This afternoon around 2 p.m., WFHB News Correspondents Ben Sharpe and Elena Bai took to the streets, asking residents how they feel about the students coming back to town. That voxpop is coming up next on the WFHB Local News.

Up next, “Real Estate or Fake Estate” on Better Beware – your weekly consumer-watchdog segment on the WFHB Local News. We turn to host and producer Richard Fish for more.

Credits:
You’ve been listening to the WFHB Local News,
Kade Young produced today’s interview with Isabel Piedmont-Smith.
Better Beware is produced by Richard Fish.
Our voxpop about the end of townie summer was produced by Elena Bai and Ben Sharpe.
Our theme music is provided by Mark Bingham and the Social Climbers.
Engineer and Executive producer is Kade Young.
Anchors are Ben Sharpe and Jaimmie Ford.