From Blight to Might, North Lawndale Residents Hope for Rebirth

by Ashley Braden
July 22, 2008 – A group of North Lawndale residents and others interested in helping the struggling West Side neighborhood will meet July 22 to develop a plan to bring a grocery store, library and more housing to the area.

The Lawndale Corridor Development Initiative, a project aimed at community development and rejuvenation, has held two meetings this summer. Sponsored by the Metropolitan Planning Council,Chicago Metropolitan Agency for Planning and Lawndale Christian Development Corp., the meetings have brought together neighborhood residents, business owners, developers and architects to work on plans for retail and residential growth. Two or three plans should be ready to present to local developers at the July 22 meeting.

“The purpose of these meetings is to allow the community to influence development before it happens, rather than respond to it afterwards,” said Karin Sommer, an associate at the Metropolitan Planning Council. “The residents want to do some revitalizing in the neighborhood – it needs it.”

North Lawndale has a lot of empty space, said Kim Jackson, executive director of the Lawndale Christian Development Corp.

“Right now, there needs to be improvements made,” Jackson said. “There are a lot of city-owned, vacant lots that could be viable opportunities for development in the area.”

The West Side neighborhood was once a booming part of Chicago. During the 1920s, North Lawndale’s population grew rapidly, housing workers from hundreds of nearby factories and warehouses including the massive McCormick Reaper Works, Sears Roebuck and Company and Western Electric.

However in the 1960’s, because of redlining and “white flight,” the housing stock declined, and jobs grew scarce. After the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. was assassinated in 1968, riots broke out in the neighborhood. Businesses and homes were burned, and the businesses that did survive moved elsewhere. The neighborhood lost 45 percent of its population between 1970 and 2000, and now has 41,768 residents, according the U.S. Census Bureau .

North Lawndale has a poverty rate of 40 percent and a 27 percent unemployment rate said Sommers.

“We’re working with the community to determine what development is realistic and economically feasible in Lawndale,” Sommer said. “We want to establish what’s possible.”

Organizers presented an overview of potential development in Lawndale at their first meeting, and asked for feedback and comments. According to the results of a keypad poll, residents want grocery stores and recreational facilities like a bowling alley or skating rink.

“There hasn’t been a grocery store or library in the area for a long time,” said Paul Norrington, resident and member of the Lawndale Corridor Development Initiative steering committee. “Bringing in something like that – that the community wants and needs – could lead off into other developments.”

Ald. Sharon Dixon (24th) and the 15-member steering committee took the information from that first meeting and prepared a second session July 8.

Sommer said that meeting was more hands-on, with participants brainstorming about what they’d like to see in three sections of North Lawndale, two along Ogden Avenue and one at the corner of 19th Street and Pulaski. Using blocks to represent buildings, residents created development plans and presented them to architects who sketched the ideas. The plans were then sent to developers who determined the projects’ feasibility.

Sommer said the architects will present “more detailed sketches” July 22 at the North Lawndale College Prep High School auditorium, 1615 South Christiana Ave., at 5:30 p.m. Community members, developers and business owners will then vote on the plans and eventually market them.

Jackson said she hopes developers will embrace the Lawndale residents’ dreams of new businesses and housing. Norrington hopes they’ll take it a step further.

“Part of the reason this area is borderline blighted is because of a lack of jobs,” Norrington said. “I’m hoping that the developers take that into consideration, and offer job training and preferential hiring to people in the community for the construction and operation of these projects.”

“Lawndale has a history of people who have lived here all their lives, created organizations to benefit the young people that live here, and have weathered the storm and committed themselves to the community,” Jackson said. “Now it needs to have economic growth.”