Activists fearing ripple effect of Obama Presidential Center call for affordable housing protections in South Shore

On the identical day the Obama Presidential Middle broke floor Tuesday, a gaggle of activists gathered close by to name for reasonably priced housing protections for the South Shore neighborhood to maintain rising costs related to the event from driving residents out of the group.

“This specific growth could have a ripple impact in Black communities,” stated Shannon Bennett, a frontrunner within the Obama Neighborhood Advantages Settlement Coalition.

A plan to guard house owners and renters in South Shore is almost full and cementing a time to fulfill with Mayor Lori Lightfoot to debate particulars is within the works, Bennett stated.

“That is the group that despatched [former President Barack Obama] to Springfield. That is the group that despatched him to the Senate. That is the group that despatched him to the White Home, and we needs to be the group that will get to remain and profit from the presidential middle,” stated South Shore resident Dixon Romeo.

About 30 supporters of the coalition gathered at sixtieth Road and Stony Island Avenue to carry a information convention Tuesday at midday.

An ordinance must be handed for South Shore that’s related, however extra expansive, than one which handed Metropolis Council final September cementing housing protections for the Woodlawn neighborhood, activists stated.

The Woodlawn Housing Preservation ordinance units apart $4.5 million for an array of reasonably priced housing applications within the neighborhood surrounding the Obama Presidential Middle and establishes affordability necessities for 30% of latest housing models constructed on 52 vacant Woodlawn tons owned by town.

Shannon Bennet executive director of the Kenwood-Oakland Community Organization speaks on the corner of 60th and Stoney Island in Hyde Park, Tuesday afternoon, Sept. 28, 2021. — Shannon Bennett, govt director of the Kenwood-Oakland Neighborhood Group

Members of the coalition imagine the presidential middle will carry with it funding and better residence costs and rents that longtime residents won’t be able to afford.

Bennett pointed to the gentrification of the Lincoln Park neighborhood, which is now one of many metropolis’s wealthiest and whitest enclaves.

“We’re not going to let that occur in our communities,” he stated, noting that the group is leaning on Lightfoot, not Obama, for assistance on the problems.

“Can our former president affect it, in fact he may. Are we in rooms that he’s in? I don’t assume anybody right here is. Our mayor needs to be accessible,” Bennett stated.

A spokesman for Lightfoot didn’t instantly return a request for remark.

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