(WTTW News)

Nearly 80% of voters in two precincts of the 7th Ward endorsed a referendum asking whether Ald. Greg Mitchell and Mayor Brandon Johnson should support “a Community Benefits Agreement (CBA) ordinance to prevent the displacement of renters, condo & home owners in South Shore in light of the impact of the Obama Center and growing development in the area.”

A rendering of the Obama Presidential Center’s athletic and conference center, designed by Moody Nolan. (Credit: Obama Foundation)

The Obama Presidential Center, which broke ground in September 2021, had been slated to open in October 2025.

(WTTW News)

Voters in two precincts of the 7th Ward will be asked whether Ald. Greg Mitchell (7th Ward) and Mayor Brandon Johnson should “support a Community Benefits Agreement (CBA) ordinance to prevent the displacement of renters, condo & home owners in South Shore in light of the impact of the Obama Center and growing development in the area.”

Members of the Chicago City Council meet on Wednesday, May 26, 2021. (WTTW News)

A probe by the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development found that aldermanic prerogative has created a hyper-segregated city rife with racism and gentrification.

(WTTW News)

The $500 million presidential center now under construction in Jackson Park has already made South Shore “ground zero” of Chicago’s housing crisis, with a high eviction rate and surging real estate prices, according to supporters of a City Council proposal.

(WTTW News)
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The lot at the corner of Wilson Avenue and Marine Drive was formerly owned by Weiss Memorial Hospital. It was subsequently sold and is now owned by Lincoln Property Company, which aims to build a 314-unit apartment building on the site. But just eight of those units will qualify as affordable.

(WTTW News)
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Chicago City Council voted this week to extend an ordinance aimed at slowing gentrification and displacement in Pilsen and areas near the 606 trail. The measure imposes a fee on permits for the demolition of buildings with residential units.

(WTTW News)

Housing Commissioner Marisa Novara said the initial imposition of the fee in April 2021 had helped slow gentrification-fueled displacement happening along the popular biking and jogging trail and in Pilsen, one of the city’s most in-demand real estate markets.

The vacant land near Higgins Road and Cumberland Avenue that GlenStar wants to transform into a 297-apartment complex. (Credit: Google Maps)

The proposal from Glenstar at 8535 W. Higgins Road will build the 41st Ward’s first affordable housing in decades amid a cluster of hotels and office mid-rises along the Kennedy Expressway near O’Hare Airport and steps away from the CTA Blue Line.

The vacant land near Higgins Road and Cumberland Avenue that GlenStar wants to transform into a 297-apartment complex. (Credit: Google Maps)

The committee vote represents a nearly unprecedented rebuke of the decades-old tradition of giving alderpeople the final say over housing developments in their wards.

The vacant land near Higgins Road and Cumberland Avenue that GlenStar wants to transform into a 297-apartment complex. (Credit: Google Maps)

Members of the Chicago City Council have until Friday to respond to 10 questions posed by federal officials probing whether aldermanic prerogative has created a hyper-segregated city rife with racism and gentrification.

(WTTW News)

The Chicago City Council may be forced to confront the role its decades-old tradition of giving aldermen the final say over housing developments in their wards has played in creating a hyper-segregated city rife with racism and gentrification. 

Now through June 27, the Logan Square Blue Line station platform is a subterranean gallery featuring a selection of photographs from “The Logan Square Book — Gentrification and Preservation in a Chicago Neighborhood.” (WTTW News)

Inside the Logan Square Blue Line CTA station, a subterranean gallery features a selection of photographs from a new book about gentrification and preservation in the neighborhood, which was, for decades, a predominantly Latino community.

Artist Mateo Zapata talks about the mural “Somos Pilsen.” (WTTW News)

Public art has become synonymous with Chicago’s Pilsen neighborhood. A new mural on 18th Street is using the medium to preserve the community’s history, and to memorialize dozens of its residents. 

The site of a 50-unit affordable housing development in Albany Park. (WTTW News)

Plans for a 50-unit affordable housing development are underway in Albany Park, a diverse community on Chicago’s Northwest Side that is not alone in facing gentrification. We discuss housing with Diane Limas of Communities United and Ald. Rossana Rodriguez Sanchez as part of our community reporting series.

(WTTW News)

Property owners and developers who want to demolish existing buildings in Pilsen and near the 606 trail would be required to pay a fee that would be used to fund affordable housing projects across the city, under a proposal set for a final vote Wednesday.