Chatham/Avalon Park Community Council: Chatham June 8 2015 Newsbrief + Bronzeville Regional Collective CBA Campaign

Monday, June 22, 2015

Chatham June 8 2015 Newsbrief + Bronzeville Regional Collective CBA Campaign

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

June 16, 2015

CONTACT

Naomi Davis, Esq.

Bronzeville Regional Collective
bvilleregionalcollective@gmail.com
773-678-9541

Bronzeville Regional Collective Announces

Obama CBA Campaign To Ensure Positive Economic Impact

Through Continued Development of Neighborhood Partnerships

Chicago, IL: The Bronzeville Regional Collective [BRC] has convened in a spirit of celebration and solidarity with a broad invitation to community organizations of the Bronzeville region to join in the momentous planning for the Obama Presidential Center. The BRC brings together organizations of diverse perspectives, skills, and goals to celebrate the power of the Obama Presidential Center to restore suffering south side communities in innovative ways, and facilitate robust dialogue, clear process, and a written Community Benefits Agreement with optimum input from communities primarily impacted by the development.

Today marks the one year anniversary of its response to the historic Obama Foundation Request For Qualifications to bidders on the Center. The organization is committed to continuing, and to enhancing the design of a unified development plan that features southeast side community economic development benefits in a process that is inclusive, transparent, and accountable, producing positive economic impacts for neighbors.

In keeping with the First Family’s commitment to strengthening America’s middle-class families, the Bronzeville Regional Collective aims for a comprehensive south side master plan which sustains and expands home and business ownership, solid neighborhood education, and preservation of cultural heritage.

“We’re delighted at this legacy opportunity – the chance to carry forward values of Chicago’s Great Migration families so powerfully embodied by our First Family,” said Naomi Davis of Blacks in Green.™

Paula Robinson of the Bronzeville Community Development Partnership noted, “This once-in-a- lifetime gift of the Presidential Center affords us the chance to build on decades of existing plans.

This is a perfect opportunity to blend our existing work in partnership with elected officials, the City of Chicago, the University of Chicago, and the First Family with this magnificent new development.”

Donna Hampton-Smith of the Washington Park Chamber of Commerce announced, “The Bronzeville Regional Collective will be hosting its first in a series of regular community workshops on Thursday, July 23^rd here at the Legends South Savoy Square, 4448 S. State Street from 6pm to 7:30pm. The price of admission will be a written idea for the Presidential Center specifically, or south side redevelopment generally.

The Obama Presidential Center offers a new way forward in the development of black communities, including systems of accountability to Great Migration communities - including those on Chicago’s west side. The Bronzeville Regional Collective plan focuses on building community wealth by:

· designating the Obama Presidential Library & Foundation within the Black Metropolis National Heritage Area where it will catalyze and circulate new income;

· supporting and creating local businesses, with a priority on increasing the rate at which black-owned businesses are created and sustained;

· increasing development of rental and owned housing affordable to middle-income families, and establishing legal protections against displacement for residents;

· monitoring enterprise and construction hires, and especially trade apprentice sponsorships to ensure breakthrough metrics;

· creating a Community Impact Fund which makes significant capital available for senior homeowners, neighbor-investors, small business start-ups, and community-based initiatives;

· completing a comprehensive feasibility study for a south side Level 1 or 2 Trauma Center; and ensuring the voice and authority of Bronzeville Regional communities to determine the policies, practices, and payments designed for their benefit as their communities are redeveloped.

Their original 2014 proposal to the Barack Obama Foundation can we viewed in full at http://goo.gl/27u4bb

About The Bronzeville Regional Collective. The Bronzeville Regional Collective [BRC] brings together organizations of diverse perspectives, skills, and goals which celebrate the power of the Obama Presidential Library and Foundation to restore suffering south side communities in innovative ways, and to begin leveling the playing field historically pitched against African Americans. The Collective honors the sacred memory of the migrations of African Americans - across the Middle Passage, through the Underground Railroad, on to the Great Migration paths issuing from the south in 1916, into the Chicago Black Belt where they settled. Today communities which do not reflect the promise of the ancestors can be restored through new agency. This group of leading community development practitioners and allies aim to catalyze measurable and substantial increases in our community health/wealth through a) sustainable and inter-generational land ownership and transfer; b) increased revenue streams through neighbor-owned businesses and buildings; and c) revived thirst and resources for vibrant lifelong learning.