Community organizations receive portion of $2.7 million for development projects

South Shore Chamber Community Development Corporation is one of three community led organizations to receive a portion of $2.7 million from The Desk’s Neighborhood Development Initiative. PHOTO PROVIDED BY KIVVIT
South Shore Chamber Community Development Corporation is one of three community led organizations to receive a portion of $2.7 million from The Desk’s Neighborhood Development Initiative. PHOTO PROVIDED BY KIVVIT

Community organizations receive portion of $2.7 million for development projects

By Tia Carol Jones

Community Desk Chicago distributed three community organizations a portion of $2.7 million to help them build capacity to do development projects on the local level. South Shore Chamber of Commerce Community Development Corporation, Teamwork Englewood and Puerto Rican Cultural Center are the recipients of the money from The Neighborhood Initiative (NDI).

Community Desk Chicago, also known as the Desk, was founded in 2019, with the goal to understand roadblocks that exist for communities when it comes to moving projects forward. It is housed at Chicago Community Trust.

The Desk focuses on advocacy, from an ecosystem perspective and on a project level. It advocates to support projects that are very challenging to get funded in neighborhoods – wealth building opportunities and those that improve quality of life.

On the ecosystem level, the Desk advocates for system change, tackling issues surrounding loans and loan values. It looks for solutions in regards to capital issues and funding going into neighborhoods. A big body of the work is to support community investment vehicles, trying to figure out how can The Desk assist communities in pooling their capital to acquire property.

“We really want to position communities to control their own destinies and move beyond a community plan, actually implement that plan,” said Ja’Net Defell, director of The Desk.

The Desk spends a lot of time being a conduit between community projects and funders. The Desk helps projects by prepping communities on how to use the language necessary to get funding for their projects. It also connects communities to resources and capital.

The three organizations were chosen because of their reputation, their position in the community and their prominence in the community. The neighborhoods of these organizations also have been struggling with gentrification and are underserved in a technical assistance perspective.

In South Shore, Defell said that the community is primed because of its proximity to the Obama Presidential Center, and Lake Michigan, to take action in terms of activating a lot of blighted and vacant buildings.

Tonya Trice, executive of the South Shore Chamber of Commerce has been active with the Small Business Advocacy Council to address the vacancy issues. The Desk wants to support Trice and her team in thinking about how to activate 71st Street and improve the quality of life for residents to create walkable, livable communities.
The South Shore Community Development Corporation was founded as the community-focused arm of the South Shore Chamber of Commerce in 2019. Both entities provide supportive services to entrepreneurs and small businesses in the South Shore community.

“We will help to create more community-led development and wealth building efforts. The two organizations kind of work hand-in-hand to make sure we are empowering South Shore with the right tools and capital necessary for economic development and growth,” Trice said.

Small business owners and entrepreneurs in the community were in need of access to more capital and more broader initiatives that benefits the small business owners, as well as other residents, so they had a voice in what development initiatives into the community.

With the funds from The Desk’s Neighborhood Initiative, the South Shore Chamber CDC will focus on real estate development projects, as well as broader economic development initiatives that will benefit the entire South Shore community.

Trice believes that South Shore is well-positioned for the revitalization of its commercial corridors and the momentum is there. There are several local developer initiatives underway. The South Shore Chamber CDC is preparing to be a strong development collaborator and leader in the area.

“We want to focus on the residents that are currently in the community, working to make sure they have the best quality of life available, and we are building our capacity to make sure we serve as the glue that binds the community together. We also want to make sure the voices of the residents in the community are listed and made a part of any projects that come into South Shore, and that we uplift and preserve the culture of the South Shore community in doing so,” Trice said.

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