Woodlawn Central is the smart investment the community needs

It’s a tale as old as time: When underserved neighborhoods with scant resources start to flourish, longtime residents are at risk of being displaced.

South Side neighborhoods have faced this problem before, but now, residents in Woodlawn are in an especially precarious position because of the neighborhood’s incomparable resources. The neighborhood borders the lakefront; is home to stunning, amenity-laden public parks; and has excellent educational institutions, convenient public transportation and burgeoning retail.

Yet Woodlawn is still ailing economically. Chicago Metropolitan Planning Agency’s 2022 Community Data Snapshot showed its residents have median and per capita household incomes of $27,541 and $20,824 respectively, far below the citywide figures of $62,097 and $39,068 respectively. The neighborhood’s median net worth is $4,439, the lowest of all 77 Chicago community areas.

Meanwhile, with the University of Chicago continuing to expand its footprint in the area and the Obama Presidential Center under construction in Jackson Park, displacement of current low-income residents is one of Woodlawn’s most pressing concerns.

Preventing displacement is paramount. Fortunately, Woodlawn has a good supply of affordable housing, both legally restricted and naturally occurring, plus a significant number of vacant city-owned lots with covenants stipulating 30% of housing development on them must be affordable.

But for underinvested communities to thrive, they need community assets that create demographic diversity. This enables residents to build and sustain healthy, viable communities and develop generational wealth. Think better transportation, schools, retail, restaurants and housing — all assets that spur economic development.

Mixed use, mixed income

Woodlawn Central, a mixed-use development that will turn eight acres of parking around the Apostolic Church of God at 63rd Street and Dorchester Avenue into a new community, has been conceived and designed to create demographic diversity — and in turn, economic development — with assets it will bring to Woodlawn.

These include a variety of new housing — including workforce housing, which is targeted to households that earn too much to qualify for traditional affordable housing subsidies, as well as market rate, senior and affordable — to allow all generations and demographic groups to live, work and retire in the neighborhood.

The development plan also includes improved public transit and new retail and office spaces to create a live-work-play environment, as well as a vertical greenhouse and “black box” theater — a simple indoor performance space with plain black walls and a level floor, designed for flexibility in stage configuration and audience seating.

This mixed-use, mixed-income plan was intentional, developed with extensive input and agreement from Woodlawn residents and stakeholders. The effort was supported by Apostolic and led by the Network of Woodlawn and One Woodlawn initiative.

Woodlawn Central was designed to serve as a model of urban regeneration, dedicated to wealth building without displacement. By increasing local employment opportunities and entrepreneurship, and bringing in a demographically diverse mix of residents, Woodlawn Central will attract thriving businesses, better elementary schools, and more and better housing. In turn, we believe this will lower crime, sustain community and faith organizations, and lead to real, long-term economic development.

Concentrated poverty destroys possibilities

Why is a diverse economic mix important? Concentrated poverty harms people and communities. A Brookings study from 2022 found that in neighborhoods where at least 30% of residents live in poor households, children born in the community are projected to die nearly six years earlier than those in other areas. Adults earn less money early in their working life and are incarcerated much more frequently.

But this Brookings research showed it is possible to boost economic development and reduce poverty without displacing community members, with inclusive prosperity. Heightened economic growth in a low-income community increases demographic diversity, housing density and the presence of community-building organizations.

With its mix of amenities, Woodlawn Central will do all of this and support equitable economic development. In turn, this will encourage higher rates of homeownership, a crucial pathway to building wealth and another factor that can stave off displacement.

South Side residents deserve sustainable and fair urban development, the type of economically transformative projects that are common in Chicago’s majority-white downtown and North Side communities. Woodlawn Central could prove to be just that for Woodlawn, where more than 82% of residents are Black.

Personally, as a longtime South Side and former Woodlawn resident who has attended church there for decades, I want to see Woodlawn win. Its residents want and deserve the same prosperity and amenities Chicagoans in richer, better-resourced communities enjoy. A development that offers Woodlawn residents improved infrastructure, safe and sustainable housing, greater access to wealth building — in short, a thriving community — is worth embracing.

Duwain Bailey is the executive director of the Network of Woodlawn.

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