OP Regional Housing Center_081716

Promoting Integration

In Oak Park and across the Greater West Side This Oak Park Regional Housing Center piece was produced in partnership with Wednesday Journal Publications.

2 2016

Greer Haseman & Patty Reilly-Murphy Proud Supporters of the Oak Park Regional Housing Center

Thank you to the Oak Park Regional Housing Center for all that it has done to shape and sustain the vibrancy and diversity of our community. We are aware that in our rapidly changing world, integrated living is far from guaranteed, and the work they do is needed now as much as it has ever been.

1011 South Boulevard | Oak Park, IL 60302 office 708.366.0400 GPS@atproperties

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IN T ROD U CT ION

Austin Ascending: Revitalizing a Community and Building Bridges

By Lacey Sikora

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ak Park prides itself as an open, inclusive, and vibrant community. Diversity is our brand and our competitive advantage in the region. And, our diversity is a success story because we have an intentional integration strategy. After all diversity without integration is segregation.

We cannot just rest on our past success, especially as racial tensions and divisions are increasing nationally.

Now more than ever, our future harmony and prosperity depends on our ability to be true to our core values. Integration is more than a social value, it is the heart of what makes Oak Park a uniquely desirable community.

Support Integration at: https://publicgood.com/org/oak-park-regionalhousing-center/donate.

Rob Breymaier Executive Director Oak Park Regional Housing Center/West Cook Homeownership Center/Austin Ascending For as long as there is residential segregation, there will be de facto segregation in every area of life.

— Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.

212 S. Marion Street Oak Park, IL 60302 p 708-386-0150 f 708-386-0187

For over two years, the Oak Park Regional Housing Center has been working to bridge the divide between Oak Park and Austin through the Austin Ascending program. Program Director Jessica Hartshorn explains that the program was conceived as a method of both investing in the Austin community while also changing preconceived notions about the Austin community among renters.

Austin Ascending works with landlords in Austin who own two to four unit buildings to provide grant money to invest in improvements to one or more of their units. With grants of up to $4,000, the landlords can upgrade flooring, windows, tile, appliances or paint. Hartshorn emphasizes that the landlords work with local contractors from the Austin community so that the money and job creation stays within the community.

“Our hope is to get our clients who are interested in Oak Park interested in Austin as well by making the apartments more appealing. These apartments are really large and offer vintage character. They are very similar to Oak Park quality, and we want to show people that Austin is a place where everyone can live.”

Austin also benefits Hartshorn says because the landlords are often rehabbing vacant or distressed properties, and their rehabilitation benefits the entire block.

Hartshorn specifies, “Some landlords bought properties that were slated for demolition or foreclosure. The program rejuvenates and stabilizes the housing market in the neighborhood.”

One Austin Ascending participant, landlord Greg Raggs turned around a building with the grant money he received.

He says of the building he rehabbed, “It was a nuisance to the neighborhood. Kids and addicts were going in there. One day, I said ‘I’m going to change this building,’ and people told me not to do it. The plumbing had

www.oakparkrealtors.org

WILLIAM CAMARGO/Staff Photographer

Greg Raggs transformed a tired two-flat and has been active in the revitalization of the neighborhood. been stolen. It was definitely a project.”

While working his day job as a residence services coordinator for the Housing Authority of Chicago, Raggs turned the property around over the course of a year and credits the Austin Ascending program with getting him over a hurdle when his funds were tight.

“I did the floors, put up ceiling fans and did some windows – things I’d run out of funds to do. The entire project was a process, but one that I can truly say I’m proud of now. In my job, I was seeing the need for better living conditions within the community. I’ve lived in Austin pretty much my whole life, and Austin Ascending has been a great help. They are helping build the community back up.”

Hartshorn notes that the program is also building bonds in unforeseen ways.

“The tenants are happy with the physical changes, but I hear more that they really like

their landlords. They connect with them on a personal level because the owners take pride in ownership and take care of the units.”

She also sees Austin Ascending forging personal bonds between Oak Park and Austin residents. “We recently held a community beautification day where groups of Oak Park and Austin volunteers planted flowers on the corners of blocks. I just caught up with one of our landlords who participated that day. She loves to garden, and she told me that since that day, she’s kept in touch with one of the Oak Park volunteers who also loves to garden. They’ve exchanged gardening tips and plants.”

She notes that Austin Ascending has several goals. One is to empower owners to have resources within the community and that the long term goal is to promote Austin as a desirable community where people of all races can live together and value each other.

4 2016

Achieving Meaningful and Lasting Diversity with the Oak Park Regional Housing Center Making a Difference in the Rental Market

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WILLIAM CAMARGO/Staff Photographer

You would be this cheery too if you just found your new dream apartment. The Howells found their apartment with help from the Housing Center.

Congratulations to the Oak Park Regional Housing Center for promoting Diversity and Integration for over 40 years!

By Lacey Sikora

or more than forty four years, the Oak Park Regional Housing Center has been securing diversity and integration in Oak Park, and through that diversity aims to create a community that is inclusive, vibrant and welcoming. One of the Housing Center’s primary roles in the Oak Park community is achieving and maintaining diversity through apartment rental services it offers free of charge.

Oak Park renters Jerremy and Katie Howell worked with the Housing Center to find the right apartment in Oak Park.

When the bi-racial couple moved from Bloomington, Illinois and started their search for a home in the Chicago area, they didn’t know where to begin. Jerremy recalls, “I knew I needed to be close to where I worked, but I didn’t know where.

Katie and I made a list of ten communities where we could have a good commute and a decent cost of living.”

Other communities just didn’t have the right fit, but the couple immediately felt like Oak Park could be a place to call home. “We knew when we got to Oak Park. It felt like a community. There’s a quietness to it, and a lively downtown,” says Jerremy. Katie chimes in, “And just the diversity we saw when we drove down the streets was appealing.”

After trying other companies but turning up empty on their apartment search, the couple stopped by the Housing Center and worked with Meena. She took them to view several apartments in one day, and her hands-on approach really sold the Howells on the community according

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“I wouldn’t be here if it weren’t for the Housing Center.

That’s a fact. They are still relevant and important. ”

Things you can do to promote diversity and integration

Support the work of the Oak Park Regional Housing Center: For over 40 years, the Oak Park Regional Housing Center has been on the forefront of the quest to keep our community integrated. Our community still faces many challenges to sustaining this integration and inclusion. Your commitment to our work through your financial support is needed now more than ever.

You can donate on our website: www.oprhc.org/donate.

Jerremy Howell Oak Park renter

Show Up: Be an active advocate for the cause of diversity and integration.

True community integration never happens by “accident.” It takes intentional effort on the part pa of all of us!

Clo Get Close: Spen time with friends in different Spend cul cultures and with different experienc from your own. Say “Hi” to ences yo neighbors! Invite them over your fo a meal. Attend an event in a for different nneighborhood or community and get to kknow new people!

to Jerremy. “She was an ambassador for Oak Park. She told us why she lived here. When you relate your story to your work, it is transformational.”

The Howells found their first apartment through the Housing Center. With a baby on the way and along with that, the need for more space, they returned to the Housing Center when it came time to find a larger space for their growing family. Through it all, they feel they made the right decision in choosing Oak Park.

Notes Jerremy, “Oak Park is very diverse and embraces that. There is a strength in differences. If a community doesn’t reflect the world we live in, it’s not good. It’s extremely important as a

couple, especially with a bi-racial child on the way, that we show him what the world looks like.”

For Katie, who grew up in a small, predominantly white town, “I took diversity for granted because I didn’t have it. It was out of sight, out of mind.

I learned to embrace differences in people when I went away, but for our kids to be immersed in that and be a part of that diversity is very important.”

Jerremy notes that diversity in a community stretches beyond race. “Oak Park is very diverse in ways other than race. In this building alone, we have millennials, baby boomers and Gen X-ers. You can learn a lot from people from different age groups. You see that

in the churches and restaurants around town too. You also see diversity in sexual orientation here, it’s reflective of the world.”

Jerremy believes the Housing Center plays a key role in achieving that diversity in the community. “I wouldn’t be here if it weren’t for the Housing Center. That’s a fact. They are still relevant and important. You open up the newspaper any day, and you see there’s still certain generalities and conflicts that come with different races. Bringing in people like me and Katie, who are professional, working class, I feel like I’m representing my race. If the Housing Center wasn’t here, we’re digressing rather than progressing.”

Sugar Beet Food Co-op is proud to support the Oak Park Regional Housing Center’s mission to achieve meaningful and lasting diversity in and around Oak Park.

Be Hopeful: Live with the spirit that demonstrates belief that true community integration is achievable.

Be Willing to Get Uncomfortable: True community integration is hard work! No shift toward justice and integration is easy. Don’t be afraid to “rock the boat.”

Tell a New Story: Speak in ways that will build up, not tear down communities.

Tell others about the benefits (social and economic) that you see of living in an integrated community like Oak Park.

Host a Meeting to continue this Discussion: Invite your friends and neighbors over for a discussion about the future of integration in Oak Park and around the nation.

Contact the Housing Center for resources to help you with that important conversation.

1009-11 W. Madison St. 708.524.8400

www.classicproperties.us Serving the Oak Park/River Forest Area for Over 20 years

6 2016

West Cook Homeownership Center:

Changing the Face of Communities Through Homeownership

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By Lacey Sikora

he West Cook Homeownership Center is a project of the Oak Park Regional Housing Center. The HUD-certified housing counseling agency is located in Forest Park and works throughout Western Cook County and the Austin community of Chicago. Program Director Erica Muhammad says the agency provides pre-purchase and first-time home buyer counseling.

“We do one-on-ones, credit counseling and financial literacy counseling. Clients receive approximately twenty hours of attention from a counselor, with about eight hours of that training coming in a group setting. We walk them through the process contract to closing.”

The Center’s three counselors serve clients looking to make a purchase in the West Cook suburbs, and an innovative program in Bellwood, Maywood and Berwyn is helping homeowners while helping the community at the same time. The center works with non-profit developers in those communities to provide incomebased down payment assistant on homes developed by the non-profit groups.

Marz Timms, the Financial Literacy Director of the Center, worked with the Oak Park Regional Housing Center for eighteen years before joining the West Cook Homeownership Center a few years ago. As the area recovered from the real estate crisis of 2008, the Center has focused its efforts on first time home buyers and providing the education to get potential home buyers prepared to buy their first homes.

Timms leads financial literacy programs in the Oak Park elementary schools, setting the building blocks for a lifetime of financial literacy. “The kids learn about savings and wants versus needs. We want to start them on the right path.”

First-time buyer Abbie Diak was introduced to the Center through her employer, Loyola University, which facilitates an employer-assisted housing program through the West Cook Homeownership Center.

As a renter, Diak was looking to purchase a home but wasn’t sure if she would qualify. Through Loyola’s partner-

WILLIAM CAMARGO/Staff Photographer

Our dream team can help you find a new home. Call 708-771-5801 for an appointment. ship with the Center, she was able to receive pre-purchase counseling.

“Obviously, as a first-time home buyer, I hadn’t been through this before. I didn’t have all of the information I needed to buy my first home. The training was very helpful.”

Diak moved into her Westchester home in 2015 and credits the Center with getting her there. “Without this program, I don’t know if I would’ve been able to get my house.”

First time home buyer Lindida Rizzo first heard about the West Cook Homeownership Center when she was house hunting in Maywood. The prospective first-time buyer attended an informational session at the Oak Park Library, and later returned to the West Cook Homeownership Center for classes and follow-up.

Call for Acquisition Refinancing or Renovation GORDON HELLWIG p 708.660.7080 f 708.660.9604 gordonh@cbopf.com

1101 LAKE STREET • OAK PARK ILLINOIS 60301 • CBOPRF.COM

“I didn’t have a realtor at the time or know what to expect from the process. Everyone I worked with was very realistic and very helpful in pointing me in the right direction. At the group class, it was really helpful to hear the stories of everyone else. People were in various stages from the beginning of the process like me to closing. It was really helpful to hear from people ahead of me what to expect.”

Rizzo closed on her home in Maywood at the end of 2015, and says she and her husband believe the West Cook Homeownership Center was an important piece of the puzzle. “I was a first time home buyer, and I didn’t know what I was doing. It’s such a good feeling to own your own home. We were renting before, but now I feel like we have more freedom and independence. It’s your house, so you feel different.

You feel proud.”

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Reaching Out. Building Relationships.

West Side Bridge People coming together to bridge the gap between the West Side of Chicago and Western Suburbs.

West Side Bridge meets the 3rd Thursday of each month. The meeting is open to all local professionals. Join us for conversation and networking.

RSVP is required. Please contact Kristen Benford at kristen@oakpark.com.

Bring your business cards!

Sponsored by:

8 2016