(WBBM NEWSRADIO) – Housing activists are calling on newly inaugurated Chicago Mayor Brandon Johnson to intervene in CHA plans to use more of their land to help private sports entities.
The Lugenia Burns Hope Center and other groups have long complained about the Chicago Housing Authority selling off some of its land for use by private business.
Outside City Hall on Thursday, Hope Center Executive Director Roderick Wilson said the latest affront is the move to sell land from the old Robert Taylor homes to XS Tennis to house tennis players and his employees.
With more than 1,200 people on CHA’s waiting list, the CHA is displacing poor people from land that is theirs, another activist said.
The advocates are asking to meet with Mayor Johnson. They also want a change in CHA leadership and a moratorium on any more such turnovers of public property.
The CHA responded Thursday by saying the plans for the former Robert Taylor site are consistent with the agency’s goals of helping to create residential developments with market rate and affordable housing units.
“It is our belief that this project will serve as a further catalyst for future development on the South end of the former Taylor footprint,” a spokesperson said.
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