CHICAGO (WBBM NEWSRADIO) -- Ground was broken this morning in the Little Italy neighborhood on the West Side for Chicago’s newest museum: the National Public Housing Museum.
The National Public Housing Museum will be built in the last remaining building of the Jane Addams Homes at 1322 West Taylor Street.
Mayor Lori Lightfoot said it will not just be about the tragedies and negative stereotypes of living in the projects.
“Magical things have happened in public housing here in Chicago and across our nation and it’s well past time that we capture, memorialize and celebrate those stories."
Co-founder of the museum and board chair Sunny Fisher grew up in public housing in the Bronx in New York City and said the museum will also raise issues of why affordable and decent housing is so critical.
Public housing resident Francine Washington predicts the museum will become a destination in the city.
The museum is scheduled to open next year.
The museum’s executive director, Lisa Lee, called today, “truly a groundbreaking day because the museum that we are building together is the nation’s first cultural institution in the United States dedicated to interpreting the American experience in public housing.”
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