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Greater Southwest Development Corporation(GSDC) is a nonprofit community development corporation that actively contributes to residential, commercial, and industrial revitalization efforts in Southwest Chicago.
Established in 1974, GSDC provides resources, education, technical assistance, and financial support that positions neighborhoods to compete for investment and maintain a mixed-income economy. By working to combat disinvestment and reverse decline, GSDC helps ensure that the southwest side of Chicago will continue to grow as a neighborhood of choice in which to live and work.
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Since 2003, GSDC has been the lead organization in the New Communities Program (NCP) for the Chicago Lawn neighborhood. NCP is an ambitious ten-year effort that works to rejuvenate communities and to promote new connections within each neighborhood by supporting comprehensive community organizing and planning. The John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation and LISC/Chicago have committed $50 million to the NCP, with a host of other funders committing additional funds.
NCP staff brought community leaders together, and in a series of meetings, they created a vision for the future of Chicago Lawn and established eight strategy areas on which to focus the efforts of the community in order to change the existing Chicago Lawn into the vision of the future.
Click here for the 8 NCP strategy areas and more info...
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NCP in Action
Following the drafting of Chicago Lawn's NCP Quality of Life Plan, the work of implementing the plan through creative programming began. Among the programs initiated, one of the most successful has been the Parents-as-Mentors program, run by GSDC's NCP partner, the Southwest Organizing Project (SWOP), in cooperation with local school officials, teachers, and community members. Through the program, parents are hired to work as teachers' assistants in their children's schools while also undergoing leadership training in weekly meetings with SWOP organizer Stephanie Garza.
(For the full story, click here.) GSDC recently highlighted Parents-as-Mentors in an audio slide show that can be viewed here. |
Neighborhood & Community News
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