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Agency overview | |
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Formed | 1937 |
Jurisdiction | City of Chicago |
Headquarters | 60 E. Van Buren Street Chicago, Illinois, U.S. |
Annual budget | $976 million (2015) [1] [2] |
Agency executive |
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Website | thecha |
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Living spaces |
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The Chicago Housing Authority (CHA) is a municipal corporation that oversees public housing within the city of Chicago. The agency's Board of Commissioners is appointed by the city's mayor, and has a budget independent from that of the city of Chicago. CHA is the largest rental landlord in Chicago, with more than 50,000 households. CHA owns over 21,000 apartments (9,200 units reserved for seniors and over 11,400 units in family and other housing types). It also oversees the administration of 37,000 Section 8 vouchers. The current acting CEO of the Chicago Housing Authority is Tracey Scott.
The CHA was created in 1937 to own and operate housing built by the federal government's Public Works Administration. In addition to providing affordable housing for low-income families and combating blight, it also provided housing for industry workers during World War II and returning veterans after the war. By 1960, it was the largest landlord in Chicago. In 1965, a group of residents sued the CHA for racial discrimination. After the landmark court decision Gautreaux v. Chicago Housing Authority (see below), the CHA was placed in receivership, which would last for more than 20 years. Things continued to deteriorate for the agency and its residents, and by the 1980s, the high concentrations of poverty and neglected infrastructure were severe.
The Chicago Housing Authority Police Department was created in 1989 to provide dedicated policing for what had become one of the most impoverished and crime-ridden housing developments in the country, and was dissolved only ten years later. The situation was so dire that the entire CHA board of commissioners resigned in 1995, effectively handing over control of the agency to Housing and Urban Development. After an extensive overhaul, management of the CHA was returned to a new board of commissioners, including three residents appointed by resident groups, in 1999. The previously ordered receivership ended in 2010. [3] [4] [5] [6]
Name | Term | Appointed by | Cite |
---|---|---|---|
Elizabeth Wood | 1937 – 23 August 1954 | Edward Kelly | |
William B. Kean | 1 October 1954 [7] – 14 August 1957 | Edward Kelly | |
Alvin E. Rose [7] | 1 September 1957 – 26 November 1967 [8] | Richard J. Daley | |
Clement Humphrey [9] | 2 December 1967 – 1 July 1973 | Richard J. Daley | |
Harry J. Schneider [10] | 1 July 1973 – 1975 | Richard J. Daley | |
G. W. Master | August 1975 – April, 1976 (acting) [7] May 1976 – 1 October 1979 | Richard J. Daley | |
Charles R. Swibel [7] | 15 October 1979 – June 1981 | Jane Byrne | |
Andrew Mooney | June 1981 [7] – 26 July 1982 (acting) 1 August 1982 – 1 May 1983 | Jane Byrne | |
Zirl N. Smith | 30 May 1983 – 7 January 1987 [11] | Harold Washington | |
Brenda J. Gaines | 7 January 1987 – 6 May 1988 (acting) | Harold Washington | |
Vincent Lane [12] | 6 May 1988 [13] – 30 May 1995 | Eugene Sawyer | |
Joseph Shuldiner [14] | 30 May 1995 [15] – September 1995 (acting) 16 October 1995 [16] – 1 June 1999 | HUD | |
Terry Peterson | 1 June 1999 – 30 August 2006 [17] | Richard M. Daley | |
Sharon Gist-Gilliam | 31 August 2006 – 16 January 2008 (acting) | Richard M. Daley | |
Lewis Jordan [18] | 16 January 2008 – 30 June 2011 [19] | Richard M. Daley | |
Charles Woodyard | 24 October 2011 – 15 October 2013 [20] [21] | Rahm Emanuel | |
Michael Merchant | 16 October 2013 – 5 June 2015 | Rahm Emanuel | |
Eugene Jones | 8 June 2015 – 10 September 2019 (acting CEO 8 June 2015 — 6 February 2016) | Rahm Emanuel | [22] [23] [24] [25] |
James L. Bebley | 17 September 2019 – 30 March 2020 (acting) | — | [25] [26] |
Tracey Scott | 30 March 2020 – present | Lori Lightfoot | [27] [25] [28] |
In 2000, the CHA began its Plan For Transformation, which called for the demolition of all of its gallery high-rise buildings and proposed a renovated housing portfolio totaling 25,000 units. The Plan for Transformation has also been plagued with problems. While demolition began almost immediately, CHA was slow to develop mixed-income units or provide Section 8 vouchers as planned.
In April 2013, CHA created Plan Forward, the next phase of redeveloping public housing in Chicago. The plan includes the rehabilitation of other scattered-site, senior, and lower-density properties; construction of mixed-income housing; increasing economic sales around CHA developments; and providing educational and job training to residents with Section 8 vouchers. [3] [29]
In 2015, the Secretary of Housing and Urban Development criticized the Chicago Housing Authority for accumulating a cash reserve of $440 million at a time when more than a quarter million people were on the agency's waiting list for affordable housing, [30] and a large number of units (16%) remained vacant. [31] [32] [33] By March 2017, only 8% of the 17,000 demolished households had been replaced with mixed-income units. [34] Many lots remain vacant decades after demolition, and the CHA has been selling, leasing, or trading land in gentrifying neighborhoods to other government agencies and the private sector for less than market value. Land owned by the CHA has been used to build two Target stores, a private tennis complex, and government facilities at a time when over 30,000 people are awaiting housing assistance from the CHA. [35] One notable resident, Chicago alderwoman Jeanette Taylor, revealed that she applied for housing assistance as a single mother in 1993 and received an approval letter almost thirty years later in May 2022. [36] More than 20 years after the initial plan was announced, then-Chicago mayor Lori Lightfoot announced in June 2021 that finishing the redevelopment of Cabrini-Green alone will take at least another 12 years and could total upwards of $1 billion. [37]
From its beginning until the late-1950s, most families that lived in Chicago housing projects were Italian immigrants. By the mid-1970s, 65% of the agency's housing projects were made up of African Americans. In 1975, a study showed that traditional mother and father families in CHA housing projects were almost non-existent and 93% of the households were headed by single females. In 2010, the head of households demographics were 88% African American and 12% White. [38] The population of children in CHA decreased from 50% in 2000 to 35% by 2010. Today on average, a Chicago public housing development is made up of: 69% African-American, 27% Latino, and 4% White and Other. [39] [ clarification needed ]
In 1966, Dorothy Gautreaux and other CHA residents brought a suit against the CHA in Gautreaux v. Chicago Housing Authority. The suit charged racial discrimination by the housing authority for concentrating 10,000 public housing units in isolated Black neighborhoods. It claimed that the CHA and Housing and Urban Development (HUD) had violated the U.S. Constitution and the 1964 Civil Rights Act. It was a long-running case that in 1987 resulted in HUD taking over the CHA for over 20 years and the formation of the Gautreaux Project in which public housing families were relocated to the suburbs. The lawsuit was noted as the nation's first major public housing desegregation lawsuit. [40]
In May 2013, The Cabrini–Green Local Advisory Council and former residents of the Cabrini–Green Homes sued the housing authority for reneging on promises for the residents to return the neighborhood after redevelopment. The suit claimed that the housing authority at the time had only renovated a quarter of the remaining row-houses, making only a small percentage of them public housing. [41]
In September 2015, four residents sued the housing authority over utility allowances. Residents claimed the CHA overcharged them for rent and didn't credit them for utility costs. [42]
In June 2023, Several groups including the Chicago Housing Initiative and the Lugenia Burns Hope Center sued CHA of illegally planning to lease public housing land at the former ABLA Homes to Joe Mansueto, one of then-Chicago Mayor Lori Lightfoot's campaign donors to build a training complex for his professional soccer team Chicago Fire. [43] [44]
Name | Neighborhood | Constructed | Notes/status |
---|---|---|---|
Altgeld Gardens Homes | Riverdale (Far South Side) | 1944–46; 1954 | Named for Illinois politician John Peter Altgeld and Labor movement leader Philip Murray. 1,971 units of 2-story row houses; renovated. |
Bridgeport Homes | Bridgeport (Southwest Side) | 1943–44 | Named after its neighborhood location, consist of 115 units of 2-story row houses, renovated. |
Cabrini–Green Homes | Near North Side | 1942–45; 1957–62 | Named for Italian nun Frances Cabrini and William Green. Consisted of 3,607 units, William Homes and Cabrini Extensions (demolished; 1995–2011), Francis Cabrini row houses (150 of 586 renovated; 2009–11). |
Clarence Darrow Homes | Bronzeville (South Side) | 1961–62 | Named for American lawyer Clarence Darrow, consisted of 4 18-story buildings, demolished in late 1998. Replaced with Oakwood Shores, a mixed-income housing development. [45] |
Dearborn Homes | Bronzeville (South Side) | 1949–50 | Named for its location on Dearborn Street; consists of 12 buildings made up of mid-rise, 6 and 9-stories, totaling 668 units, renovated. |
Grace Abbott Homes | University Village (Near West Side) | 1952–55 | Named for social worker Grace Abbott, consisted of 7 15-story buildings and 33 2-story row houses, totaling 1,198 units. Demolished. |
Harold Ickes Homes | Bronzeville (South Side) | 1953–55 | Named for Illinois politician Harold L. Ickes; 11 9-story high-rise buildings, totaling 738 units; demolished. |
Harrison Courts | East Garfield Park (West Side) | 1958 | Named after its street location; consists of 4 7-story buildings; renovated. |
Ogden Courts | North Lawndale (West Side) | 1953 | Named after William B. Ogden; consisted of 2 7-story buildings; demolished. |
Henry Horner Homes | Near West Side | 1955–57; 1959–61 | Named for Illinois governor Henry Horner, consisted of 16 high-rise buildings, 2 15-story buildings, 8 7-story buildings, 4 14-story and 2 8-story buildings, totaling 1,655 units; demolished. Replaced with West Haven, a mixed-income housing development. |
Ida B. Wells Homes | Bronzeville (South Side) | 1939–41 | Named for African-American journalist Ida B. Wells, consisted of 1,662 units (800 row houses and 862 mid-rise apartments); demolished. Replaced with Oakwood Shores, a mixed-income housing development. [45] |
Jane Addams Homes | University Village (Near West Side) | 1938–39 | Named for social worker Jane Addams, consisted of 32 buildings of 2, 3, and 4 stories, totaling 987 units; demolished. Replaced with townhouses and condominiums under the name Roosevelt Square. |
Julia C. Lathrop Homes | North Center (North Side) | 1937–38 | Named for social reformer Julia Lathrop, consists of 925 units made up of 2-story row houses, mid-rise buildings; renovated. |
Lake Parc Place/ | Oakland (South Side) | 1962–63 | Named after its location, consisted of 6 buildings; Lake Michigan high-rises (also known as Lakefront Homes; 4 16-story buildings; vacated in 1985 and demolished by implosion on 12/12/1998) [47] [48] and Lake Parc Place (2 15-story buildings; renovated) |
Lawndale Gardens | Little Village (Southwest Side) | April–December 1942 | Named for its street location, consists of 123 units of 2-story row houses, renovated. |
LeClaire Courts | Archer Heights (Southwest Side) | 1949–50; 1953–54 [49] | Consisted of 314 units of 2-story row houses; [50] demolished. |
Loomis Courts | University Village (Near West Side) | 1951 | Named for its street location, consists of 2 7-story buildings, totaling 126 units. |
Lowden Homes | Princeton Park (South Side) | 1951–52 | Named for Illinois governor Frank Lowden, consist of 127 units of 2-story row houses; renovated. |
Madden Park Homes | Bronzeville (South Side) | 1968–69; 1970 | Consisted of 6 buildings (9 and 3 stories), totaling 279 units; demolished. Replaced with Oakwood Shores, a mixed-income housing development. [45] |
Prairie Courts | South Commons (South Side) | 1950–52 | Consisted of 5 7- and 14-story buildings, 230 units made up of row houses, totaling 877 units; demolished. Replaced with new development which was constructed between 2000–2002. |
Racine Courts | Washington Heights (Far South Side) | 1953 | Named for its street location, Consisted of 122 units made up of 2-story row-houses. [51] Demolished. |
Raymond Hilliard Homes | Near South Side | 1964–66 | Consists of 3 buildings, 22-story building; 16-story building and 11-story building, totaling 1,077 units. Renovated in phases, Phase I: 2003–04; Phase II: 2006–07. |
Robert Brooks Homes/ | University Village (Near West Side) | 1942–43; 1960–61 | Consist of 835 row-houses (Reconstructed in phases: Phase I: 1997–99, Phase II: 2000), 3 16-story buildings (450 units; demolished between 1998–2001). |
Robert Taylor Homes | Bronzeville (South Side) | 1960–62 | Named for the first African American chairman of the Chicago Housing Authority Robert Rochon Taylor, consisted of 28 16–story high rises, totaling 4, 415 units; demolished between 1998–2007. Replaced with Legends South, a mixed-income housing development. [52] |
Rockwell Gardens | East Garfield Park (West Side) | 1958–60 | Named for its street location; consisted of 1,126 units made up of 11 buildings (16- and 14-story); demolished between 2003–2007. Replaced with West End, a mixed-income housing development. |
Stateway Gardens | Bronzeville (South Side) | 1955–58 | Named for its location along State Street, consisted of 8 buildings (13–17 stories); demolished between 1996–2007, replaced with Park Boulevard, a mixed-income housing development. |
Trumbull Park Homes | South Deering (Far South Side) | 1938–39 | Consists of 434 units made up of 2-story row houses and 3-story buildings; renovated. |
Wentworth Gardens | Armour Square (South Side) | 1944–45 | Named for its street location and the major league baseball team that used to play at its baseball field. Stretching from 39th & Wentworth to 37th and Wells. Consists of a 4 block area of 2-story row-houses, 3 mid-rise buildings; renovated. |
Washington Park Homes | Bronzeville (South Side) | 1962–64 | Named for nearby Chicago Park District park and neighborhood, consisted of 5 17-story buildings located between 45th and 44th Streets, Cottage Grove Avenue and Evans Street; demolished between 1999 and mid-2002. |
In addition to the traditional housing projects, CHA has 51 senior housing developments, [53] 61 scattered site housing [54] and 15 mixed-income housing developments. [55]
Cabrini–Green Homes was a Chicago Housing Authority (CHA) public housing project on the Near North Side of Chicago, Illinois. The Frances Cabrini Rowhouses and Extensions were south of Division Street, bordered by Larrabee Street to the west, Orleans Street to the east and Chicago Avenue to the south, with the William Green Homes to the northwest.
Robert Taylor Homes was a public housing project in the Bronzeville neighborhood on the South Side of Chicago, Illinois from 1962 to 2007. The largest housing project in the United States, it consisted of 28 virtually identical high-rises, set out in a linear plan for two miles, with the high-rises regularly configured in a horseshoe shape of three in each block. It was located along State Street between Pershing Road and 54th Street, east of the Dan Ryan Expressway. The project was named for Robert Rochon Taylor (1899–1957), an African-American activist and the first African American chairman of the Chicago Housing Authority (CHA). It was a part of the State Street Corridor which included other CHA housing projects: Stateway Gardens, Dearborn Homes, Harold Ickes Homes, and Hilliard Homes.
The Anti-Cruelty Society is an animal welfare organization and animal shelter in the River North neighborhood of Chicago, Illinois. The Anti-Cruelty Society is a private, not-for-profit humane society that does not receive government assistance. It is one of the largest such organizations in the United States. The organization offers adoption, veterinarian, and training services.
Stateway Gardens was a Chicago Housing Authority (CHA) public housing project located in the Bronzeville neighborhood on the South Side of Chicago, Illinois.
The Chicago Housing Authority Police Department (also known as the CHAPD) was created as a supplement to the Chicago Police Department (CPD), to provide dedicated police services to the residents of one of the nation's most impoverished and crime ridden developments for low-income housing. The CHAPD accomplished their daily goals by utilizing "community oriented policing techniques and aggressive vertical patrol" of all Chicago Housing Authority public housing projects throughout the inner city of Chicago, Illinois and some suburban areas.
James "Jim" R. Martin is an American writer, independent producer, director, and documentary filmmaker. He is best known for his PBS feature-length documentary Wrapped In Steel, broadcast nationally in 1984–85, and PBS documentary Fired-Up Public Housing is my Home broadcast nationally in 1988–89. Both Wrapped In Steel and Fired-Up were nominated for Emmy. Fired-Up won an Emmy for Best Independent Network Documentary, Chicago. Author, Create Documentary Films, Videos, And Multimedia: a comprehensive guide to using documentary storytelling techniques for film, video, Internet and digital media projects. ISBN 978-0-9827023-0-7, Actuality Interviewing and Listening 2017 ISBN 978-0-9827023-6-9, Documentary Directing and Storytelling 2018 ISBN 978-1-7216794-6-1, Listen Learn Share 2018 ISBN 978-0-9827023-8-3.
The Gautreaux Project is a US housing-desegregation project initiated by court order. It is notable both for being one of the only social programs based in a randomized experiment, and the only anti-poverty housing program endorsed by the Reagan, Bush, and Clinton administrations.
Henry Horner Homes was a Chicago Housing Authority (CHA) public housing project located in the Near West Side community area on the West Side of Chicago, Illinois, United States. The original section of Henry Horner Homes was bordered by Oakley Boulevard to the west, Washington Boulevard to the south, Hermitage Avenue to the east, and Lake Street to the north near the United Center. A discontiguous section named Horner Annex was bordered by Honore Street to the west, Adams Street to the south, Wood Street to the east, and Monroe Street to the north. Constructed between 1957 and 1963, The housing project was named in honor of former Illinois governor Henry Horner.
The Marshall Field Garden Apartments is a large non-governmental subsidized housing project in the Old Town neighborhood of Chicago, Illinois. The project occupies two square city blocks and was the largest moderate-income housing development in the U.S. at the time of construction in 1929. Marshall Field Garden Apartments has 628 units within 10 buildings. Polo G lived in the project in his youth.
Blueprint for Disaster: The Unraveling of Chicago Public Housing is a history of the public housing program in Chicago.
Near North Career Metropolitan High School was a public 4–year magnet high school located in the Old Town neighborhood on the Near North Side of Chicago, Illinois, United States. Operated by the Chicago Public Schools district, Near North opened in September 1979.
The Ida B. Wells Homes, which also comprised the Clarence Darrow Homes and Madden Park Homes, was a Chicago Housing Authority (CHA) public housing project located in the heart of the Bronzeville neighborhood on the South Side of Chicago, Illinois. It was bordered by 35th Street to the north, Pershing Road to the south, Cottage Grove Avenue to the east, and Martin Luther King Drive to the west. The Ida B. Wells Homes consisted of rowhouses, mid-rises, and high-rise apartment buildings, first constructed 1939 to 1941 to house African American tenants. They were closed and demolished beginning in 2002 and ending in 2011.
Harold L. Ickes Homes was a Chicago Housing Authority (CHA) public housing project on the Near South Side of Chicago, Illinois, United States. It was bordered between Cermak Road to the north, 24th Place to the south, State Street to the east, and Federal Street to the west, making it part of the State Street Corridor that included other CHA properties: Robert Taylor Homes, Dearborn Homes, Stateway Gardens and Hilliard Homes.
Eddie T. Johnson is an American retired police officer for the Chicago Police Department. He served as the 62nd Superintendent of the Chicago Police Department from March 2016 until December 2019.
The Lake Michigan High-Rises, also known as Lakefront Homes, was a Chicago Housing Authority (CHA) public housing project in the North Kenwood–Oakland neighborhood located in the South Side of Chicago, Illinois, United States. Constructed in 1962 and completed in 1963, The Lake Michigan High-Rises originally consisted of four 16–story buildings; totaling 457 units. The Lake Michigan High-Rises was located west of Lake Shore Drive and was included as a part of the CHA Lakefront Properties. Today, only two buildings of the Lakefront Properties exist; they were officially renamed from Victor Olander Homes to Lake Parc Place in 1991. The other four high–rises were demolished by implosion in December 1998, it was the first and only to date in Chicago Housing Authority history.
Lori Elaine Lightfoot is an American politician and attorney who was the 56th mayor of Chicago from 2019 until 2023. She is a member of the Democratic Party. Before becoming mayor, Lightfoot worked in private legal practice as a partner at Mayer Brown and held various government positions in Chicago. She served as president of the Chicago Police Board and chair of the Chicago Police Accountability Task Force. In 2019, Lightfoot defeated Toni Preckwinkle in a runoff election for Chicago mayor. She ran again in 2023 but failed to qualify for the runoff, becoming the city's first incumbent mayor to not be reelected since Jane Byrne in 1983.
The 2019 Chicago Public Schools strike was a labor dispute between Chicago Public Schools and the Chicago Teachers Union and the Service Employees International Union Local 73 that lasted 14 days. The strike began on October 17, 2019, when both unions failed to reach a contract agreement with Chicago Public Schools over compensation, benefits, staffing, wrap-around services such as counselors, nurses, and librarians, and caps on class sizes. On October 31, the strike officially ended when the mayor and the Chicago Teachers Union reached a tentative agreement allowing students to go back to class on November 1, 2019. The agreement included millions of dollars dedicated to reducing class sizes, hundreds more social workers, nurses and librarians, and a 16 percent salary increase over the coming five years, but did not achieve all the main goals of the unions.
Wentworth Gardens is a low rise 344-unit housing project operated by the Chicago Housing Authority (CHA). It lies just south of Guaranteed Rate Field in Bronzeville on Chicago's south side.
World Business Chicago (WBC) is the official economic development organization for the City of Chicago. WBC is a public-private partnership and a 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization supported by funding from the City of Chicago, philanthropies, and the business community. In 2019, WBC reported $8.9 million in revenue. The stated mission of the organization is "to drive inclusive economic growth and job creation, support business, and promote Chicago as a leading global city."
The Chicago Casino Proposals is a request for proposals made to the City of Chicago, for the first permanent casino within city limits. There were 5 original proposals. After vetoing 2, there were 3 remaining after the first round of selections. This included the Bally's Tribune site, the Hard Rock International One Chicago site, and the Rush Street Gaming 78 neighborhood site. On May 5, 2022, Mayor Lori Lightfoot announced that the Bally's Tribune site was the choice as the location for a city casino.
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