According to a report on NPR.org, the city of Chicago owns nearly 5,000 empty lots in the greater Englewood area on the South Side due to the foreclosure crisis that resulted in the demolition of many homes. Having limited success with affordable housing and urban garden efforts, the city is now offering lots in Englewood for $1 each, providing the applicant lives on the same block. Although the city is supposed to maintain them, they often become overgrown and mini garbage dumps, sometimes play areas for children and occasionally taken over by drug gangs. Older residents have passed away or moved, and many of the decent jobs have also left. Illinois University Urban Affairs Professor Phil Ashton says the Large Lot Program is a way to tap into an underutilized resource. “Existing homeowners are sometimes some of the best assets these neighborhoods have. They have a lot of energy, and they are fully invested in their neighborhoods,” he informs MHProNews.

Sonya Harper, 32, an employee of a nearby urban farm, has always lived on South Wood Street in Englewood. Now occupying her grandmother’s home, she and some neighbors want to repurpose the vacant lots. She says, “We want to be a block club. It turns from, ‘We care about gardening and food and nature and open space, and yet this is all brand new to us,’ to, ‘Hmm, what’s going on down the street?’ ‘Oh, look at that vacant lot over there, should we do something about that?’ ‘Oh, Ms. Thompson needs help cutting her grass.’” Mayor Rahm Emanuel, neighborhood leaders and corporate officials recently broke ground for a Whole Foods Market in Englewood. The city has already received 400 applications to purchase 500 vacant lots as part of a pilot program. HUD Code and modular homes could provide affordable housing in the neighborhood. ##

(Photo credit: David Schaper/NPRNews.org–Sonya Harper tending a community garden on a vacant lot in Chicago.)