Garfield Park Conservatory

Garfield Park Conservatory Alliance facilitates LISC Program

Do you love helping to make things grow? Are you excited about the possibility of rolling up your sleeves and helping to design and build the kind of community that you’d be proud to call home — where both plants and people grow together?

The Garfield Park Conservatory Alliance is facilitating the New Communities Program which is generously supported by the Local Initiative Support Corporation (lLISC/Chicago), and provides opportunities for residents, businesses, city agencies, community based organizations and institutions, and other interested stakeholders to participate in the development of a plan to improve the “quality of life” for East Garfield Park.

Since April 2004, the NCP Task Force, a core of about 50 East Garfield Park community stakeholders, have met periodically in special interest working groups to focus on researching, identifying prioritizing and addressing issues of mutual concern to community stakeholders. To date over 200 interested community stakeholders have participated in the quality of life planning process. Through the visioning process, organizing efforts and both formal and informal opportunities for public engagement, community members have identified quality of life issues around:

1.	Land Use (planning for the type and degree of development of the vast numbers of vacant lots in East Garfield Park, and developing appropriate community greening initiatives and opportunities)

2.	Housing (addressing special target populations including the elderly, market rate vs. low to moderate income and affordable housing, the influx of condo owners, previous public housing residents, and ex-offender populations).

3.	Business, Commercial, and Workforce Development (revitalization of community businesses and improving relationships with area residents, entrepreneurship and barriers to quality jobs and business ownership).

4.	Education (school closings, academic performances, and potential for excellence for area students, adult literacy).

5.	Cultural Arts (capitalizing upon community assets and resources to spur economic growth, revitalization and sustainability).

6.	Community Health (physical, mental and emotional health and well-being; access to transportation, community safety and violence prevention; re-neighboring and the issues surrounding “gentrification”).

7.	Youth Focus (recreational opportunities, career alternatives, leadership development, job readiness and civic engagement).
Read more about the current projects and successes of the New Communities Program in East Garfield by visiting the New Communities Program website.