MAYOR WANTS BLACK FORMER CHICAGOANS TO ‘COME BACK HOME’
Mayor Lori Lightfoot said Wednesday she has “great plans for reintroducing Chicago to the nation” midsummer and into the fall that includes a “reunion weekend” to encourage African Americans who have fled Chicago to “come back home.”
Lightfoot offered a sneak peek at her plans to rebuild a Chicago economy ravaged by the coronavirus pandemic while moderating a virtual panel she called “Cup of Joe,” featuring Chicago business and community leaders and activists discussing their hopes and dreams for the Biden administration.
Carlos Nelson, CEO of the Greater Auburn-Gresham Development Corporation, set the stage for Lightfoot’s preview when he talked about the need for “Black and Brown folks from our communities” to have a “lead role” in rebuilding their longneglected neighborhoods.
“I would implore you and implore the federal government that, as funds come into our community . . . that those funds go to leaders from our communities, economic development professionals from our communities, developers from our communities, so we can build our communities back for us, by us,” Nelson said.
Lightfoot said she “couldn’t agree more” about the need to build wealth and capacity in Black and Brown communities. It’s what her $750 million Invest South/West plan to rebuild 10 impoverished inner-city neighborhoods is all about.
“One of the things that we have planned going into the future is a reunion weekend. We’ve lost a lot of population over the last 10-plus years. People leaving Chicago, particularly Black Chicago, going to other places in the country — Atlanta, Dallas and even just moving to the suburbs because they didn’t feel like Chicago was welcoming and their home,” the mayor said.
“We’ve got to change that around and when we open back up, we’re gonna be heavily marketing to all areas of the country that we know the Chicago diaspora has gone to and saying, ‘Come back home. Give us another look. We are a different city. We want you to come back home.’”
Greg Schulson, chairman of the Illinois Restaurant Association and owner of Burrito Beach restaurant, said a restaurant industry forced to lay off more than 20% of its employees needs a bailout comparable to what airlines got recently and the financial industry received in 2008.
“Our almost singular focus right now is keeping people employed. Anything you can do to bring dollars into the restaurant industry, into the hospitality industry, tourism, the hotels to get people back to Chicago to then visit the restaurants — those are the things that . . . would really help . . . give more opportunities to people we employ,” Schulson said.
Among the other topics touched on during the panel was the need to give 8 million undocumented immigrants a path to citizenship, as Biden has proposed.