CHICAGO (CBS) — After years of disinvestment, there are new and vital sources coming to the Auburn Gresham neighborhood.
They’re all housed in a single new Wholesome Life-style Hub at 839 W. 79th St., simply west of Halsted Road. We’ve been following the development of the building for many months, and on Friday, CBS 2’s Irika Sargent was there for the grand opening.
You might keep in mind in July, Sargent and CBS 2’s Joe Donlon had been on the identical constructing for a particular half-hour report in regards to the response to mass shootings on the town’s South and West sides. We selected the Wholesome Life-style Hub because the backdrop for that newscast as an indication of hope for the actual change that may be made on the group stage – when investments are made in our neighborhoods.
The constructing at 839 W. 79th St. was in-built 1925. It had been sitting vacant for the final 25 years.
The Greater Auburn Gresham Development Corporation set its sights on growing a venture that will serve the entire group – a constructing that will home medical and dental companies, a pharmacy, a café, a financial institution, and a lot extra.
On Friday, they celebrated that dream coming to life. Throughout the grand opening celebration from 4 p.m. to 7 p.m., residents walked by means of an open home to find out about all of the sources coming to the Auburn Gresham neighborhood. Greater than 600 friends had been anticipated in all.
Carlos Nelson, chief government officer of the Better Auburn Gresham Improvement Company, was the one who first had the thought for the Wholesome Life-style Hub.
“We have been engaged on this since actually 2016 as a imaginative and prescient to convey again to life this vacant 60,000 square-foot constructing that is simply sat ominously proper close to 79th and Halsted – the busiest bus line in the whole metropolis of Chicago,” Nelson stated.
The Chicago Bears had been a significant benefactor, donating greater than $600,000 for the venture.
“When the Chicago Bears heard about our work doing the Racial Fairness Speedy Response job pressure; doing COVID response work in Auburn Gresham, they wished to become involved with what we had been doing,” Nelson stated.
One of many missions with which the Bears signed on was to convey high-quality well being care. One other was to display methods to point out how meals can be utilized as drugs – within the type of a high-tech educating kitchen, Nelson stated.
The brand new hub will add over 150 jobs to the group, with the aim of constructing wealth for generations to return who stay within the space.
Some are calling it the Miracle on 79th Road.
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