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HighBeam Research
Title: Looking to the next generation //Children, newcomers hold key asneighborhood starts to gray Series:MAKING IT: The story of Chatham
Date:
May 1, 1986
Publication:
Chicago Sun-Times
Author:
WilliamBraden((PHOTO CAPTION CONTINUED)) people with hurt feelings who were notreceived very well when they moved here," says the Rev. Michael J. Nallen."You can have a suburban lifestyle and still live inside the city," boasts LeeNunery (center). Nunery and wife Carolyn, who grew up in Chatham, areraising 2-year-old David there. "It's a community of excellence," says LisetteA. Allison, 22. "It's proud. "You go away to get educated, but you comeback." After graduating from Bradley University, she returned as a reporterfor the local paper. "Some-body's always calling me to see if I want to sell myhouse," says Clemen-tine Skinner, 70. LEFT: A mass invasion of young blackand white professionals would be self-limiting, says sociologist William A.Sampson. RIGHT: "We might have to look at some smaller condo-typedevelopments here" to accommodate potential residents, says Ald. EugeneSawyer. Like many who grew up in Chatham and moved back as adults,Keith Tate wants to "put something back." The 37-year-old accountant isexecutive vice president of the community council. MAP; See roll microfilm.((CAPTION ENDS)) Three decades ago, upwardly mobile blacks broke out of the ghetto to settlein the South Side community of Chatham.Chatham became a focal point for the emergence of a black middle classthat currently represents half of Chicago's black population. It is a vibrantcommunity of excellence that is also a community in transition. This is the last of four articles on the people, the values and the future of Chatham.Keith Tate remembers when the whites fled Chatham."It was devastating for people such as myself," said Tate, a 37-year-oldaccountant. "At that time I was still growing up. And I had a bunch of whitefriends on my block. They used to come to my house every morning. And I'dgo to their houses. We'd eat breakfast together. We'd play together. And oneday, all of a sudden, they were all gone."
 
But whites may be coming back to Chatham, after three decades. Youngwhites have been scouting the community, looking for housing opportunities.And many blacks would like to see some of them move in, because thecommunity now sorely needs an infusion of new young people, whatevertheir color.Chatham today is in some ways a victim of its own success, of old age, andof racial integration."Most of our children who grew up here have been successful," said EddieRobinson, 67, a retired carpenter. "They have good jobs. So they move on,away from here. They move downtown. They move all over. I have adaughter in the West Indies, a son in Atlanta. And the sad thing is, the rest of us are growing old here now in Chatham." You can see that at meetings of the Chatham-Avalon Park CommunityCouncil, in which Robinson serves as an area vice president. Most of theofficers are senior citizens, gray of head and long in the tooth. And the blockclubs that make up the council have dwindled from more than 220 to maybehalf that number, many of them inactive.Infirm older folks are finding it harder to maintain their homes - to mow theirlawns, weed their gardens and keep up repairs.As their best and brightest move out, Chathamites also are disturbed by aninflux of newcomers who have been moving into rental apartments insurrounding areas and in Chatham itself (mainly in the areas north of 79thStreet and east of Martin Luther King Drive). Middle-class blacks historicallyhave been pursued in their migrations by poor blacks, and the patternappears to be repeating itself in Chatham."They're coming from the ghetto," said Jack Fisher, 69, a retired factoryworker. "From down in the slums. And they're not the type of people I'd liketo live with. They don't care about the neighborhood."A substantial number are on welfare, or in Section 8 subsidized housing.Chatham's homeowners are innately suspicious of renters, because rentershave less incentive to keep up their property. And Chatham's pioneersremember what happened in West Woodlawn, which once had a stablemiddle-class enclave, after the young moved out (many of them to Chatham)and the block clubs lost their vitality. Ald. Eugene Sawyer (6th) would like tosee Chatham's block clubs and community council reach out to involve thenew renters, and there is movement now in that direction.
 
Given the current demand for houses in Chatham, you might think theproblem of regeneration already is solving itself."Somebody's always calling me to see if I want to sell my house," saidClementine Skinner, a 70-year-old widow. "They have a list, I guess, and theycall all the seniors. I get at least three or four calls a week." That's typical. Available homes in fact seldom make it to the market andoften are snapped up by insiders who are tipped off by friends and relatives.But there is very little turnover at this point, and no guarantee that theexodus of young Chatham-ites will be balanced in the future by a significantinflux of other young people who will find Chatham an attractive area tosettle down and raise families. Seven Chatham teenagers who had gatheredto talk about their educational goals were asked where they planned to liveafter college. One girl said she might well come back to Chatham. Anothergirl said she would follow her job, probably to the suburbs. Two boys plan toshare a loft on the North Side. One boy opted for New York, another forCalifornia and still another for Louisiana.Against that, you'll find former children of Chatham who have returned tomake their homes in the community. Tate is one. Another is Carolyn Nunery,32, a human resources officer at the Northern Trust Co. Another is Lisette A.Allison, 22, who graduated from Bradley University and is now a reporter forthe Chatham-Southeast Citizen.All of them express a commitment to "put something back" in thecommunity that nurtured them. Tate serves as executive vice president of the community council. Nunery would like to open an upscale shop on one of Chatham's down-at-the-heels commercial avenues. Allison said:"I want to work in my own community and serve the black population here. Ilove it here and want to stay. It's a community of excellence. It's proud. Andmy roots are here. You go away to get educated, but you come back. A lot of kids will come back, eventually. They'll be the property owners, and they'llhave the same values their parents had."Selling points include a tradition of stability, excellent housing stock atmoderate prices and easy access to the Loop and other areas via the DanRyan Expy. and rapid transit."You can have a suburban lifestyle and still live inside the city," saidNunery's husband, Lee. "There's a sense of common values. And I could notconceivably see raising children in a place like Lincoln Park. People obviouslydo it. But out here, our son David can run in the backyard until he's green inthe face. And that's tremendous."
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