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Austin school poised to open renovated auditorium  | Articles | News | AustinWeeklyNews.com

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Austin school poised to open renovated auditorium  | Articles | News | AustinWeeklyNews.com

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Austin reclaims a sacred space | Articles | News | OakPark.com

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Austin reclaims a sacred space | Articles | News | OakPark.com

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Go back to the 1960s, and I do, Catholic girls in Oak Park and River Forest had two choices if their parents were determined to send them to a parochial high school, and mine did so choose.

One sister picked Siena High School at Washington and Central. The other went to Trinity in River Forest. Siena, no knock on either sister, I've got to live with these two, was seen as the more academically challenging. Trinity, in that moment, had a rep as more of a social/finishing school. My Trinity sister did not go the finishing school route, choosing instead to sign up with the convent straight out of high school. She'll have 50 years in next year. The Siena grad went on to college and then a career as a public school teacher.

A couple of weeks ago on the editorial page we wrote about what happened in the Austin neighborhood when racial change swept the West Side in the 1960s, into the early 1970s. Almost all the white people left in a rush. And many of the institutions that bound that neighborhood over the decades collapsed or decamped in short order.

Just 15 years after spending a reported $1 million on a striking glass-faced expansion of its building to house its peak in enrollment, Siena, with its 85 years of history, was gone, its building sold to the Chicago Public School system in 1973. Then CPS was gone within a year or two.

The Siena expansion included a 1,000-seat auditorium. I remember sitting twice in that auditorium trying to pick out my sister Mary from a seeming cast of thousands as they performed Oklahoma one year and Brigadoon the other.

I hadn't been in that space again until a couple of years ago. Not many people had. Over many decades and changing uses of the building, the auditorium wing of Siena had been mothballed, used for storage, a nesting place for birds.

But the trio of Austin born and focused nonprofits - Circle Urban Ministries, Catalyst Circle Rock School, and Rock of Our Salvation Church - which had melded into shared use of the venerable building had big plans for the space.

The past two years have been spent simplifying and clarifying the ownership of the property among the entities, stripping down the space while developing architectural plans for restoration and raising donations to launch the $4 million project.

Last Thursday morning was the groundbreaking as hundreds of Austin's leaders, parents, church members, Oak Park supporters and the grade school's Sistema Ravinia Orchestra - the largest African-American elementary school orchestra in the nation, I'm told - gathered in the about-to-be-reborn auditorium.

It was an uplift and affirmation to each person fortunate enough to have attended.

The orchestra is a wonder. Now here's a partnership. The Ravinia Festival has actively supported this school with 15 to 20 music teachers per week, $200,000 annually, for a decade. And these kids get better each time I hear them perform. There are the farmers from Kearney, Nebraska who have been coming every February for 35 years to continue to restore the building. Their early years were spent installing new plumbing after all the copper pipe was looted out of the basically abandoned building decades back. There were generous donors, the church pastor, the school principal.

And there was Lonni Kehrein, who with her late husband Glen, founded Circle Urban Ministries 45 years ago with a goal of fostering racial reconciliation in Austin. It was in 1995 that the two founded Circle Rock Prep School at Washington and Central. Nineteen kindergarten kids, 18 black and a white kid from Africa, she said. It has all grown, with rocks and tumbles in the path, from that start. The auditorium, it was announced that morning, will be named the Kehrein Center for the Arts.

The West Side is blessed and it is littered with fabulous sanctuaries of century-old churches. But it is a rare thing to find a glorious auditorium. And, promise the trio of non-profits, this auditorium is not just for them but for all of Austin. It is open for all manner of community-building events from concerts to graduations to speakers.

Ambitiously - and why not be ambitious? - the new arts center will be finished this year. Maybe the school's Christmas pageant on Dec. 6 will be the first performance on this stage since Brigadoon vanished into its Scottish mist. There are hints of a show-stopping, Broadway star-fused benefit concert early in 2019. And, yes, the Sistema Ravinia orchestra will perform.

Building a community takes time. Especially following the rupture of racial change that untethered Austin from its history a half-century back. But new and deep roots grow strong in this proud African-American neighborhood.

Contact:
Email: dhaley@wjinc.com Twitter: @OPEditor

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Go back to the 1960s, and I do, Catholic girls in Oak Park and River Forest had two choices if their parents were determined to send them to a parochial high school, and mine did so choose. One sister picked Siena High School at Washington and Central.

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New performing arts center coming to Austin - Story | WFLD

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New performing arts center coming to Austin - Story | WFLD

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Music and the arts may not come to mind when you think of Chicago's west side.

But in a neighborhood with a bad rep for crime, there's a new plan to change the focus, by building a performing arts center in Austin. The hope is to replace violence with violins.

"When people value their lives, they value their community. It reduces crime," said Saudia Davis.

Davis found potential hidden in a building at Washington and Central that's home to a church, ministry and a charter school called Catalyst Circle Rock. There's also a big unused auditorium.

Now, all three groups and more are celebrating getting to use it when it's transformed into the "Center for the Arts."

"This is a safe place, this is a place we can begin to have different programs for our kids in this community. Let me tell you, they've been waiting over 40 years for this to happen," said Pastor Robert L. Stevenson.

The auditorium hasn't been used since 1973. Now, the plan is to have 1000 seats for a variety of events.

"I don't know of anything else that serves as a performing arts school, a theater of performing arts for the community and a church on Sunday, so it's faith education and transformation. Can't ask for more on the west side," Davis said.

Catalyst's Sistema Ravinia Orchestra will use the space -- a major step up for what's now the largest African American elementary school orchestra in the country.

"It's just wonderful to have this opportunity for all of these children who would not have it if not for this center being here," said Congressman Danny Davis.

The "Center for the Arts" is expected to be finished late this year.

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New performing arts center coming to Austin

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Music and the arts may not come to mind when you think of Chicago's west side. But in a neighborhood with a bad rep for crime, there's a new plan to change the focus, by building a performing arts center in Austin. The hope is to replace violence with violins.

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On the Southwest Side, community rebuilds after mortgage crisis, rabbi writes | Chicago Sun-Times

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On the Southwest Side, community rebuilds after mortgage crisis, rabbi writes | Chicago Sun-Times

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The mortgage crisis of 2008 hit Chris and Keana Lindo sideways.

They were renting their home on the Southwest Side when their landlord went into foreclosure.

"My family and I moved in the neighborhood and immediately felt at home. The neighbors were welcoming, and I loved the school my children attended," Keana Lindo said.

Then, without warning, the Lindos were forced to move. Within days, the windows of their former home were boarded up with giant sheets of plywood.

The mortgage crisis disproportionately affected communities of color and struck the Southwest Side brutally.

Chicago Lawn saw so many foreclosures between 2011 and 2012 that a Google Map of foreclosures in that neighborhood looks like a sea of red. One big swath - from 59th to 63rd streets between California and Rockwell - had 93 properties left vacant or abandoned. A neighborhood struggling but surviving was being pushed over the brink.

Then, the Southwest Organizing Project - SWOP - stepped in after the community came together through conversations to save the neighborhood, according to lead organizer Jeff Bartow.

Even with strong anchor institutions like St. Rita parish, the Inner-City Muslim Action Network, Morrill Elementary and Fairfield Academy, community members realized they alone couldn't tackle 700-plus vacant and abandoned properties. So SWOP worked with United Power and Brinshore Development on that one especially troubled area.

Financing for the first phase of the project started with $3 million from the state. Soon after, then-Gov. Pat Quinn pledged another $4 million. These funds were leveraged with private capital to raise total funding for the project to $15 million.

The city got quite a return on investment for $900,000 - 80 vacant buildings transformed into affordable homes, safe streets and improving schools.

Here's hoping the city steps up with a big investment for the second phase.

What SWOP and its partners have been able to do is remarkable. There are now only 13 board-ups, and most of the homes have been refurbished. The care shown for the housing market has extended to the arenas of public safety and education.

A walk around the neighborhood - which I took four years ago and then again recently - offers evidence of a stable, working-class community with great pride. The target area now has everything anyone would want: affordable homes, safe streets, good schools.

Following the successes of the first phase, SWOP has its sights set on adding 70 blocks to the target area. Phase 2 calls for investing in more than 200 properties. Members are trying to raise another $10 million, to again leverage into even more funding until all 200 homes - and the neighborhood - are restored.

In this expanded area, the communities around Holy Cross Hospital, the Maria Kaupas Center, Catalyst Maria High School and McKay School will help lead the way.

If all of this seems like it's just dollars and buildings, make no mistake: SWOP is changing lives.

Forced after 2008 to leave the neighborhood, the Lindos decided to try to return. With the guidance of Neighborhood Housing Services of Chicago, they now are renting in their community and saving to be homeowners in a neighborhood taking charge of its own change.

Since moving back, the Lindo family has gotten more engaged with SWOP. Keana Lindo is a parent-mentor coordinator and works with young people at Morrill. She has gotten her associate's degree in business administration and soon will start school to become a social worker.

"SWOP has changed my life for the better," Keana Lindo said. "They are reclaiming the neighborhood for the people who live in the neighborhood, rebuilding hope and dreams in the community. They are also building leaders like myself. Reclaiming the Southwest Side has given this community life, the schools are succeeding, and the community is vibrant."

If the mortgage crisis hit the Lindo family sideways, they, together with their organized community, now plan a great course of success into the future.
Seth M. Limmer is senior rabbi of Chicago Sinai Congregation. Sun-Times CEO Edwin Eisendrath is a member of Limmer's congregation.

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On the Southwest Side, community rebuilds after mortgage crisis, rabbi writes

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The mortgage crisis of 2008 hit Chris and Keana Lindo sideways. They were renting their home on the Southwest Side when their landlord went into foreclosure. "My family and I moved in the neighborhood and immediately felt at home. The neighbors were welcoming, and I loved the school my children attended," Keana Lindo said.