LAC CONVENTION A HUGE SUCCESS!

Lee Hubbell, LAC President, calls Convention to order

                            Together, we accomplished much! 

LAC 10-YEAR ANNIVERSARY CONVENTION

We celebrated over 10 years of victories like: 

• Creating and preserving affordable housing at Marah’s, Ruth Shriman House, the Belray and Rienzi Plaza…in less that 10 years we have ensured that over 1000 low-income households have remained part of our community
• Reducing hate crimes in East Lakeview by over 50%;
• Creating a more just healthcare system through KidCare, Family Care and our work to end discriminatory pricing and predatory debt collections;
• And much more!

We Took Action for more:

• Raising awareness of the struggles of homeless youth in East Lakeview by challenging our Police and our own members to take action;
• Meeting our community’s local healthcare needs by securing a commitment from Advocate Illinois Masonic to work with us;
• Creating affordable housing in the 43^rd and 44^th Wards by creating local affordable housing set-aside policies

The audience cheers the speakers

Homeless Youth

We raised awareness of a long-ignored problem in our community of homeless youth and police harassment/abuse of them:

• Youth bravely shared their stories and spoke truth to power about their experiences as homeless youth
• We shared the story of one recent incident of police abuse and our work with the 23^rd District to address it

We challenged our allies and our members to take action:

• We recognized our strong and positive relationship with the 19^th and 23^rd District Police Commanders and won commitments from them to continue working with us to end police abuse/harassment of homeless youth
• We challenged the gathered community (our members) to do our part by further educating ourselves about this problem and taking action…and you have responded! So far 7 congregations have committed to holding youth education forums!
  
   
  Youth share their stories with the support of Night Ministry

 Healthcare

We made significant steps towards addressing local healthcare needs identified in LAC’s recent healthcare assessment:

• Secured a commitment from Advocate Illinois Masonic CEO Susan Nordstrom-Lopez to meet with us to discuss ways we can work together to meet our local community’s healthcare needs…a meeting is now being scheduled for late January.

 We raised awareness of new and broader healthcare issues:

• Raised awareness of worker issues at Advocate Illinois Masonic and their decision to seek to form a Union
• Secured a commitment from the leadership of the Service Employees International Union (SEIU), the union seeking to organize at Advocate, to sign on to a code of conduct agreement and to meet with LAC in the near future
• Won numerous commitments from our political allies. Most significantly, Cook County Commissioner Mike Quigley agreed to host City-wide and local hearings regarding non-profit hospitals’ use of tax dollars

Fred Buckley discusses the lack of accessible dental care as Barb Bolsen looks on

AFFORDABLE HOUSING

We made major strides towards the passage of a city-wide set-aside ordinance:

• Alderman Tom Tunney renewed his commitment to voting for this ordinance and we thanked him for his local leadership. Alderman Tunney agreed to include a local 44^th Ward set-aside policy in new developer materials that his office is creating
• We announced publicly for the first time that due to LAC’s work, Alderman Vi Daley has also initiated a 43^rd Ward policy to require affordable set-asides of all developments of 10+ units!

 Rienzi Plaza tenants updated us that their building is in the process of being sold to an unknown owner:

• We won commitments from Alderman Tunney and Commissioner Quigley to get us a meeting with that owner as soon as the transaction takes place. We won a commitment from the community to continue fighting for the long-term affordability for Rienzi Plaza and other buildings like it!

Nick Brunick talks about affordable housing 

 So, what do we do now? A call to action in the New Year!

Since the Convention, LAC task forces have been working hard to follow up on the success of our great convention. In the past month we have been busy following up with new leaders, developing strategies for the upcoming year and taking action! If you want to be part of bringing justice to your community and your city in 2005, then you need to do two things now in 2004…

 1.) Mark your calendars for the upcoming January 13 Community Council and the Public Life 101 (see details below)

 2.) Invite 2 or 3 others from your congregation/institution to attend with you (how about those who attended the Convention with you?)

 GET INVOLVED! POWER FADES IF IT IS NOT USED!

LAC Community Council

On the agenda:

• Updates on our issue work since the Convention
• Opportunities for Action around healthcare, housing and homeless youth
• BOARD ELECTIONS…come meet the new LAC Board!

Thursday, January 13 at 7 PM at Ruth Shriman House, 4040 N. Sheridan 

Public Life 101

A four part training on LAC and organizing

• This is a great series for new/interested folks or long-time leaders looking to polish their public life skills and meet new leaders!

Tuesdays, January 25, February 1, 8, 15 at 6:30 PM-location to be announced

 Homeless Youth Education Forums

If you are interested in learning more about homeless youth in East Lakeview and challenging your institution/congregation to do something about it, host a forum! We can help you adapt one that works for you.

32^nd and 43^rd ward residents ask Alderman Matlak and Daley to support housing set asides

If you live in the 32^nd or 43^rd wards, call LAC to find out how you can let your alderman know how important it is that they support affordable housing by signing on to the affordable housing set aside ordinance!

 Call Alyssa or Matt for further details about any of these events at 773-549-1947.