Sen. Al Gore said the rest of the country should use Chicago`s South Shore neighborhood as a blueprint on how to turn abandoned buildings into safe, affordable housing.
”We need to learn from the success stories like this,” the Democratic vice presidential nominee said during a campaign stop Thursday while visiting an abandoned South Shore building being converted into three-bedroom apartments.
What makes the plan work, community developers told Gore, is South Shore Bank`s commitment to lend to smaller, neighborhood developers that many banks would consider high risks.
That commitment, developers said, has spurred creation of the Neighborhood Institute in South Shore, a non-profit developer that drew on neighborhood contractors and several funding sources to renovate the abandoned building on the 6900 block of South Clyde Avenue.
”The Clinton-Gore campaign has an extensive agenda for community development banks throughout the United States,” Gore said. ”You are showing here that it can be a major success.”
Gore said the Bush administration ”responds to the privileged few, the wealthy, the powerful,” and overlooks the power of neighborhood developers.
Dorris Pickens, president of the Neighborhood Institute, told Gore that the abandoned building ”represents the deterioration that occurs in too many urban areas around the country.”
When renovated, apartments will rent for about $500 a month, she said.
