Only a few blocks west of the Washington Park site of the proposed Olympic Stadium is the southern tip of what--until 2005--was the Robert Taylor Homes. Once the largest public housing development in the world, the Robert Taylor Homes stretched north and south for two miles, comprising more than 4,300 housing units. Currently, the former site is being redeveloped. Of the 2,550 planned units in the finished project, only 851 will be public housing replacement units.
According to Ben Joravsky of the Chicago Reader, the city's end goal for public housing redevelopment was about middle-class development, not improving housing for the city's poor:
The CHA's so-called Plan for Transformation opened up the South, North, and West Sides to gentrification and development. Of course, [Mayor Richard] Daley doesn't come right out and admit he got rid of the poor people. He goes along with the idea that the plan was about finding them adequate low-income housing.
Introduced in 1997, the "Plan for Transformation" is already six years behind schedule. Upon completion, it will have outsourced the majority of CHA units to the private market, allowing the CHA to shed responsibility for the built structures.
The reorganization is no small feat. Its immense scale led Jonathan Fanton of the John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur foundation to state, "It's probably the biggest project since the Chicago Fire."
Many residents have been given Housing Choice Vouchers (HCV) to find housing on the private market. However, the CHA does not track the whereabouts of these residents, so activists have only anecdotes to judge from.
"Communities on the city's South and West Sides, such as Roseland and Englewood, have been inundated with families displaced from the high-rises," wrote Chicago Tribune reporter Antonio Olivo. "Most now live in privately owned Section 8 homes, some as bad or worse than their old units."
Through the new criteria put forward under the city's plan, the CHA is, in effect, dumping two-thirds of its public housing stock. It has also put further constraints on residents moving back into their previous neighborhoods once they are redeveloped. Effectively, it has instituted a vetting process for residents, who are now required to work a minimum of 30 hours a week or attend school to be placed in housing.
http://socialistworker.org/2007-2/638/6 ... sing.shtml