Businesses to Urge Governor to Support Funding for Regional Transit System
The p.m. rush hour at Union Station will be the backdrop on Monday, June 25,
for a news conference with business, university, and elected leaders calling on
Gov. Rod Blagojevich to support a funding fix that will keep public
transportation – and business – moving across Chicagoland.
Metropolitan Chicago is Illinois’ economic engine:
two-thirds
of
the
state’s
population
lives here, and two-thirds of total
state revenue is generated here. Without a strong, reliable public transportation
system, Chicagoland could easily be in the ranks of
Cleveland … or Detroit. Alarmed by what’s at
stake
for the
region
and state if Metra, Pace and the Chicago
Transit Authority (CTA) are forced to cut service and raise fares, the Metropolitan
Planning Council (MPC) will hold a news conference downtown at Union Station,
on the sidewalk between the Adams Street and Jackson Boulevard entrances, on Monday, June 25, at 3
p.m. Business leaders, university officials, and state legislators will call on
the governor to support funding for the entire regional transit
system.
The Illinois House Mass
Transit Committee has passed a bipartisan bill that would provide funding and reform
for the region’s transit agencies, but Gov. Blagojevich has threatened a veto due
to the measure’s sales tax increase. “By standing in the way of a regional
sales tax increase, which would provide adequate, sustainable funding for transit,
the governor will do more harm than good to the region’s working people
and businesses,” said MPC VP of External
Relations
Peter
Skosey.
For more information, contact MPC Communications
Associate Mandy Burrell, at 312-863-6018 or mburrell@metroplanning.org; or Skosey, at 312 .863.6004 or pskosey@metroplanning.org
.
Green Buildings Give Rise to Green Neighborhoods in Illinois
Whether motivated by personal finances (i.e. sky-high
gas prices) or global stewardship (i.e. An Inconvenient Truth
), more and more local leaders realize that careful
planning is key to being able to accommodate some 2 million new residents
expected in the Chicago area by 2030. Marking a shift away from costly,
energy-hungry development patterns, the Illinois General Assembly recently
became the first in the
U.S.
to pass legislation supporting
“green” neighborhoods that meet the strict standards of the LEED for
Neighborhood Development (LEED-ND) program.
At a July roundtable discussion, co-hosted by the
Campaign for Sensible Growth and Northwest Municipal Conference, and sponsored
by VOA Associates, panelists will discuss why the market wants more green
communities and what municipalities can do to get these projects done. They’ll
also discuss the new Green Neighborhood Award Act (SB 135), which will, if
appropriated, provide incentives for development projects in Illinois that are
consistent with LEED-ND standards of the U.S. Green Building Council
.
LEED-ND takes the highly successful LEED standards for sustainable buildings to
the next level by creating standards to achieve energy-efficient neighborhoods
through the core principles of sensible growth, such as promoting housing near
jobs, services and transit, and improving access to open
space.
The roundtable will take place Tuesday, July 17, 2007,
10 to 11:30 a.m., Oakton Community College, Conference Center Dining Room, 160
E. Golf Road , Des Plaines, Ill. Participants can register and pay online at
growingsensibly.org. Media may attend free of charge, but should register
through Mandy Burrell, at 312-863-6018 or mburrell@metroplanning.org
.
New Initiative in North and Northwest Suburbs Will Help Workers Afford Homes
When Maria Ortiz,
a switchboard operator for Pace Bus Co. in northwest suburban Arlington Heights,
began renting an apartment
in nearby
Mount Prospect, the
late President Ronald Reagan was in office. Twenty-two years – and three presidents
– later, Ortiz, a single, working mother, finally has a home of her own, thanks
to
Mt.
Prospect’s first-time homebuyer
program.
Ortiz, 46, makes less
than $40,000 a year, and represents the typical employee who has found great
job opportunities, but little to no affordable housing in the north and
northwest suburbs. While the standard conviction is that, if an employee saves her
money for long enough, then she eventually will be able to afford the downpayment on
a home, that’s just not the reality for Ortiz and many others. “I was even
saving money,” said Ortiz, of her two decades of renting. Yet it wasn’t until
she received a $10,000 forgivable loan
through
Mt.
Prospect ’s first-time homebuyer program that she
was able to afford a condominium
in Mount
Prospect.
Across the region, thousands of
employees, like Ortiz, are working hard but need help to become homeowners.
That’s why MPC teamed up with Charter One Bank, Housing Opportunity Development
Corporation, and 10 north and northwest suburban mayors to encourage more local
companies to invest in programs like employer-assisted housing to help their
workers afford homes. Through the Charter One Workforce Housing Initiative,
employers large and small in Arlington Heights, Buffalo Grove, Deerfield,
Highland Park
, Highwood,
Lake
Forest
,
Mt.
Prospect
, Northbrook, Palatine and
Rolling Meadows
are
discovering how they can benefit by investing in workforce housing solutions.
For information on the Charter One Workforce Housing Initiative, contact
Mandy Burrell
, at 312.863.6018 or
mburrell@metroplanning.org
.
Meet the MPC Staff: MPC’s Roberto Requejo Helps Bridge Divides in Public
Housing Arena
Before moving
to
the U.S. from
his
native Spain, Roberto Requejo, MPC
housing associate, had already earned a master’s degree in the on-the-ground
connection between urban development and political corruption and patronage. He could
have chosen to move to
any
U.S. city to study urban planning and initiate change, but he
chose
Chicago. Today, he is
instrumental in managing MPC’s role as both monitor and partner of the Chicago
Housing Authority Plan for Transformation.
Since 2003, Requejo has served as MPC’s housing
associate in charge of the Council’s Public Housing in the Public Interest Initiative
. In addition to partnering with the CHA, Requejo also
works closely with other housing authorities across the region and with the U.S.
Dept. of Housing and Urban Development; and brings together policymakers,
developers, service providers, community-based organizations, and researchers to
ensure low-income families in the region are able to enjoy quality homes in
areas with economic opportunity.
Requejo earned bachelor’s and master’s degrees in public
policy from the Universidade de Santiago de Compostela, and a master’s degree in
urban planning and policy from the University of Illinois at Chicago. Before
joining MPC, the Galicia, Spain, native worked for the American Planning
Association providing planning advice for municipalities all across the country;
and as a project manager for the Chicago Association of Neighborhood Development
Organizations. “Seeing things happen on the ground, and being able to go to
places such as Oakwood Shores and see the new homes and schools and know that I
had a part in making that happen” is what Requejo says he enjoys most about his
work here in Chicago. If you’re working on stories related to public housing,
contact Requejo at 312.863.6015 or rrequejo@metroplanning.org.