Coffee shops, restaurants, art centers, and theaters on the South and West sides received grants totaling to $25 million on Monday. The money, from the city’s Neighborhood Opportunity Fund, aims to help small businesses grow.
The grants, given out in $250,000 increments or more, are used by landlords and business owners for everything from bringing in local artwork in restaurants to adding outdoor space at a care and expanding an urban farm. The list of recipients for this round span 25 community areas and 70 percent are people of color.
In Little Village, Catedral Cafe wants to build out a new kitchen and rooftop patio for a new vegan restaurant across the street from their existing location. A few blocks away, a landlord will rehab space for a new brewpub Cerveza Fiesta which will also host beer brewing classes. Over in Lawndale, Duwell Fish Company, a 50-year-old family business, will renovate a parking lot for a farmers market. In Englewood, Kusanya Café plans to build out space for a yoga and wellness classes.
The purpose of the program is to encourage activity along commercial corridors in neighborhoods that haven’t seen a lot of private or public investment. It was launched in 2016 when Mayor Rahm Emanuel amended the zoning code so that downtown growth would finance new construction or rehabs on Chicago’s south and west side corridors.
This last and final round of grants, given out in amounts of $250,000 or more, brings the total impact of the program up to $47 million spread across 200 businesses.
At an awards ceremony, Mayor Emanuel made a point that investments are only half of the equation. “When people say they want to have a coffee shop in my neighborhood—there are about 30 new coffee shops on the South Side. Visit them and go there,” he said. “This doesn’t work if you don’t shop in the neighborhood or go to that restaurant.”
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