'How can we benefit from it if we're not there anymore?': Obama Center neighbors still waiting for housing protection

 

Less than 3 miles from where former President Barack Obama and first lady Michelle Obama broke ground last week on their long-awaited presidential center on the South Side of Chicago, Tahiti Hamer lies awake at night thinking about the limited time she and her family have left in the neighborhood where she's lived her whole life.

Following the announcement of the center in 2015, neighborhoods adjacent to the 19-acre planned site have seen skyrocketing rents and housing prices, and Hamer, 42, a single mother of three, is one of several facing displacement.

Image yahoonews 

Hamer, a teacher at a local YMCA, said she’s tried to buy a home for the last two years, but it’s been out of reach in her neighborhood. She found a house she could afford 12 miles south. 

“I do not want to leave. I want to stay, but I’m barely keeping my head above water now,” she said. Hamer’s rent has gone up from $800 to $1,000, and she said her landlord has already told her there’s another $100 hike coming because the area is “coming back up."

Image yahoonews 

“It’s sad that the place that I’ve lived my whole life I can’t stay in anymore," she said. "And once I leave, it will be impossible to ever come back. It's the same story with so many people in this community."

Image: Tahiti Hamer and her children in front of their home in the South Shore neighborhood in Chicago.

Tahiti Hamer and her children in front of their home in the South Shore neighborhood in Chicago.Courtesy Tahiti Hamer

Despite the Obama Presidential Center being built for the benefit of historically underprivileged communities of color, housing experts say without timely and robust housing protections, it may become a catalyst for displacement, pushing out the residents it intended to help.

Source nbc

Article appeared on nbc  Read more