Lathrop Homes has a new playground due to the construction of the Damen Avenue Bridge. The Chicago Department of Transportation, along with Walsh Construction, hired Lathrop residents to help with the project.

A dedication ceremony will be happening soon. Look for further details on the Lathrop Homes improvement in the next issue of RJ.

Thanks to Avery Patillo for your help with the Jimmy Thomas Nature Trail. Also, special thanks to all of our young people who have been coming out on Saturday. Keep up the good work!

Congratulations Arlando Adamson, a Robert Taylor Homes resident-owned-business owner, for getting the contract to finish the Jimmy Thomas Trail. Read more »

Three score equals 60. How that adds to years of wear and tear makes one feel very old. But age is something to be proud of, especially when you have outlived old friends and have made new friends. Sixty shows integrity.

I’m not talking about myself, thank you. I’m talking about the Lathrop Homes development and the Chicago Housing Authority, which both turned 60 years old this year.

Most reporters and writers who would do a chronological (let’s count the years) story and would find this as an opportunity to teach you a history lesson. Not this writer! I can easily lead you on a ‘follow the yellow-brick road’ trip through the entire history of CHA’s 60 years while doing a piece on the 60 years of Lathrop Homes. I can, as well, say that knowing your past can help one make good plans for the future.

But sometimes the lessons of the past don’t provide answers to issues of the day. Most of the time, we have to learn from our own mistakes. Read more »

It’s a great Saturday morning before Mothers Day. The weather’s been awful for spring and in housing, cabin fever can run rabid. Let’s go outside, shed our winter-thickened skin and maybe get some cleaning done. This is the time of the year when a neighborhood puts on the shine.

Certainly that’s what Lathrop residents thought as we came together for cleaning and greening our area on this year’s Clean-Up Day. With all this cleaning, one has to consider there will be trash and there will be recycling. Well, it couldn’t be a better day for the recycling program – known as the Buy Back initiative – held every Saturday at Lathrop. And what would be a greater jewel in this crown but to have Bill Abolt, assistant commissioner of the City of Chicago Department of Environment, come to Lathrop on such a busy-body of a day. Bill rode his bike over to Lathrop with his young daughter in her harness and had the chance to walk the very grounds that birthed the Buy-Back Recycling Program that’s being implemented throughout public housing neighborhoods. Read more »