Chicago Tonight: Whole Foods Brings Economic Development, Lower Prices to Englewood

Cross-posted from The Sixth Ward

Chicago Tonight did a story about the new Whole Foods Market Englewood that opened on Wednesday. Since this development was announced in 2013, there were plans to keep prices down at this store. It appears that they've kept their promise:

“Definitely there are lower prices here and some very reasonable prices. For an example, whole milk is $1.99 a gallon here, and it’s roughly $4 a gallon in our other locations,” said Michael Bashaw, regional president of Whole Foods. “I think you can go all through the store and look at commodity, day-to-day items that you need to feed your family, and you’ll find those good values.

“We are passing on the benefit of being here in Englewood … the rents are cheaper here, and so our operating costs are lower and that allowed us to have lower retails.”

The dreaded "G" word has come up in this excitement and it appears from this quote from Andrea Natay of RAGE that it's not a concern, “Whole Foods coming into the community does not equal gentrification. Whole Foods coming into the community equals great change. A great, positive change, at that.”

Also consider the fact that 63rd & Halsted had once been an important commercial hub as stated on Chicago Tonight which went into decline during the 1960s and 1970s. We see a fall and now a rebirth.

Speaking of that, it's funny how before 2013 another member of RAGE - in fact the founder - was on WCIU calling for a Whole Foods in Englewood and then guess what it happens. If only I could find that video and preserve it as it had been posted here but is no longer available online. A self-fulfilling prophecy?

Disclaimer: One of the bloggers at The Sixth Ward is a Whole Foods Market team member.

Donzell Starks RIP

On Monday, we've learned that Donzell Starks - with his wife Alisa Starks one of the owners  ICE Theaters - he died due to pancreatic cancer according to a fb status shared on Concerned Citizens of Chatham .

Also in that same status Alisa was referred to as his ex-wife, unsure if that could be verified independently of social media.

One of the main stories we covered during the past four years revolves around the ownership of the Chatham 14 changing hands. With a business dispute causing ICE Theaters to be evicted from the Chatham with operations taken by new ownership. Currently, the Chatham is owned by the Texas based company Studio Movie Grill.

In 1997 ICE Theaters built and opened theaters in the Chatham, Englewood, and Lawndale bring movie theaters back into inner city neighborhoods. He without a doubt leaves behind a significant legacy that hopefully other entrepreneurs in our communities will also do something as groundbreaking.

Condolences to the Starks family.

EDITED 10/4/2016 8:45 PM- Another post via Concerned Citizens of Chatham shows information on memorial services.

VIDEO: Whole Foods Englewood and Starbucks Grand Opening

Cross-posted at The Sixth Ward

[VIDEO] JP Paulus was at the grand opening of the new Whole Foods Market Englewood on Wednesday morning. Hopefully he'll be ready to share his thoughts on this historic and exciting occasion at the intersection of 63rd & Halsted.

There are a few shots shared on ig regarding the grand opening provided by this blogger. Unfortunately I didn't get there in time for the grand opening and arrived just as the rain got heavier.

In the meanwhile, artistmac was there to shoot 33 minutes of video of the grand opening. He did this previous with the opening of Walmart stores in West Chatham and Pullman also. He was also there for the ground breaking at Englewood Square which took place in 2014.

Anyone else visited the store on the first day? How was your experience on the first day? Will the Englewood shop be your store in the future?

DISCLOSURE: One of the bloggers here at The Sixth Ward is a Whole Foods Market team member.

More media on the Pullman Whole Foods distribution center #teamwholefoods

Cross-posted via The Sixth Ward

ABC 7 did a story on this Thursday

And then they noted an information session for those interested in a job at the coming Whole Foods Englewood store expected to open this fall. That event should've been held Thursday night at Kennedy King College (@ 740 West 63rd Street).

The Tribune was there at a presser at the site located near 720 E. 111th Street. If you want to forgo reading that article there's a video there you can watch. It shows comments made by Michael Bashaw the Midwest region President of Whole Foods flanked by Mayor Rahm Emanuel & 9th ward Alderman Anthony Beale.

Whole Foods Market distribution facility coming to Pullman

The map above were you see that red marker, a Whole Foods Market distribution center is expected to be built there.

Whole Foods plans to build a distribution facility in the Pullman neighborhood on the South Side that would employ 150 people.

The 140,000-square-foot facility will be at 720 E. 111th St., according to the city of Chicago. The site is currently vacant.

The center, to open in early 2018, will replace an existing Munster, Ind., facility and will serve up to 70 Whole Foods stores in the Midwest and Canada, according to the city.

The city "will consider approximately $7.4 million in tax-increment financing assistance" for the project, according to a statement. The subsidy is being considered "to ensure the site was competitive with the existing facility in Indiana," the statement said.

The Whole Foods distribution center will be built on a 17-acre site owned by a venture of Chicago Neighborhood Initiatives, a unit of Minneapolis-based U.S. Bank, CNI President David Doig said in an email. Doig's real estate company will prepare the site for an industrial developer, which will build the distribution center and then lease it to Whole Foods.

The facility will be able to handle cold and dry storage and will have office space, CNI said.

More on the future site of the facility and adjacent properties:

The former Ryerson property also includes a Method soap factory that opened about a year ago and includes a Gotham Greens farm on its roof.

Doig's CNI also developed a new shopping center on the site anchored by a Wal-Mart big box store, and more retailers plan to open stores there. The neighborhood also received a boost about a year ago, when President Barack Obama designated the area a national monument, citing its manufacturing and labor history.

You may have seen this vid below on CBS 2 this morning, BTW

Konkol: Roseland's Only Steak House Survives Tough Times Down At 'The Ranch'

Yolanda Pierce at right and two of her workers - Photo by Mark Konkol

All the times I passed this place on Michigan Ave and never been inside. It seems to be one of the few consistent businesses on this stretch. It survived a long time and apparently still does although times and demographics have changed since this business opened in 1969.

On a morning stroll, I hiked west from Pullman and under the 113th Street viaduct that leads to the wrong side of the tracks.

I walked past Palmer Park, where the faint scent of marijuana hung in the cool, humid air, and headed up the hill toward Michigan Avenue — Roseland’s once-vibrant shopping strip now populated by hustlers, pimps and dealers who openly cater to the vices of the addicted, the desperate and the damned — on my way to “The Ranch.”

That’s what locals call the neighborhood’s only surviving steak joint, where you can get a T-bone, charbroiled just the way you like it, with a baked potato and salad for less than 20 bucks. And they serve tasty breakfast — two eggs with hash browns and toast for under $5 — all day long.

The late John Kapsaskis opened The Ranch Steak House at 11147 S. Michigan Ave. in 1969. Back then, Roseland was home to mostly blue-collar white families who later fled to the suburbs when black folks moved in and good-paying steel mill jobs dried up. His son, Dino — “The Greek Cowboy,” as one photo behind the counter calls him — kept the family steakhouse going even as the neighborhood’s population changed and its economy slumped.

Inside the front door is a far different world than the one left behind on the sidewalk. A set of bull horns hang from the ceiling. A sign welcomes customers to a dimly lit dining room decorated with carved Indian chief statues and faded photos of cowboys, those rifle-toting white men on horseback from Hollywood westerns.

Yolanda Pierce runs the ranch although the family who owns it no longer appears to be involved. Pierce's ex-fiance who's family runs the business is out taking care of his elderly mother in Greece. So now it's Pierce:

She’s the blond-haired, blue-eyed gal, a former hair stylist from Griffith, Indiana, who runs The Ranch now that Dino Kapsaskis — the owner and her ex-fiance — packed up and moved to Greece to take care of his 93-year-old mother.

Pierce’s friends tell her she should be angry that Kapsaskis left her to run The Ranch by herself, unsure if he’ll ever return.

“Even though he is my ex, this is his business. Dino could have sold this place. He always said business is business. He felt like he was doing me a favor. If I go anywhere else I’ll make minimum wage. What can I do?” Pierce said.

“We still care about each other enough to keep it going. I’m not mad at him. He did what he had to do. I’m taking care of my mother. I take care of my daughter. I do what I got to do.”

If you read the rest of the article she'll not that this place considering it's location isn't making a huge profit but she emphasizes how she helps her employees:

She doesn’t just do it for herself and her own family. The Ranch is the lifeblood that keeps a lot of people — her dishwasher, waitresses and cooks and even Kapsaskis, whom Pierce sends cash she considers “rent” — on the winning side of “the struggle.”

“They say when you eat at Outback Steakhouse or one of those chain places you’re paying for the owner's private jets and fancy houses. What we make helps everyone here. Nobody makes a lot of money. Here, you’re paying for our people to buy clothes for their kids,” Pierce said.

“I just feel like I don’t care if it’s a struggle. I’m gonna keep it going and that’s how Dino feels, too. No matter what, we’re going to try to keep The Ranch open for as long as can. Either things are going to get better or … whatever.”

I suggest you read the whole thing. This is a course on how to run a business in a difficult community to own a business. You may not agree with everything Griffith says about parking meters or minimum wage

Here's hoping The Ranch survives for any position renaissance that I expect Roseland to one day have. Especially when the CTA Red Line is finally extended further south. Plus I hope that the Pullman National Monument will have an effect on the surrounding communities as well.

Buy-N-Save Supermarket: What would YOU like to see here?

Last week I walked along 103rd Street and these two images are examples of some of the shots I had taken. Not sure how long this store at 209 E 103rd St has been closed, but it was a surprise when I found out it had been and in a boarded up state. The next is what would you like to see here? Is it possible to attract another grocer here?

9th ward action...

[VIDEO] Before I note once again the two candidates forums today, I wanted to share with you this recent video from 9th ward candidate Michael LaFargue. He is hoping to take the Alderman seat of current Alderman Anthony Beale.

LaFargue - currently President of the West Chesterfield Community Association - does a video featuring his background. He also features some of the other community activists and business owners of the 9th ward.

This includes Eddie Davis of Bass Furniture - 11431 South Michigan Avenue - who commented on the shopping mall that we recently noted here. The shopping mall that was once located at 115th/Michigan was demolished during the course of the last decade. Davis claimed the closure and demolition of this mall has hurt other nearby businesses.

It's a long video of roughly 15 minutes. Anything said in this video sway your vote?

Todays candidate forums for 9th ward candidates

• Chesterfield Community Council 9th Ward candidate forums at 11 AM
  McDade Classical School
  8801 S. Indiana
  Noted recently on this blog

• NAACP candidates forum with 9th Ward candidates scheduled for 1 PM
  Simeon High School
  8147 S. Vincennees
  Also noted on this blog

Open House for the Method plant in Pullman NEXT Thursday

This information was sent to people on 9th Ward Ald. Anthony Beale's e-mail list:

• Open House

  Informational Session for the Pullman Community (9th Ward)
  Thursday, September 18, 2014
  7-9pm
  
  Gwendolyn Brooks College Preparatory Academy
  250 E 111th Street
  Chicago, IL 60628
  (Enter Door #36)
  
  for more information on open positions or to submit your resume, please visit www.methodhome.com
  
  If you do not have a computer to apply for method jobs, no worries... 9/2/14 -10/3/14, please call 773.928.6000 x229 to schedule an appointment to use computers that are available, here you can apply for jobs, upload your resume, and complete a prescreen assessment.

An actual flyer is seen below.

DNA Info: Movie Theater Will Give Away Free Tickets For Donated School Supplies

Photo via UTD Discount Activities

And again sorry for the short notice on this, but if you're going to the Studio Movie Grill theater in Chatham @210 W. 87th St. perhaps you can bring some school supplies as well:

An annual event at Studio Movie Grill-Chatham will give away movie tickets for a donated school supply worth $5 or more.

Tickets can be used to see any movie but must be used the same day, said Lynne McQuaker, a spokeswoman for Studio Movie Grill. High school and college students must show a valid ID to receive their student tickets and no adult tickets will be distributed.

The third annual Back-To-School Supply Drive runs from 10 a.m.-10 p.m. Saturday at the South Side theater, 210 W. 87th St.

Also for additional reading over at The Sixth Ward on Thursday, the expected changes to the Chatham 14 are running behind!

Tribune: Hyperlocal website EveryBlock to be resurrected

EveryBlock.com

This was crossposted to The Sixth Ward late Wednesday night. Then as we go into early Thursday morning EveryBlock is now live! As a result there will be some changes to this place!

We wrote about them last month and as it turns out its return will come much sooner than at least I had thought. They were coming just had little idea when.

EveryBlock, the hyperlocal website shut down last February amid financial losses, is returning from internet limbo.

Comcast, which had seemingly pulled the plug on the neighborhood news site for good, is relaunching it Thursday in Chicago, hoping to reconnect with its users and revive its fortunes in the challenging hyperlocal space.

For nearly a year, the Chicago-based site has offered a static apology/eulogy to former users and the curious alike: “We’re sorry to report that EveryBlock has closed its doors.” Soon it will be crackling with blurbs about restaurant closings, building break-ins and community events, sating the need to know on a block-by-block basis, ending what executives are now calling a “hiatus.”

“It was extremely popular,” said Comcast spokesman Jack Segal.

“Chicago is a city of neighborhoods and each neighborhood is unique, and people want to know what is happening down the street.”

The site’s resurrection comes six years to the date of EveryBlock’s original launch, a propitious coincidence, according to Comcast executives.

Naperville native Adrian Holovaty founded EveryBlock in 2007 with the help of a $1.1 million grant from the John S. and James L. Knight Foundation designed to encourage the development of digital news. The website went live in January 2008 in Chicago, San Francisco and New York, eventually expanding to 19 markets.

Interesting ownership history in this article. EveryBlock was a startup and began I believe as the website ChicagoCrime.org. In 2009 the site was acquired by NBC Universal and overseen by their property MSNBC.com and then ultimately NBCNews.com until finally that division shut EveryBlock down last February. Now Comcast - who owns all NBC properties - will now operate the site.

BTW, click the link to their website under the EveryBlock logo now it's to a teaser page. The last time I visited that site when it was initially announced that the site will be revived, there was still the noticed that the site was shut down.

In any event I look forward to bring back the Blotter page to this blog which contained the nifty EveryBlock widget. Hopefully they will consider bringing that tool back and it was much better than having a simple feed in the sidebar. In a post on their official blog where they initially introduced the widget there is a page for widget control which doesn't appear much different than the tease page, but hopefully that means the widget is back!

Hat-tip Curbed Chicago!

Chatham 14 is now Studio Movie Grill

Crossposted to The Sixth Ward on January 10, 2014

It's been an interesting period of transition for the Chatham 14. In October 2012, the original operating company ICE Theaters had been evicted and the location was closed for a week before a new company - F & F Management - was brought in by new owner Michael Silver to operate the Chatham. Then all screens were upgraded for digital and 3D exhibition during the Spring of 2013 and now another piece of news.

According to DNA Info Chatham 14 now has new owners - Studio Movie Grill or SMG. While some of the many changes to the Chatham were noted in the DNA Info article here are some more details on the changes to come and how the many employees of the Chatham will be affected:

1. Chatham 14 theaters are 100% owned by SMG with Mr. Michael Silver having no ownership interest in this entity.
2. S&S Management is running the theaters day to day operations until 2/2/14 when their contract expires.
3. All janitorial, snow removal, HVAC contracts currently maintained by African American vendors will stay in tact.
4. African American vendors are being identified for the renovation work.
5. There WILL NOT be a Sports Bar located within the theater but a bar area that will be a part of the fast casual restaurant that will be located in the lobby.
6. All employees have jobs until the proposed renovations are completed and the new business officially opens. They will have the opportunity to apply for the new jobs as their roles will change under the new concept.

Also, You may have heard about them before. They were the subject of ABC 7's program 190 North and you can see the video below. SMG is based out of Dallas, Texas and the closest location to us is in Wheaton, Illinois.

Pullman poised for a revival

[VIDEO] I've talked about Pullman on this blog in the past it's near Bennett School and now more shopping options here on the South Side with a Walmart schedule to open today. The story you see above from CBS 2 Chicago illustrates a rebirth of this historic neighborhood that was once a planned community. A company town that once produced many railroad cars once upon a time.

In addition thanks to the neighborhood's history there are calls to turn it into a National Park according to another article from CBS. It reached a milestone when the National Park Service said that the Pullman Historic District is worthy of becoming a National Park. In addition to being a planned company town it was also home to a major labor movement involving Black Americans that was formed amongst the Pullman Porters who once served on the sleeping cars of many American railroads.

Between Walmart and possibly becoming a National Park, Pullman may well be on the way up!

ICE Theaters Community Day...

Coming later this month at their locations in Chatham and Lawndale. ICE Theaters is holding this free family festival in conjunction with Black Pages International that features education, health & wellness, fitness, financial, business & economic development, and community empowerment resources, along with workshops, entertainment and $1 movies. Check out the flyer above for more information on this event.

Don't forget about ICE Theaters Kids RULE Summer that continues this month. The last scheduled movie is Dr. Seuss' The Lorax!

There are two albums at Concerned Citizen's of Chatham FB page that show scenes from the first two previous Community Day at ICE Theater's Chatham location.

• ICE Chatham 14 Community Day 2011
• ICE Chatham 14 Community Day 2010