Sweet Home Chicago is an affordable housing campaign led by a coalition of nine community organizations and three labor unions. Together we are advocating that a share of Chicago's tax increment financing (TIF) funds be dedicated to affordable housing. The housing would be created for average residents of the city who pay their tax dollars into the TIFs and deserve the benefits.  TIF dollars are property tax dollars that the city uses to develop certain neighborhoods. They can be used to build affordable housing. By 2008, there was nearly $1.3 billion built up in Chicago's TIF accounts.
 
Sweet Home Chicago proposal:
Each year the city would dedicate 20 percent of TIF funds collected towards affordable housing.  If this were in effect in 2008, $110 million would have gone towards housing.

Developments would qualify to receive funds if 50 percent of the units were affordable to households earning less than $37,000 for a family of four. In addition, citywide, 40 percent of the units created each with the dedicated funds must serve households earning less than $22,600 a year for a family of four.

For housing that is for sale, units would have to be affordable to families of four earning less than $60,300.

Sweet Home Chicago partners:
Sweet Home Chicago is a coalition of 12 partners: Action NOW, Albany Park Neighborhood Council, Bickerdike Redevelopment  Corporation, Chicago Coalition for the Homeless, Jane Addams Senior Caucus, Kenwood Oakland Community Organization, Lakeview Action Coalition, Logan Square Neighborhood Association, Organization of the NorthEast, Service Employees International Union (SEIU)-Healthcare Illinois/Indiana, SEIU Local 1, and United Food and Commercial Workers Local 881.

Read more about the Sweet Home Chicago campaign on our Media Page and on our website home page -- check out Upcoming Events and our blog.  

To support the campaign's launch, the Marguerite Casey Foundation generously awarded a $30,000 strategic mini-grant to the Sweet Home coalition in fall 2009.