COMMUNITY ACTIVISM IN OAK PARK: COMPETING AGENDAS ...
COMMUNITY ACTIVISM IN OAK PARK: COMPETING AGENDAS ...
COMMUNITY ACTIVISM IN OAK PARK: COMPETING AGENDAS ...
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you sure you want to live here? Just kidding. My wife and I<br />
actually haven’t had any problems with our neighbors in the past<br />
three years we’ve been living here. Let me introduce you to the<br />
neighborhood…Next door there are African-American men that<br />
drink forties and smoke the chronic on their front porches early in<br />
the morning. They don’t make a lot of noise other than that.<br />
Across the street, those guys like loud cars and loud music. Next<br />
door to you is a suspiciously clean law student who gets his clothes<br />
pressed by a service that picks them up from his doorstep. I think<br />
he’s a rich kid whose parents pay for everything.<br />
Chris continued,<br />
Anyhow, around the corner is a park that you should never walk<br />
around. There are a lot of drive-by shootings that happen there at<br />
night. While living here you’ll hear a lot of gun shots. Don’t be<br />
afraid to call the cops. We don’t usually call the cops unless they<br />
happen really close to our house.<br />
Chris was very observant of his neighborhood and was aware of the issues that<br />
took place in the community, but he was not bothered by them and did not want to spend<br />
time being involved in community groups. He enjoyed living in a neighborhood that was<br />
unpredictable and close to his job. He and his wife used their “street smarts” and took<br />
necessary precautions in their neighborhood. But they also did not frequent many shops<br />
in the neighborhood and stated that once his daughter reached school age, he and his<br />
family were going to move into a better school district.<br />
Maria was a thirty year-old Mexican-American woman who lived with her mother<br />
and step-father in Oak Park. She was a high-school math teacher and often attended<br />
community gatherings and events in the community. Although she wasn’t a participant<br />
in community activism, she attended social events in the community. I met Maria at a<br />
Neighborhood Association meeting and I liked her right away. She was smart and we<br />
quickly became acquaintances. One day while I was visiting her and her mom at their<br />
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