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Accelerating Initiatives in Chicago’s 77 Communities

Community-based sustainability initiatives are taking place across the metropolitan area of Chicago. These, however, are often relatively isolated activities with limited interaction between them. Though many organizations, foundations, companies, and government agencies have programs and resources to assist local sustainability efforts, many communities are unaware of these opportunities or unfamiliar with ways to access them.
​
The ICA is the organizing sponsor of accelerate77, a program aimed at accelerating grassroots sustainability initiatives throughout Chicago’s 77 community areas.

In order to ACCELERATE sustainability in a bottom-up fashion driven by practical action, expanded imagination, and greater organizational capacities among local groups, the underlying strategy is to:

IDENTIFY

Identify holistic sustainability (environmental, economic, social) leaders and initiatives in all of Chicago’s 77 community areas.

CONNECT

Connect initiatives with one another to inspire new ideas, practices, self-consciousness and motivation through peer interchange.

COLLABORATE

Engage resident leaders, organizations, and groups in systematic learning, planning, and collaborative collective action.
  • Phase I: IDENTIFY
  • Phase II: CONNECT
  • Phase III: COLLABORATE
  • Sustainability Roadmap
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Listen and Learn

Starting in the fall of 2011, over 200 students from 5 Chicago-based Universities began to uncover the organizations, initiatives and individuals working at the community level toward creating a more sustainable Chicago. Professors from Chicago State, DePaul, Northeastern Illinois, Loyola and Roosevelt integrated the project into their curricula as a civic engagement component to their courses. During the summer of 2012, over 40 interns from around the US continued to uncover what was taking place at the community level within Chicago. All the students were asked to use an asset-based lens when in the communities.
Goals
  • Uncover individuals, organizations and initiatives working towards a more sustainable Chicago. Sustainability can mean a lot of different things, but our team decided to refer to it as something that gave life to the community, and strengthened the community socially, culturally or environmentally.
  • Engage with college and post college students and introduce them to basic community organizing methods, asset-based approach to community development, and practical ways of understanding social and environmental justice concerns. We also wanted to get them engaged with the city around them, and involved and excited about community areas in Chicago.
Process & Methodology
The key process was preparing students to take a ‘deep dive’ into learning about an unfamiliar community and started uncovering what systems were at play. This process would both get them more engaged in the area, and surface insightful information on who was organizing and working within the area. The students were given an introduction to community organizing theory and tools, safety guidelines, as well as a background in asset mapping. After an evaluation of the pilot with students from Oklahoma City University, we determined it was successful in achieving both of our goals. We continued to partner with several different university professors and students throughout the city. The project was integrated into course curricula - generally as a civic engagement component. Over 200 students participated in the process, and 8 different classes, covering many different fields of study.
Lessons Learned
  • ​There is an amazing amount of energy at the university level, even though it tends to be an untapped resource for community areas.
  • Individuals are willing to do an incredible amount of work and invest their time and energy into something they really believe in.
  • Sustainability is a hard term to define perfectly. We were able to make a lot more progress as a team when we created our own working definition of the word.
  • Students want to be engaged!
Read Full Report
go to ac77 website

Connection Events

Connection events create opportunities to share knowledge, highlight best practices on emerging trends relating to urban sustainability, and learn about resources available to them.
​“Sharing Approaches That Work” Share Fair - Sept 15, 2012
The culmination of 18 months of exploring and uncovering sustainability initiatives was a Share Fair event that aimed to both showcase and connect individuals, initiatives, and organizations from each of the 77 community areas in Chicago.

​In this day-long event at Truman College, participants were able to network, learn about local and city-wide resources available to them, and learn about the city’s plan to promote sustainability. Over 400 people attended the event with over 150 local organizations and initiatives showcasing their work. 
The three main modules of the event included:
Sharing Approaches That Work
​community interaction to learn from each other’s experiences
Keynote Address
​Karen Weigert,
Chief Sustainability Officer, City of Chicago
Connection Seminars
​presentations by resource organizations on grant and program opportunities
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learn More

Building Community Energy Strategies forum - Nov 15, 2013
Participants began the day by meeting each other, creating images of what they think the future of energy looks like in Chicago, then posting these images on the wall and discussing them with others. Participants then split into three tracks for the day for rich, dynamic discussions about reducing, reinventing and transforming energy in Chicago.

These discussions raised key questions and challenged all of us to think about how we play a role in changing the face of energy in Chicago.
​
The forum was organized around three tracks:
  • REDUCE: What are effective methods for engaging more people in using available resources to lower individual energy use/cost?
  • REINVENT: How do we effectively harness and promote renewable energy sources - including human energy
  • TRANSFORM: How can individual action transform the ways communities source and use energy?
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learn more
After a day full of engaging interchange, Jamie Ponce, of the C40 initiaitve speaking from the unique lens of the Keynote Listener, commented on the days “who, what, when, where, and why”. He spoke to the rich motivation he witnessed of all the participants that attended the event - which stemmed from all different places, like stewardship, community, faith, policy and social justice. He noted the importance of sharing our stories and quoted a participant from earlier in the day: “If we don’t tell our stories, how will anyone know them?” 
faith and sustainability forum
The Faith traditions have played significant roles in social movements throughout history and in the current Climate Change debate. This forum showcased local action happening in Chicago while also pushing the participants to tackle hard questions.

Over 85 participants from communities ​​across the Chicagoland area gathered at the ICA GreenRise to meet like-minds and share approaches on faith based sustainability projects.

​Event activities included:
  • Hearing upcoming opportunities to increase sustainability in faith communities
  • Seeing how local congregations are currently engaging in sustainability efforts
  • Connecting with resources through organization and peer-to-peer sharing 
  • Gaining new understanding of the challenges facing our earth
  • Developing a personal or congregation action plan
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Learn More

Chicago Sustainability Leaders Network (CSLN)

​The accelerate77 project has led to the formation of the Chicago Sustainability Leaders Network (CSLN). As the organizing sponsor of the network, ICA is currently engaging members of the CSLN, a network of local activists and community organizations/organizers throughout Chicago, in collaborative change making efforts.
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learn more here

Austin Community Sustainability Roadmap

The Austin Community Sustainability Roadmap is a model for sustainability planning for all 77 community areas. This process of creating a community sustainability roadmap for a neighborhood cluster involves engaging residents from schools, businesses, and churches in a selected cluster to create a community action plan for specific sustainability initiatives.
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Download the Report
Sustainability Roadmap Process
September - November 2013

 
Session I: VISIONING The first community gathering to create an Austin Sustainability Roadmap to foster healthy business districts and neighborhoods was convened at the Columbus Park Refectory September 4, 2013, One hundred residents talked about their hopes and dreams for the future of the Ward and community answering, “What do you want to see in place by 2015? What are the values that are behind this vision? What do you imagine would make this community more economically, environmentally and socially sustainable?”
 
Session II: RECOMMENDED ACTIONS At the Shriners Hospitals for Children October 2nd, residents selfselected the topic they had most passion about implementing from the vision. They considered how they could support Austin assets and potential actions to realize their vision.
Two representatives from each of the eight areas met October 23rd at the North Avenue Branch Library to review the draft and envision action planning and implementation in 2014.
 
Session III: PRIORITY FOCUS Residents reviewed and revised their action areas. Then they focused on the top three priorities for 2014 action to realize a healthier and more resilient community.
 
In 2014 the team leaders of each of the action areas are meeting monthly with Alderman Deborah Graham to report on their implementation progress, share information, and revise their plans as needed.
If you'd like to learn more or join in the process contact Karen Snyder: KSnyder@ica-usa.org
 
Links to this work in the news:
Residents work on plan for a sustainable Austin 
by REEMA AMIN on OCTOBER 15, 2013 READ MORE HERE
Community brainstorms vision for 29th Ward
by KATIE KATHER on SEPTEMBER 10, 2013 READ MORE HERE
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  • About Us
    • Mission & Approach
    • History
    • Our Team
    • Annual Report
    • Contact Us
    • Jobs
  • Programs
    • International
    • Global Research Network
    • Facilitation Services
    • Chicago Sustainability >
      • Accelerate77
      • Sustainability Leaders
    • Uptown >
      • Uptown Garden Walk >
        • 2019
        • 2018
        • 2017
        • 2016
      • Uptown Coastal Initiative
  • ToP Training
  • Building
    • About ICA GreenRise >
      • Restoration Project
    • Conference Center
    • Live at ICA
    • Lease at ICA
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  • News
    • Latest News
    • Publications
    • Past Events >
      • v4 Home Page
      • Chicago protoype
      • National prototype
      • Global prototype
      • GreenRise prototype >
        • #CarbonFree2035
      • ToP prototype
      • ToP Training
  • Store
  • Donate