Could a Bank's $20 Million Investment Add Up to Better Days for South Chicago?
Here’s hoping Fifth Third bank’s investment sparks a major rejuvenation of this long-struggling Chicago neighborhood.
Originally published by the Chicago Sun-Times
By CST Editorial Board
The South Chicago community literally helped make Chicago.
For most of the 20th century, many of our city’s skyscrapers, expressways and bridges were built with steel that the neighborhood’s mills — namely the giant U.S. Steel South Works plant — churned out around the clock and by the freightload, providing thousands of good-paying jobs along the way.
And then what happened? The days of Big Steel ebbed in the 1970s and then ended, and the city and its institutions repaid its debt to South Chicago by allowing it to become yet another neighborhood debilitated by chronic disinvestment.
So we were glad last week to hear the announcement that Fifth Third Bank will be making a three-year $20 million investment in the South Chicago neighborhood.
