The Chicago Reporter articles from May 2006

The Chicago Reporter archives from May 2006

Editor's note/reporter news.
May 1, 2006... Chicago natives like to say the only thing you can count on here when it comes to the weather is that it will change. The sentiment also rings true for many of our most pressing social issues surrounding race and economics. But whether those...

New movement: a new generation of young organizers are bringing fresh energy to community activism.(New Voices)
May 1, 2006... A sterile church basement might not be a typical weekend hangout for most college students, but that didn't stop Juan C. Cruz from spending a recent Friday evening at Christ Evangelical Lutheran Church, 3253 W. Wilson Ave. Cruz was among the...

Safe refuge: homeless youth find secure homes elusive because of their sexual orientation.(Keeping Current)
May 1, 2006... Last year, Aaron Bowen was dubbed a "future gay hero" by The Advocate, a national gay and lesbian magazine, but there was a time when he felt more like a victim. The 21-year-old Chicago native spent the past six years living on his own ever...

Sold in the U.S.A.: more human trafficking cases are originating within the U.S., but the plight of victims often goes unheard.(United States)(Cover story)
May 1, 2006... The window frame broke, loosening the lock. Ricardo Veisaga listened for footsteps. It had been more than a week since the Argentinean went outside unaccompanied. Two weeks earlier, he had responded to an ad in a Chicago newspaper. In Spanish,...

Gearing up.(Chicago controls human trafficking)
May 1, 2006... State officials prepare for a fight against trafficking By Angelica Herrera In June 2005, Gov. Rod Blagojevich signed legislation that made human trafficking a prosecutable offense at the state level. The Trafficking of Persons and...

Resisting the dream: while violence has all but ended, barriers to racial integration, like discrimination, stereotypes and intolerance, remain.
May 1, 2006... In August 1966, as Martin Luther King Jr. and others marched through thousands of screaming white residents in Marquette Park, Elbert Ransom Jr. heard a familiar melody. It sounded like an Oscar Meyer Weiner commercial, but the chant spoke...

Block buster: the arrival of one block's first black family stirs tensions in one of the Southwest Side's few remaining white neighborhoods.(Patricia Bridges)
May 1, 2006... In March, Patricia Bridges turned off of 113th Street onto Sawyer Avenue in Mount Greenwood and saw the home where she would be moving with her mother, fiance and seven children. She was overjoyed. Located on a quiet street filled with...

Just moving on: after years of waiting and struggling to meet new requirements, thousands of CHA residents may not return to new mixed-income housing.(Chicago Housing Authority)
May 1, 2006... Born and raised in the Robert Taylor Homes public housing development, Antoinette McCoy left her home at 4429 S. Federal St., Apt. 903, in 2002 shortly before it was balled and craned into a massive parcel of vacant land. When she left,...

May 1, 2006.(Parting Shot)
May 1, 2006... Mateo Fernandez of Supermercado of El Guero handed out bottles of water to help demonstrators rallying against a border security bill in Congress that would criminalize undocumented immigrants and those who aid them. [ILLUSTRATION OMITTED]...