NIPC Announces Full Circle Grant Awards

For Immediate Use
March 9, 2004

NIPC ANNOUNCES FULL CIRCLE GRANT AWARDS

Three-year federal grants totaling $300,000 are being awarded today by the Northeastern Illinois Planning Commission (NIPC) to six Chicago community groups and the City of Aurora as part of the Full Circle neighborhood mapping and planning project underwritten by the U.S. Department of Commerce.

All seven organizations will be equipped with NIPC’s innovative web-based mapping tool, Parcel Pointer, to collect and post real-time data for a defined neighborhood. In addition, NIPC’s Common Ground visioning tool, Paint the Region, will be implemented to promote the participation of local resident and stakeholders in planning the future of their neighborhood. The seven organizations include:

Albany Park Community Center
Bethel New Life, Inc. (West Garfield Park)
Centers for New Horizons (Bronzeville)
DevCorp North (Rogers Park)
Little Village Environmental Justice Organization (South Lawndale)
Southeast Environmental Task Force (Lake Calumet Region)
The City of Aurora Planning Division

“Selection of the grant winners was difficult,” said Greg Sanders, Full Circle Internet Project Manager. “All applicants were good candidates and demonstrated tremendous dedication to neighborhood planning initiatives.”

Grant applications were reviewed by a minimum of five housing, planning and environmental professionals as well as NIPC’s Sanders and Common Ground Project Manager, Hubert Morgan. Each application was evaluated based on the organization’s capacity for:

Collecting and documenting neighborhood assets
Hosting public planning forums
Offering technology training to neighborhood residents
Administering the Full Circle* project long-term

(* The Full Circle project has three key objectives: to represent local concerns within the planning process, to use technology tools for asset mapping and community visioning, and building ongoing relationships between communities and regional planners.)

Grant applications also were scored on suitability criteria such as the amount of developable assets or vacant land in the area to be mapped by the organization.

Grant awards will be used to conduct the multi-phase mapping and planning process in each organization’s defined neighborhood. Work will begin with an inventory of the neighborhood’s assets. Data will be collected on wireless hand-held devices connected to web servers to update the asset inventory automatically. This inventory will be utilized during public planning sessions where the hopes and intentions of local residents will be gathered and incorporated into recommendations for implementation.

Full Circle participants will also have access to planning experts from Northwestern University’s Asset-Based Community Development Institute, IIT’s Stuart Graduate School of Business, the Center for Neighborhood Technology, and the Midwest Technology Access Group.

“NIPC is pleased and excited to be working with such a diverse group of partners representing a variety of geographic areas,“ stated Ronald L. Thomas, AICP, Executive Director of NIPC. “In addition to the grant awards, NIPC will offer all grant applicants our technical assistance to map their neighborhood.”

NIPC is committed to expanding public participation in the regional planning process, Thomas emphasized. “We will continue to seek ways of supporting initiatives that empower local residents and community-based organizations to plan the future development of their neighborhoods.”

Comprehensive information on the Full Circle program is available on the NIPC housing web site, www.chicagoareahousing.org/FullCircle .

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About NIPC
NIPC was created in 1957 by the Illinois General Assembly as the region’s comprehensive land-use planning agency. The legislation authorizes NIPC to conduct research for planning -- including official forecasts of population, employment, and other socio-economic indicators -- to advise units of local government on their plans and policies, and to provide general comprehensive plans and policies for use by local governments. NIPC's role was reaffirmed in 2000 by an Interagency Agreement with the Chicago Area Transportation Study (CATS), the Regional Transit Authority (RTA), and the Illinois Department of Transportation (IDOT). The agreement stipulates that NIPC's plans and data are the basis for the Regional Transportation Plan (RTP) that guides critical decisions and investments of federal transportation funding. For more, see http://www.nipc.org.