Aurora Hispanic Heritage Advisory Board

City officials are hoping business owners and residents on the near east side will attend a series of three upcoming meetings to provide input into the continued revitalization of their neighborhood.

The neighborhood, roughly bounded by Lake Street, Liberty Street, North Avenue, and East Avenue, has been designated a Neighborhood Revitalization Strategy Area (NRSA) by the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development since 1999. One consequence of that designation has been the availability of funding to local businesses. The loan program, Section 108, has led to jobs being created through the establishment or remodeling of a medical building, restaurant, florist, and daycare facility. The city has been working on updating the plan, “To best leverage federal dollars as we go forward in revitalizing the area”, according to Karen Christensen, Aurora’s Manager of Neighborhood Redevelopment.

The meetings, which will be held June 3, June 29, and July 22, are designed to collect direct feedback from residents and businesses in the area as to how they want their neighborhood to look, the needs they believe need to be met, and suggestions into its long term future. An advisory board consisting of representatives from Waubonsee Community College, the Quad County Urban League, East Aurora School District 131, the Aurora Economic Development Commission, Family Focus, Rebuilding Together Aurora, the Aurora Regional and Aurora Hispanic Chambers of Commerce, Aurora Downtown, and Aurora Township has been meeting since January to begin updating the original plan.

Christensen said they have contracted with the Metropolitan Planning Council (MPC) and Chicago Metropolitan Agency for Planning (CMAP) to assist with garnering input from residents and businesses in the revitalization area. She said that ideally, attendees will go to all three meetings as they are meant to build off of one another.

For example, at the first meeting, CMAP will present demographics and census information in the target area and compare it to similar information in the city as a whole. They will then ask a series of questions to attendees as to how they want their neighborhood to look and suggestions for the future. The answers of all attendees will be recorded electronically and used during the second meeting which will feature an MPC Developer Panel. The members of that panel will work directly with residents and business owners to explain what may be feasible from an economic development point of view including ideas for new housing, retail, or mixed use development. The third meeting will be an analysis of the attendees’ views along with the ideas of the developers that will be integrated into a final plan that will be submitted to HUD in August.

“Because this area is designated as an NRSA, we may be able to take advantage of other federal programs that will lead to housing and economic redevelopment much like the Section 108 Loan”, said Christensen. “These meetings present excellent opportunities for those who live and work in the neighborhood to have a stake in its future.”

All of the meetings will be from 6-8 p.m. at the Fred Rodgers Community Center, 501 College Av., Room 315.