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A Look Back at Chicago's Public Housing

The Chicago Reader published a story and video this week looking back on the history of Chicago's public housing and the role the Gautreaux Supreme Court case and subsequent court ordered assistsed housing program played in asssiting in desegregating portions of the City of Chicago. In the 1950's and 60's, the Chicago Housing Authority had a policy known as the neighborhood composition rule which furthered segregation and housing discrimination in the form of isolating African American public housing residents in certain neighborhoods. In the years following the Gautreaux case, R&C served as counsel to the federal reciever for the Chicago Housing Authority, The Habitat Company. Over the course of two decades, R&C assisted CHA in integerating more than 25,000 public housing residents into various Chicago neighborhoods and suburbs and helped CHA redevelop some of the largest public housing projects in the country through the HUD Mixed-Finance and HOPE VI revitalization programs.