Just A Little Concrete Playlot

Community Organizing in Logan Square

In July 1986, Unity was only a little concrete-paved play-lot in the middle of a concrete jungle. Joel Monarch recounts how it became the Unity Park of today, with one of the most active advisory councils in the city.

But this is also a story about community organizing - bringing neighborhood issues into focus, finding consensus, and working with local government to implement them - colored with insights into the unique political atmosphere of that period in Chicago.