North Austin Community Center

North Austin Community Center

Location: Chicago, Illinois

Closing Date: March 31, 2021

Project Description & Impact: A community center containing an indoor athletic facility, an after school club, a kitchen, a multipurpose room and related parking. The project will provide a safe recreational space to low-income individuals and also provide high quality and holistic after-school programming to low-income children.

Client: North Austin Community Center, QALICB

Financing Tools Used: Federal NMTCs, State of Illinois NMTCs, Illinois state grants, source debt

The Story Behind this Project

The North Austin Community Center (NACC), located on a 10-acre campus on Chicago’s West Side, is a professional-level facility for sports, education and wellness which will help close the opportunity gap for West Side youth and their families. The facility will offer best-in-class playing spaces and holistic programs unparalleled in Chicago and beyond. Nothing compares to this campus in terms of size, scope and mission—especially in the Austin neighborhood, which sits at the intersection of four densely populated Black and Latinx communities.

NACC is led by mission-minded, experienced professionals who have rallied a grassroots effort to develop the concept, catalyze the philanthropic community, and bring the project to fruition. Construction began in August of 2021 and the center will open to the community in the fall of 2022. The main building will be a newly constructed 150,000 sq. ft. facility housing Intentional Sports and By The Hand Club For Kids. Adjacent to the new facility is the Grace and Peace (GAP) Revive Center, a 75,000 sq. ft. holistic community service center that provides food, social services and family support to hundreds of residents each week. Surrounding these two anchor projects are turf fields, enriching landscaping and a community playground—all on a former brownfield that has been vacant for over 40 years. This $35.5 million project will serve an estimated 25,000 children annually with 250,000 visitors per year.