It was one of those can’t-lose community development opportunities urban planners dream about. Two groups of southwest-side activists–the Greater Southwest Development Corporation and the Boulevard Arts Center–had joined hands to transform the Hi-Way theater, a boarded-up, tax-delinquent, onetime X-rated movie house at 6315 S. Western, into an arts center. The center would benefit black and white neighborhoods throughout the southwest side, creating 700 jobs and pumping millions of desperately needed tax dollars into county and city coffers.
The Development Corporation, which has helped ignite nearly a decade of development on and around the intersection of Western Avenue and 63rd Street, was brought into the project about two years ago at the request of the Boulevard Arts Center. At that time, the widely respected arts organization was in its fifth year of offering art training and dance and theater performances and had outgrown its location in a church on 51st Street.
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“We looked at about 100 buildings; it was a strenuous hunt,” says Patricia Devine-Reed, Boulevard’s executive director. “But for one reason or another–either the conditions were too bad or the costs too great–the buildings were not appropriate.”
“In our case, as a not-for-profit, we probably wouldn’t be paying property taxes on the Hi-Way,” he says. “But we would fix it up so it wasn’t an eyesore, and the businesses inside would create jobs and generate sales taxes. It would cost about $1.2 million to rehab the theater. We could raise that money through grants and low-interest loans, but the deal wasn’t doable unless we got the building for free.”
During those first hectic weeks of May, Meyer, Capraro, and Devine-Reed were in constant contact with the city’s Department of Economic Development. It was clear that Mayor Daley actively endorsed the arts center, and on July 24 the City Council unanimously approved it as well. Meyer and company assumed the city would immediately send their proposal to the County Board’s Tax Delinquency Committee for review.
“We get hundreds of requests for no-cash bids,” says Schumann. “It’s the city’s responsibility to make sure that all the details are in order.”
The October 29 scavenger sale began at 8:30 in the morning; within an hour someone named Romel Koktapeh had bought the building for $19,500.
