When earth movers lift the first mounds of dirt Friday on a Mariano’s Fresh Market going up in historic Bronzeville, it will be the start of a project that has gone beyond a grocery to the uplifting of a community.
The rare company/community partnership first alleviates a food desert.
By mutual agreement, it’s being built by an all-black team, several of whom have unique ties to a community once called Chicago’s Black Belt.
Jobs have been set aside for residents of Bronzeville, including training for applicants from nearby Chicago Housing Authority developments.
Bronzeville’s rich history was incorporated into the store’s architecture.
And for a community focused on renaissance, the project has spurred new business and residential development that has come to piggyback.
“Mariano’s was willing to listen to what the community had to say and take suggestions,” said Bernita Johnson-Gabriel, executive director of the nonprofit Quad Communities Development Corp. in Bronzeville. “We had input on the design. The Bronzeville store will be much different from their other stores, with artistic elements melded into the architecture in keeping with our community’s history.”
The Mariano’s is being built at Pershing Road and King Drive on a lot that’s been vacant some 10 years since the Chicago Housing Authority tore down the dilapidated, drugs- and gangs-challenged Ida B. Wells public housing complex.
It will be adjacent to 40 acres of CHA mixed-income housing long planned and overdue as the agency has stockpiled money intended for replacement housing.
The unique design of the 74,000-square-foot store includes an artistic screen wall honoring some of Bronzeville’s most famous residents. Bronzeville was home to such prominent black artists and intellectuals as activist/journalist Ida B. Wells, author Richard Wright, poet Gwendolyn Brooks, dancer Katherine Dunham, musician Louie Armstrong and sociologist Horace Clayton.
Larger than most Mariano’s, the store is part of the Chicago-area expansion by parent company Roundy’s Supermarkets Inc. of Milwaukee. Roundy’s plans to have 39 stores in the Chicago region by the end of 2016 and ultimately 50 by opening five stores annually.
The team building the new store — expected to open in summer 2016 — includes project developer John Bonds of Safeway Construction, who was born a block from the store’s site, and general contractor Wilbur Milhouse of Milhouse Engineeering & Construction, whose mother was born in the Wells housing development.
The area had been called the Black Belt because a majority of the city’s blacks were segregated there by the mid-20th century. Milhouse’s grandparents migrated from Georgia in the 1940s, settling in the then-new housing between 37th and Pershing, King Drive and Cottage Grove.
“My mother was born there in ’51, and her family moved when she was 11. She would tell me stories all the time about how nice the projects used to be, a great place for families to raise children and for kids to grow up,” said Milhouse, who himself now lives in Bronzeville. “When I heard of this project, I definitely wanted to be a part of it because of my personal connection.”
Also on the building team of a store expected to bring 200 construction and 400 grocery jobs are architect Phil Johnson of Johnson & Lee Architects, and construction manager Claude Powers of Powers & Sons.
Roundy’s Chairman, President and CEO Bob Mariano says the company typically provides intense job training in underserved communities it enters. To ensure Bronzeville residents benefit, he has hired The Target Group and Chicago Cook Workforce Partnership to provide the training.
“I’m committed to making sure the African-American community is well represented in every aspect of this project — from our development and construction team to workers during construction and when we open,” says Mariano, noting CHA residents will get some of the construction jobs.
“We’ve worked tirelessly to achieve that, and we’re very excited about what we’re doing at 39th & King Drive,” Mariano said.
The Mariano’s site, which is in the 4th Ward, includes 8,000 square feet of commercial space for other retailers. Since its announcement a year ago, it’s helped draw new commercial and residential development.
A retailer has committed to build a 25,000-square-foot store on the northwest corner of Pershing and King Drive — which is in the 3rd Ward — and its design will complement the Mariano’s. A developer also started building 112 market-rate homes a few blocks away at 41st and Vincennes.
“Having Mariano’s in the community is a huge win for Bronzeville,” said Ald. Pat Dowell (3rd), who with Ald. Will Burns (4th) shares parts of Bronzeville and worked with Burns on securing the Bronzeville store.
“Bob Mariano and his team really worked with the community on everything from securing an African-American architect and general contractors, to jobs,” she says. “I think people have waited a long time for this community to take off. Mariano’s is a very visible symbol that revitalization in Bronzeville is here, and it’s really become a catalyst.”