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South Suburbs for Greenspace to hold rally for environmental justice Thursday, public meeting on Monday

South Suburbs for Greenspace (SSG, formerly South Suburbs for Greenspace over Concrete) will hold a rally at 6:30 p.m. Thursday advocating for the creation of a local environmental justice commission.

The “Don’t Zone Us Out” rally will take place at Homewood village hall, 2020 Chestnut Road.

The rally will occur just before a zoning revision workshop at 7:30 p.m. hosted by the Homewood Planning and Zoning Commission, and organizers said they want to ensure that the zoning code rewrite makes Homewood a model of sustainability and local green initiatives. 

An environmental justice commission, as envisioned by South Suburbs for Greenspace, would use a holistic approach to address the problems of the community from an ecological perspective.

This commission would be congruous with the village’s participation in the “Greenest Region Compact,” which the village joined in 2019, and its status as a Tree City USA.

SSG asserts the zoning code rewrite should use context-based zoning, which not only looks at land uses for particular zones, but also views the zones as part of a larger plan where adjacent zones are factors in determining allowable uses for a site. 

For example, such zoning methods could prevent the least restrictive zone, manufacturing, being directly adjacent to the most restrictive zone, residential.

On Monday, July 26, SSG will host a public meeting at the carport behind La Voute Bistro on Martin Avenue between Ridge Road and Chestnut. This meeting will update the public on the fight to protect the greenspace at Calumet Country Club and future greenspaces through advocating for strong green provisions in the zoning code rewrite for Homewood.

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