Project H.O.O.D. (Helping Others Obtain Destiny) initially started as a campaign to raise $450,000 to purchase land located at 6625 South King Drive in the Woodlawn neighborhood of Chicago for a Community and Economic Development center on Chicago’s Southside. The campaign for the initial seed amount was raised and Phase I was completed on February 24, 2012. The closing for the property purchase was completed on March 6, 2012. The street King Drive was named after African American leader Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. to pay homage to his dedication to ensuring that the rights of African Americans in America were given to his generation and beyond. Ironically, that same street is home to drugs, violence and prostitution as well as many families who suffer from economic hardship. The 66th and King Drive location was once home to a Super Motel where prostitutes, drug dealers and criminals prompted the neighboring New Beginnings Church to take action.
Vision: Ending violence and building communities, one neighborhood at a time.
Mission: To empower people with guidance, information and tools necessary to become peacemakers, problem solvers, leaders, and entrepreneurs in their communities.
New Beginnings Church played a major role in the motel getting closed through its SHUT EM DOWN campaign. Today the fight continues as Pastor Brooks and the church works hard to build a Community and Economic Development Center where the motel encouraging crime once stood. New Beginnings Church’s Project H.O.O.D campaign is essentially aimed to replace the motel with an oasis for the residents of the West Woodlawn community.
The community center is to feature:
- Commercial Spaces for Businesses (small and large) to spark Job Creation
- Areas for Social Services including expansion of New Beginnings Church’s “Master’s Academy.”
- State-of-the-art Technology Center
- Media & Performing Arts Theater
- Sports & Recreations
One of the features that caught the interest of an anonymous donor is Green Technology and a planned rooftop garden. This generous donor, who matched new donations given to the organization’s donations totaling $50,000 in a 48 hour period in order to increase the impact of each donation in the name of Sylvia F. Sobolik (1922 – 2011), an avid gardener. Its a multi-level solution to a many layered problem. . . violence. “No competitive sports programs, no social things, no conflict resolution, no jobs,” Brooks was quoted as saying in The New York Times, “All of that breeds hopelessness, which in turn causes what we’re seeing — murder.” Rev. Brooks proclaims.
Spending 94 days atop a motel roof in the dead of a Chicago winter was only Phase 1 of Pastor Corey Brooks’ plan to build a community center. Now, he’s hitting the pavement. The Pastor of New Beginnings Church of Chicago will walk across America in an effort to raise awareness of the epidemic of gun violence all over America and to raise $15 million to fund the Project H.O.O.D. Community Center in Woodlawn.
Woodlawn and Englewood have been the epicenter for much of Chicago’s murderous violence. In 2011, Pastor Brooks lamented over the violence that claimed the 17-year-old son of two of his congregants. When gunfire broke out directly outside the church at the time of the wake, Brooks knew he must do something to end the violence which had caused him to officiate over the funeral services of 10 young men age 25 and under in that year alone. He set out on a mission to bring awareness to the epidemic of gun violence in Chicago’s Woodlawn and Englewood areas through a vigil in a tent on the roof of the abandoned motel for a total of 94 days.
“I believe God put me on Earth to bring attention to violence in inner cities,” Brooks says. Brooks’ rooftop stand atop a decrepit motel that was a haven for drugs and prostitution drew national attention, as well as visits from politicians and dozens of Occupy Chicago protesters. In the end, a pledge of $100,000 from movie mogul Tyler Perry provided the final push for reaching the pastor’s goal of raising $450,000 to buy and demolish the abandoned den.
In Phase 2 of his effort, Pastor Brooks will walk from Times Square New York to the Staples Center in Los Angeles, CA to raise $15 million dollars to build a community center where the motel once stood. Funds raised for Project H.O.O.D. (Helping Others Obtain Destiny) Walk Across America will be used to combat four societal ills as identified by Brooks: social, economic, educational and spiritual.
“We believe drastic things have to be done, and we’ve got to be creative if we want to eliminate violence,” Brooks says.
Project H.O.O.D. Walk Across America will take to the road by foot on June 5, 2012.
If you want to join our March to End Violence, please click here.
To learn more about Project H.O.O.D. and how you can support visit www.projecthood.org, like them on Facebook and follow them on Twitter.
