Nominating Committee Now Accepting Applications for SOAR Board of Directors

Streeterville residents who are interested in being considered as a candidate to serve as a director of SOAR's Board of Directors are invited to submit an application to the nominating committee. Applicants must be SOAR members in good standing.

SOAR Board members gain interesting and important insights into how all stakeholders work together to "keep Streeterville a neighborhood." To turn these insights into policy requires participation by residents from every corner of the community (Chicago River to East Lake Shore Drive/Oak Street, and from State Street to Lake Michigan) who offer complementary skills and experience.

Interested Streeterville residents are asked to complete an online application and submit copy of a current resume or curriculum vitae.  

SOAR Board members are elected for one (1) or two (2) year terms at SOAR's annual meeting.

Streeterville Real Estate Updates

Northwestern University recently announced that Perkins+Will won the design competition held for the biomedical building to replace Bertrand Goldberg's Prentice Women's Hospital. You can read the full announcement here.

Gail Spreen, SOAR president and chair-Real Estate Committee, said, "We are eager to continue to work with Northwestern University to ensure that Perkins+Will reviews, understands and implements the organization's Planning and Zoning Principles and issues raised in the letter we sent to the University last month. There will be opportunities for the community to review the project in various stages and SOAR will play a significant role in organizing meetings." Read the letter to the University and online comments.

 The SOAR Real Estate Committee heard a presentation from Optima Chicago Center this week and will issue comments soon. Read about the proposal.

In other real estate news, a previously planned hotel development at 150 E. Ontario that was stalled, is seeing action on the site. Read the details.  

Thanks to Chicago Curbed for their interesting compilation of current Streeterville construction.

Congratulations to the folks at 500 N. Lake Shore Drive for being among the most pet-friendly buildings in the city. Read about it.

SOAR Welcomes New Supervisor of Lake Shore Park

Welcome to Juan "Dan" Puente, the new supervisor of Lake Shore Park, who recently arrived from the same assignment at Wicker Park. To enable everyone to get to know Dan, we soon will include a story about him in News Briefs. He can be reached at 312.742.7891.

The Lake Shore Park Advisory Council, whose president is Streeterville resident Peggy Holst, meets at 4:00 pm on the second Monday of each month at 808 N. Lake Shore Drive. The next meeting is Monday, June 10. Board member Howard W. Melton represents SOAR on the Council. If you have concerns you'd like to raise, please contact him. For more information visit the Lake Shore Park webpage.

Participants in the May 1st Safety & Security Panel Announced

SOAR task force co-chairs Craig Kaiser and Manny Martinez announce participants in the Safety and Security Panel discussion on Wednesday, May 1, at the Allerton Hotel, 701 N. Michigan, beginning with registration at 6 pm. From the Chicago Police Department 18th District: Commander William Dunn; Chicago Transit Authority: Jim Keating, chief of security; Navy Pier, John Graeber, director-safety and security; Northwestern University: Chief of Police Bruce Lewis and Assistant Chief Dan McAleer; Loyola University Water Tower Campus: Police Lieutenant Bob Langan.

The SOAR Safety and Security Task Force is developing a very exciting new approach to safety and security in our community modeled on the Chicago Police Department's Community Symposium Initiative. To initiate the project they have invited senior security leadership to participate in a panel to discuss how we, as a community, can make Streeterville the "Safest Neighborhood in Chicago".

Residents will be educated on the resources available to protect themselves and the community.  Following the speakers, there will be a Q&A period where residents can ask questions. This program is FREE. Register today.

SOAR Forms Preservation/Landmark Task Force

SOAR is pleased to announce the formation of the Preservation/Landmark Task Force, chaired by Shelley Gorson, with Maurice Champagne, Betty Eaton and Gail Spreen as founding members.

The mission of the task force is to "identify buildings in Streeterville with architectural or historical significance in order to advocate for their preservation as part of the urban fabric of our community."

View the task force process and the Chicago Historic Resources Survey buildings in Streeterville: North-South Streets and East-West Streets. (Note these are large documents and may take a few minutes to download.)