HISTORY / ACCOMPLISHMENTS
Since 1978, The Westside Ministers Coalition has worked to bring about “positive change” for the Austin community and other communities throughout the city of Chicago. The Coalition started as an extended arm of the “Westside Ministers Conference” to deal with the politics in and around the Chicago land area. The Coalition gave pastors the opportunity to tackle other social issues plaguing our various communities. From this bold move by our spiritual leaders an organization was born like no other in the city.
Over the years the Coalition had been a model for other organizations who desire to make a positive impact on their communities. In the early 1990’s the Coalition invited other “grass roots” organizations in and around the Austin area to come and meet with the members of the Coalition so that we might collectively find ways to help our residents. Since this concept began we have provided many valuable resources and technical support to build the capacity of our faith-based initiatives and other non-profit organizations, through information disseminated at our, monthly networking meetings.
Over the years we have sponsored:
Housing Fairs, Job Fairs, Scholarship Programs, health Fairs, property tax Appeal Workshops and Predatory Lending Forums. In 2006, as a result of our advocacy efforts for Education Equality and Reform, we along with American Quality Schools successfully won a contract bid for our own High School Austin Business & Entrepreneurship Academy, 2008 Plato Learning Academy. To this end, the coalition will continue to positively effect change on the Westside of Chicago and beyond.