ABSTRACT
This emptiness-“an industrial slum without the industry,” a local resident calls it-is North Lawndale. The neighborhood, according to the Tribune, “has one bank, one supermarket, 48 state lottery agents . . . and 99 licensed bars and liquor stores.” With only a single supermarket, food is of poor quality and overpriced. Martin Luther King, who lived in this neighborhood in 1966, said there was a 10-to-20-percent “color tax” on produce, an estimate that still holds true today. With only a single bank, there are few loans available for home repair; private housing therefore has deteriorated quickly.
