Six Acres Is Enough

With colored signs reading “Stop taking our homes” and “Parker stay in your lane,” among other phrases, approximately 15 adults and three children stand before Parker’s iron gates, chanting “Hey hey, ho ho, Parker leave our homes alone,” “Six acres is enough,” and “No means no.” Some hand out paper flyers to passersby and the occasional car honk elicits a cheer from the small crowd. 

At 12:30 p.m. on Saturday, November 9—the same time as Parker’s Middle School Open House—a crowd of Lincoln Park residents gathered in front of Circle Drive to protest Parker’s acquisition of several condominiums in the 300 West block of Belden Avenue. Another protest followed the next Saturday, outside of Parker’s Upper School Open House. 

“Parker secretly bought condominiums in our building, and they are planning to take over our building” Daniel Silvoy, who has lived with his family in his Belden condominium for a year, said. “As I understand it, they purport to be a model democracy and a model democracy, in my view, is one that approached their neighbors transparently.” Silvoy says that Parker did not do this. 

Principal Dan Frank ‘74 denies any allegations that Parker has been secretly acquiring property on Belden. “We’re as clear as can be,” Frank said. “We only respond to people who are interested in us. We’re a deeply embedded and important part of this community for more than a century, and we want to conserve and keep those vital qualities that make this neighborhood a thriving environment for people.” 

The protest follows a series of speculations of Parker’s potential northward expansion, ignited by a Chicago Tribune article published July 31. The article detailed how Parker offered more than $20 million to purchase two residential buildings on Belden: $11.2 million for Belden by the Park and $9 million for the adjacent 19-unit building at 317-325 W. Belden, as told by residents of the buildings. 

In an email sent to the school and neighborhood community on August 8, Frank emphasized how Parker is “responding on a case-by-case basis basis to solicitation we have received” and “Parker is not and has no intention to purchase any other properties, including the Shakespeare Apartments, or any of the townhouses on the 300 block of Belden.”

Parker became interested in the Belden property last spring, according to Frank, after neighborhood residents initiated a conversation with the school. Yet, many of the protestors from March insist that Parker is covertly buying the Belden condominiums. 

“One of the things that I think is important to remember, too, is that Parker did not do this on the up and up,” Jerry Savoy said. Savoy has lived in the 327-333 Belden condominiums with his family for a year, said, “they secretly acquired properties in order to get a foothold in the building, and by doing so, they effectively prevented us from marketing our apartments for sale.”

The “foothold” Savoy is referring to is Section 15 of the Illinois Condominium Property Act. This law states that, if the owners of units representing at least 75% of the units in a condominium association vote to sell the entire condominium, then all the individual condominium owners must sell their condos. 

Simply put, once Parker owns 75% of the total condominiums, other private owners will be obligated to leave at Parker’s request to convert the condominiums into school property. As of now, Parker owns four of the 15 condominiums at 327-335 W. Belden. 

“I just want to emphasize that there are alternatives for Parker to grow on its existing footprint and they don’t seem to be any interest in doing so,” Savoy said. “Rather, their interest is in displacing families who really just want to exist in peace and quiet in their apartments.”

Some alternatives that Savoy and others proposed were building on the staff parking lots, using vacant lots on Clark Street, building up from Parker’s existing buildings, or creating underground parking lots upon which an expansion could be made possible. 

“I’m very much in favor of Parker expanding,” Savoy said, “but I don’t think they need to displace families to do so. They have ample space within their six-acre footprint to expand.”

As prospective families trailed through Circle Drive for the open house, they were handed paper slips which quoted the same phrase splayed across the auditorium: “A school should be a model home, a complete community, and embryonic democracy.” Below, the slip said: “Parker is spending your tuition money to expand its campus by tearing down our homes and destroying our community. Is this a model home?” 

Some of the protestors believe that Parker’s acquirement of properties directly violates the school’s mission statement. “It hurts me a lot to have to do this,” Julian Kerbis ‘70, who grew up at 353 W Belden Avenue and attended Parker, said, “but it’s kind of a sham of the motto we all grow up with that you probably know by heart—a school is a complete community, an embryonic democracy. And here… something Donald Trump would do. It’s legal, but it’s unethical and it’s immoral.”

Frank disagrees. “The sense of respecting people’s own volition and their own choices in life is an important value that we have at Parker,” Frank said, “and we’re living in accord with those values.”