Chicago's Community Development Commission has approved $11.5 million in tax increment financing for a 50-unit affordable housing development in East Garfield Park that will also include a food hall built to support local Black-owned culinary businesses. The project, called Harvest Homes II, is planned for 3456 W. 5th Ave., on a site bounded by W. Jackson Blvd. to the north and W. 5th Ave. to the south, between S. Homan Ave. and S. St. Louis Ave.
The commission also signed off on selling four city-owned parcels for $1 each to help clear the way for construction, according to Urbanize Chicago. The site sits within the city's Midwest Redevelopment Project Area TIF district, a zone created to combat disinvestment across East Garfield Park and North Lawndale, according to a City of Chicago staff report. That district was drawn up after planners recorded more than 700 vacant lots covering over 70 acres within its boundaries, per the city's Department of Planning and Development.
The project is led by the People's Community Development Association of Chicago (PCDAC) alongside the NHP Foundation, the same partnership that delivered the original 36-unit Harvest Homes phase along West 5th Avenue in 2017 for roughly $13 million to $14 million — a project the city says was the first new affordable housing built in East Garfield Park in more than 30 years.
Fifty Units Across a Range of Incomes
Harvest Homes II will include 50 affordable apartments split among 19 one-bedroom, 20 two-bedroom, and 11 three-bedroom units ranging from about 600 to 1,100 square feet, according to the NHP Foundation. Per the seed report, the income mix includes 5 units set aside at 30% of area median income, 12 units at 50% AMI, and 33 units at 60% AMI. The three-story building will reach 41 feet in height and is designed in a U-shape by Urbanworks, with a facade mixing dark gray and redwood ribbed metal panels, ironspot brick, and Juliet balcony railings.
Amenities will include a community room, a fitness room, a management office, and a bike room with 50 spaces, along with 11 parking spaces on site. A north courtyard along W. Jackson Blvd. will feature green space for residents and the community, including a resident plaza, a public plaza, and a playground.
Food Hall Aimed at Local Black-Owned Businesses
The development's roughly 5,000-square-foot food hall and kitchen will include an outdoor patio, seating for about 150 people, and space for three food vendors. The concept is meant to address East Garfield Park's status as a food desert with few sit-down restaurants by giving local Black-owned culinary businesses shared kitchen resources and lower startup costs, according to the NHP Foundation and PCDAC.
General contractor Burling Builders has set up a targeted local hiring initiative for construction, prioritizing recruitment from West Side zip codes 60624, 60612, and 60623. The move mirrors a pattern West Side community leaders have pushed for on other publicly financed housing projects in the area.
A Complex Financing Stack Years in the Making
City planning staff put the total development cost at $39.77 million, including $29.67 million in hard construction costs — about $455.62 per square foot — and $1.12 million in land acquisition. The seed report rounds the overall project cost to $39.8 million. Beyond the $11.5 million in TIF funds, financing includes $15.84 million in 9% low-income housing tax credit equity, $9.65 million in city multi-family loan funds, $1.4 million in debt, $730,000 in seller notes, $320,000 from a ComEd energy grant, and another $320,000 in IAHTC equity.
Harvest Homes II first secured its competitive 9% Low-Income Housing Tax Credits from the Chicago Department of Housing back in 2023, well before the project sought city TIF subsidy and land transfers, per the NHP Foundation. The site cleared its zoning hurdles last year, when the Chicago Plan Commission approved the rezoning in June 2025 and the City Council followed in July 2025, shifting the parcels from RM-5 and B3-3 designations to a unified B2-3 Neighborhood Mixed Use Planned Development, according to Chicago YIMBY.
What Comes Next
Developers still need to draft a formal redevelopment agreement, and the financing package requires final Chicago City Council approval before it can close, per the commission's action. Construction is expected to start in November 2026, with completion targeted for May 2028.
The approval adds to a string of recent public investments in East Garfield Park housing. The city approved $14.5 million in TIF funding in February for Hub 32, another mixed-use project in the neighborhood, and a 14-unit transitional housing development opened nearby in May. Those additions come as tenants elsewhere in the neighborhood, including at Harrison Courts, have raised concerns about deteriorating conditions in existing housing stock — a reminder of the gap between new construction and the state of the area's older buildings.
