A measure awaiting Gov. Bruce Rauner's signature would enable local counties or municipalities to create urban agricultural zones in areas where access to food is limited.
Sonya Harper is a state representative whose district covers the contrasting sides of Chicago that have come to symbolize the Windy City.
"I think my district perfectly represents the two Chicagos that everybody talks about, the great part that everybody sees on TV, so I've got part of the loop downtown, but I grew up on the south side of the city in a neighborhood called West Englewood and that's a food desert," Harper said.
Harper said her community on the southwest side of Chicago has one grocery store to serve close to 70,000 people. Many of those residents lack transportation. "If I'm an elderly person or I'm a mother with lots of kids, I really don't have good access to get to that grocery store easily," Harper said. "In the other part of my district probably not even 10 miles away, residents there can walk to five different grocery stores, five different restaurants."
So Harper helped create a farming community in her neighborhood through a program called Grow Greater Englewood. Its mission is to help fill that grocery void, put people to work using vacant and abandoned property and give people in her hometown healthier food options.
"Every day more people are dying in our communities from preventable diseases moreso than bullets. We've found a way to use our vacant land--because we have lots of vacant land--as a way to grow food, as a way to meet our own dietary needs," Harper said.
She said several farms have set up in Englewood, while much of the produce is sold at food stands and farmers markets. She added the group is still working on improving distribution chains so the food can help people across a wider area.
Harper has since left the group and become a state legislator. She figures if it can work in Englewood as a pilot project, why can't it work elsewhere in the state?
The Democrat who took office in 2015 championed a measure to allow local governments to create urban agricultural zones intended to give incentives to producers to set up in food deserts. Producers which sell at least 75 percent of food that's locally grown would be eligible. Sales taxes from agriculture products would be diverted to a fund that could be dedicated for a county, municipality, or one or more school district.