GRAND BOULEVARD — Four volunteers with My Block, My Hood, My City were robbed while hanging up Christmas lights in Grand Boulevard on Saturday, the nonprofit and police confirmed.
The volunteers were decorating a home near 48th Street and Martin Luther King Drive as part of the nonprofit’s annual “Be Part of the Light” event, which aims to decorate homes, buildings and light poles for the holidays along a 12-mile stretch of King Drive.
Around 3:50 p.m., four women ages 30-34 were decorating a home near 48th and King Drive when multiple people pulled up in a white SUV and got out, demanding the women’s belongings before fleeing with a purse, wallet and a fanny pack, police said.
The volunteers were unharmed and went home “in good spirits, healthy, and OK physically,” said Ernesto Gonzalez, marketing manager of My Block, My Hood, My City.
“It’s unfortunate. The reason we do this work, it’s because the South Side needs love, needs light,” Gonzalez said. “[This event] isn’t going to fix such a deep-rooted issue in one day. This is years of work.”
No one is in custody and detectives are investigating the robbery, police said.
The robbery interrupted what was otherwise a positive event to spread Christmas cheer across the South Side. More than 300 volunteers bundled up Saturday to decorate more than 100 homes King Drive between 35th and 115th streets before a Christmas tree lighting ceremony in Washington Park.
My Block, My Hood, My City’s founder, congressional candidate Jahmal Cole, has experienced the deep rooted issues that plague some South Side neighborhoods firsthand. He was shot in the arm in September in South Shore and shot at on 53rd Street in Hyde Park in November, he previously told Block Club.
Gonzalez said the group’s annual tradition also is meant to uplift South Siders.
“When someone [robs someone else,] it’s because they lost [hope],” he said. “And that’s why we’re here. … Lights like this, outside of looking nice, it gives people hope,” Gonzalez said. “And it should give people curiosity to do more for their neighbors.”
To make matters worse, the Christmas tree the group saw lit up in Washington Park was burned overnight — for the second year in a row, according to Washington Park Chamber of Commerce CEO Donna Hampton-Smith. The tree has been vandalized repeatedly over the years.
“It’s unfortunate that an event that was supposed to bring the community together resulted in the burning of a beautiful tree,” Cole said in a statement. “While it is a setback it’s not going to stop us from beautifying the community through holiday season.”
Organizers say the setback won’t deter My Block, My Hood, My City from hosting a second Light Up The South Side event Dec. 13, but the team plans to beef up security, Gonzalez said.
“We know our volunteers are the heart of M3,” Gonzalez said. “We’re headed into our fifth year of giving, and we’re going to continue this until we can’t do it anymore. I don’t see that ever stopping.”