HOUGH AREA DEVELOPMENT CORP. - The Encyclopedia of Cleveland History

The HOUGH AREA DEVELOPMENT CORP. (HADC), a locally based organization formed in the spring of 1967 to direct neighborhood redevelopment after the HOUGH RIOTS, undertook several ambitious programs before becoming inactive in 1984. After the riots, DeForest Brown, a street minister turned social worker, feared the misuse of HOUGH reconstruction monies. Brown put together a coalition of professionals and neighborhood leaders. Known as the Machine, Brown's coalition included Hough leaders Daisy L. Craggett and Christine A. Randles, architect Julian C. Madison, and Burt W. Griffin and C. Lyonel Jones of the LEGAL AID SOCIETY OF CLEVELAND. The group formed the HADC in secret, fearing that the local COUNCIL FOR ECONOMIC OPPORTUNITIES (CEO) IN GREATER CLEVELAND and other officials would take control. HADC found support within the federal Office of Economic Opportunity (OEO) and from Mayor Carl Stokes's CLEVELAND: NOW! program, which provided an initial $62,000 grant. In July 1968 HADC received a $1.6 million OEO grant to fund a shopping center (Martin Luther King, Jr., Plaza at Wade Park Ave. and Crawford Rd.), 600 units for housing development, and a factory (Community Products, Inc.). Perhaps HADC's most controversial project, involving picketing and boycotting, was Great Eastern (formerly Ghetto East) Enterprises, Inc., and in 1969 the purchase of 2 McDonald's restaurant franchises by HADC in cooperation with "Rabbi" David Hill. Although problems plagued all of these community efforts, they symbolized the ability of AFRICAN AMERICANS to plan, build, and operate businesses in areas where urban renewal had failed.

Changes in federal policy cut off federal funding; by Sept. 1982 HADC was dependent on local foundations. In Jan. 1984 the Hough Area Development Corp. laid off its staff.

Hough Area Development Corp. Records, WRHS.

Related Article(s)

• AFRICAN AMERICAN HISTORY
• REFORM, CHARITY AND PHILANTHROPY
• NEIGHBORHOODS AND LANDMARKS