Moses works as a block club leader in South Shore, cleaning up the community and helping people find work. He believes it’s up to the community to care for itself.
You could say appearances are important to Kirk Moses.
As a block club leader in the South Shore part of Chicago, improving the look of the neighborhood is one of his primary focuses.
The way a neighborhood looks, Moses says, determines how people feel as well as the economic opportunities available.
“You can go out to Naperville or Champaign, and you feel like you can let your guard down a little bit. Your head’s not on a swivel,” said Moses, 57, who’s from Chicago and has lived on his block for 20 years.
“If you were a business owner, would you want to set your office up in an area where your building and maybe three other buildings are operable, and all the rest are boarded up?” he said. “I don’t think you would pick that location unless you buy the whole block.”
A few years after he moved to his South Shore block, he started helping out the block club leader who lived a few doors down. Eventually he became the leader.
Shortly after that, the cleanup efforts began when he and a neighbor noticed the condition of the alley behind their homes. “One day, we were going outside to take the trash out, and we were like, ‘Man, why does our block look like this?’ So we started cutting stuff down.”
“Since then, new neighbors have moved on the block adjacent from me across the alley, and we just continued this process,” Moses said. “One of the neighbors sets up a little table. We have drinks and music. We get as many neighbors as we can to participate. Every little bit counts.”
“It’s up to us to look out for us. If we continue to wait on politicians and people in power that have been in power for a significant amount of time to get something done, then we’re just like a dog chasing his tail. We’ve got to just get out there and do it.”
In addition to working to improve the look of the community, Moses has been trying to use his work experience to educate residents about available careers and get them access to work.
“I’m a retired elevator constructor, so I have knowledge and understanding of technical fields and trades.”
Moses said that he encourages people to go into the trades because it offers job security and opportunity. “You’ve got a job for life. It boosts your pay and all types of opportunities. I think the reason people are oblivious to all these opportunities is because the information is not being put out there. I just want to give that information to people.”
Moses also is executive director of Lift Them Up Center, an organization his mother started in Champaign to engage youth. Now, he wants to expand it with a workforce development program where people can learn basic tools, homeowner skills and practical trades.
Through Kam’s Multi-Service, the small business he operates, he offers people one-off jobs. “I will pay guys for labor work if I know they’re out of work. If they’re in a position where, ‘Hey, I need some money real quick,’ or ‘I’m struggling,’ it helps.”
Finding jobs for local residents can be challenging because of factors such as limited education, criminal backgrounds and the businesses available in the area. But Moses is hopeful because of the new opportunities moving in, specifically citing the Illinois Quantum & Microelectronics Park under way at the old U.S. Steel South Works site and a planned 40-bed hospital on the property.
That “is going to make a significant amount of jobs available,” Moses said. “They’re going to need so many people that they’re basically going to be pulling people off the street and giving them the training they need in order to hold those positions down.”
Moses said the city doesn’t get in the way, and he doesn’t necessarily want them to be more involved.
To him, community intervention is better than government intervention “because the government programs are people that are not directly connected to the block.”
Said Moses, “Our job as humans is to leave the world in a better state than it was when we got here.”
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Making the block beautiful and helping people find work — that’s what Kirk Moses is doing. You can support the volunteers at Lift Them Up and learn more about Moses’ upcoming work by reaching out here.
Kirk Moses
Executive director, Lift Them Up Center, and block club leader, South Shore
South Shore, Chicago
