DNC host committee seeks representatives from Chicago’s 77 community areas
Chicago’s host committee for this summer’s Democratic National Convention is seeking representatives from each of city’s 77 community areas to spearhead recruiting and volunteering efforts for the convention.
These 77 neighborhood ambassadors will each be responsible for recruiting at least 50 volunteers from their neighborhoods to help with a variety of tasks before and during the Aug. 19-22 convention, as well as hosting neighborhood events and serving as liaisons between convention organizers and community groups.
“One of the reasons Chicago was selected (to host the DNC) is because the diversity of our city really reflects the diversity of the country,” said Natalie Edelstein, a spokeswoman for the local host committee. “We want to make sure that our volunteer corps matches the diversity of our city. We want to make sure that all of the folks … from Rogers Park to Pullman have a say in convention planning, have a stake in the event and feel like they’re being represented.”
The neighborhood ambassadors themselves will be volunteers and the application can be found online at chicago2024.com/neighborhoodambassadorprogram. The application process will remain open through Feb. 9.
Convention organizers also are looking for 23 ambassadors to represent surrounding suburbs. In all, organizers anticipating needing 12,000 volunteers to pull off the convention at which President Joe Biden is expected to receive the national Democratic Party’s nomination for a second term.
Volunteers, who must be at least 16 years old and able to pass background checks, will work in a variety of roles, from helping delegates and other visitors navigate the city’s airports to staffing convention headquarters and helping with communications and media logistics, Edelstein said.
“I’m not kidding when I say we have a job for everyone,” she said.
The convention, especially the made-for-TV spectacle of prime-time speeches from the floor of the United Center, will bring the national spotlight to the city as it continues grappling with gun violence and the ongoing migrant crisis, which has caused divisions among top Democrats.
Communities, particularly on the West Side west of the United Center, are eager to see a boost from the convention, much like communities east of the stadium saw under then-Mayor Richard M. Daley ahead of the 1996 DNC, when the city poured $60 million on beautification efforts.
U.S. Rep. Danny Davis, Ald. Walter Burnett Jr. and other West Side leaders told the Tribune last summer that they would be advocating with both convention organizers and City Hall for investments to be made and opportunities to be given to residents there.
Aside from recruiting volunteers, part of the role of the neighborhood ambassadors will be to communicate neighborhood-level concerns to convention organizers, Edelstein said.
“We view it as sort of an open line of communication,” she said. “We want to know what’s going on in the various areas of the city. We want to know what concerns folks have about the convention, and vice versa.”
In an effort to ensure diversity among contractors and other businesses involved with the DNC, the host committee late last year announced the creation of an advisory council to set diversity spending goals as well as to establish equity practices, community engagement strategies and contract and event execution plans.
Earlier this month, the host committee and the Democratic National Convention Committee said they’d hired four major contractors to play key roles in convention operations at the United Center. Among them were Englewood-based Show Strategy, a Black-owned business that will provide exposition services and, with Maryland-based Hargrove, serves as event manager.
Organizers also selected Kansas City, Missouri-based Populous as the event architect and a joint venture of longtime Chicago construction firm, McHugh Construction, and Powers & Sons Construction Co., a minority-owned firm, as construction manager.
