Reception begins at 5:00 pm

Join WTTW, the National Public Housing Museum and award-winning filmmakers Sarah Burns and David McMahon - whose film credits with Ken Burns include The Central Park Five and Jackie Robinson - for a preview and discussion of their upcoming feature-length documentary East Lake Meadow: A Public Housing Story, premiering on WTTW11 on Tuesday, March 24.

In 1970, the Atlanta Housing Authority opened a public housing community called East Lake Meadows on the edge of the city. But as public housing in America was abandoned and stigmatized and a crack wave swept through the neighborhood, East Lake Meadows became nearly uninhabitable. In the mid-1990s, Atlanta bulldozed the housing project to make way for new, mixed-income housing. Through the stories of former residents, the film raises critical questions about concentrated poverty and limited housing opportunity for African Americans, and what can be done to address it. Executive Producer of East Lake Meadows: A Public Housing Story is Ken Burns.

Immediately following the screening, Sarah Burns and David McMahon (producers of East Lake Meadows- A Public Housing Story), Dr. Lisa Yun Lee (Executive Director of the National Public Housing Museum), Cheryl Johnson (Executive Director of People for Community Recovery and Altgeld Gardens resident), and JR Fleming (Coalition to Protect Public Housing director, founder of the Chicago Anti-Eviction Campaign, and former Cabrini-Green resident) will discuss the film and public housing.

This event is now full.