GRAND CROSSING — Businessman Herbert Hedgeman said it makes him sick to his stomach when he sees a veteran homeless or outside begging for change.
"No one who has served their country in the military should come home and be homeless. It really bothers me when I see my fellow veterans down and out with nowhere to go for help," said Hedgeman, an Army veteran. "That's why I plan to build a veterans building because it's needed."
Hedgeman, 83, said he is trying to raise $18 million to build a 92-room apartment building on a vacant lot he owns in the 7500 block of South Maryland Avenue for veterans. He has enlisted Loewenberg Architects as well as Apartment Builders Inc., which is owned by Hedgeman, as a co-developer.
The building would provide one- and two-bedroom units at market rates and also have a medical facility. Once built, the veterans building would sit next to St. Mark Manor, 840 E. 76th St., a senior apartment building which is on land Hedgeman previously owned.
Ald. Michelle Harris (D-8th), whose ward includes the site, was unavailable for comment.
Carl White, a 72-year-old Woodlawn resident, retired from the Army in 2001 after 27 years. He plans to be first in line for a unit.
"I am a veteran true and blue and would welcome the opportunity to live among my brothers," White said. "I will never understand why veterans are treated badly by society when all they did was make this country safer and stronger."
Developing communities is something Hedgeman, a South Shore resident, said he enjoys.
Earlier this week at a community meeting in Chatham, he introduced a proposal to build a 90-room hotel in the 7600 block of South State Street on a vacant lot he also owns.
But the former owner of the Barbara Ann's Inn Motel in Grand Crossing received mixed reactions from residents who overall were not in support of his hotel project.
"Most of the residents against it are seniors and I cannot figure out why seniors do not want to adapt to change," Hedgeman said. "If I do not put a hotel there, you can bet someone else will and I doubt if it's one of us [blacks]."
Unlike the hotel proposal that will require a zoning change, the site for the veterans building is already zoned for residential development.
"I hope to have the money raised and the building fully occupied in the next three to five years," Hedgeman said. "Until then, I plan to continue doing what I can to help veterans and the black community."
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