HYDE PARK — Hyde Parkers are carrying on with plans for caroling in Cornell Park after it was the site of a fatal shooting earlier this month.
The Cornell Park Advisory Council is organizing an evening bonfire, caroling and hot chocolate from 5-7 p.m. Thursday at the park, 5473 S. Cornell Ave.
The pocket park in East Hyde Park was the site of a shooting Dec. 2 that police characterized as an execution fueled by a feud over drugs. Curtis Nowells, 33, was shot in his head and killed at 2:50 p.m. on a Friday, rattling neighbors who have been working to improve the park.
The advisory council is encouraging people to come back out and keep the park active despite the cold weather with an evening teaching kids crafts like building a birdhouse and caroling around a bonfire with hot chocolate.
Neighbors have been working to hang Christmas lights to brighten the park that was marred by the recent shooting and have longer term plans to improve the park.
“Of course, the shooting is on peoples minds, but I wouldn't want that to obscure the fact that these planned events are an extension of a number of positive events that preceded the shooting,” said Norm Bell, president of the advisory council.
The park’s rotted wooden playground was removed by the Chicago Park District in 2013. The Park District has been working with the advisory council to develop a new playground that is more focused around teaching kids about nature.
Bell said the advisory council is planting native plants and planning more educational events for kids.
The shooting of Nowells happened just steps away from a new information kiosk, one of the first new installations for the park by the advisory council.
Though neighbors have complained in the past about drug sales in the park, which in part prompted the formation of the advisory council, the park seemed to be turning around due to the efforts of neighbors.
Wentworth District Cmdr. Crystal King-Smith said Monday that police monitored the park after the shooting and found no evidence that the park was still being used for drug sales.
She said Nowells was from South Shore and the shooting so far did not appear to involve anyone from Hyde Park.
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