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This story was originally published by Capital B.

By the time Jerry Whirley heard that a $9 billion quantum-computing campus was coming a few blocks from his South Shore home, most of what he actually needed from his neighborhood, like somewhere to buy medicine or groceries, had already vanished.

He didn’t learn about “Quantum City” from the governor or the mayor, but from a teach-in at his local library, where community activists explained that a Department of Defense–backed supercomputer complex was headed for them.

“Why is there $9 billion for something nobody understands, for something people didn’t ask for,” Whirley, 38, remembers thinking, “when folks here just want a pharmacy, a grocery store, and a chance to stay in their home?”

In 2024, state and city officials signed off on building the project atop contaminated land in one of Chicago’s remaining majority‑Black neighborhoods bordering Lake Michigan. Since then, they have committed hundreds of millions in taxpayer money in partnership with the Pentagon’s research arm to help build what they say will be the country’s first large‑scale quantum computer.

Quantum computing — a largely unknown but rapidly advancing technology — could, in theory, be used for things like health care or infrastructure. The military wants to use this technology to more quickly deploy and detect missiles and drones, improve communication networks, and to detect or accelerate the use of cyber-attacks.

This Isn’t the First Time Chicago’s Been Used as a Laboratory for Policing

In South Shore, where many already feel wedged between the Obama Presidential Center and a wave of speculative development, neighbors fear this project could accelerate rent hikes and property taxes, pushing out the Black families who held on through disinvestment. But when residents tried to use one of the few tools available to directly weigh in — petitioning for a ballot question asking whether the project should be paused until concerns about displacement, utility costs, and pollution were addressed — the city’s elections board blocked it.

Residents told Capital B that their fight is less about opposing new technology than questioning why Black communities are rarely given a real say over what gets built in their neighborhood. So when the referendum was blocked, many saw it as proof that the same people most at risk of being uprooted are being shut out of shaping a multibillion‑dollar experiment in their own backyard.

“We deserve resources, and we also, most importantly, deserve autonomy over our own communities,” said South Shore resident Jayna McGruder. “We’ve been asking for jobs and housing and health care for generations, and instead they’re giving us a war computer.”

Eliza Glezer, assistant deputy director for the Illinois Department of Commerce and Economic Opportunity, rebutted the claim that residents have not had a fair chance to share their opinions about the project. The project has gone through “robust, ongoing community engagement,” the representative said.

“This process ensures residents have........

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