So Hull House closed on Friday without a whimper. No one put up a fight. So maybe it deserved to die. Over 635 people have signed the online petition to save Hull House by the time of this writing but no one organization took the issue on.

I spoke to or reached out to leaders of organizations that had Jane Addams in their names. UIC’s Jane Addams College of Social Work (http://www­.uic.edu/j­addams/col­lege), the Jane Addams Hull House Museum (http://www­.uic.edu/j­addams/hul­l) – both creatures of the University of Illinois at Chicago and therefore PUBLIC institutio­ns supported by our tax dollars and the Jane Addams Senior Caucus (http://www­.seniorcau­cus.org). They had no interest in pushing back.

What about the professional associations of social workers around the world and the ones that represent Illinois social workers? Nothing.

What about schools of social work, schools of public policy, schools of public health and schools that teach about good government? Nothing.

Did the legislators of Illinois and Chicago who lavish hundreds of millions of PUBLIC dollars on greedy private companies raise a stink or offer solutions. Nothing.

Shame on them. Shame on all of us.

OK, that’s the past – what about the future?

What can we learn from this sad story?

Who will bring us together to discuss public priorities and public disasters such as this one?