They say about America—and if we’re being honest, they’re not wrong—that it is a country where everyone dreams in green, the color of the dollar, where our days are spent rushing from one job to another just to fill our pockets and pay the bills, rent, and tuition.
However, there are also those who, amid the general pursuit of money, do not forget the importance of social responsibility and caring for the community.
The Serbian transportation company Denver Cargo decided to help the local community in the Chicago suburb where it has its office and yard by launching a project through which it hired and accepted 37 young people from the town of Ford Heights, whose population is predominantly African American, for internships and training.
The entire initiative was organized in cooperation with the town’s mayor, Mr. Freddie Wilson, who has been so impressed by the partnership with the Serbian-American company and its owner, Filip Milivojević, that he plans to visit Serbia soon together with the top participants of the joint project.
Following this information, we traveled to a suburb of Chicago and spoke with the main figures behind our story.
We first spoke with Mr. Filip Milivojević, who explained how he came up with the idea for the project and what he hoped to achieve with it.
Ford Heights Mayor Freddie Wilson emphasized that everyone will benefit from the project:
“This is for the benefit of everyone. From the young people, who will learn practical business skills and launch their first businesses, to their parents, who will know their children are not out on the streets, and finally to the local community, which will become a better and safer place to live through youth employment and the creation of new companies!”
The owner of the Serbian-American company Denver Cargo, Filip Milivojević, says the goal of the project is to help create better conditions for living and doing business in the local community:
“Our plan is to achieve that goal by training and involving young people in business activities and initiatives. At my company, young people from Ford Heights have had and will continue to have the opportunity to learn different types of jobs within the transportation industry, but we also motivate them to start their own businesses. Some of them are already on their way to opening daycare centers, recycling companies, agricultural businesses, or developing software for online gambling.”
Together with our hosts, we visited a workshop they jointly established and supported, where young people are learning basic skills that may one day help them in everyday life or in the workplace. The mayor was particularly proud that children who, until recently, did not know how to hammer a nail have now learned to build prefabricated houses, furniture components, and toolboxes.
Asked whether, if successful, their project could become a model for other companies and local communities across America, Filip Milivojević answered affirmatively.
“We want our model and project to encourage other cities and companies here in America and in our Serbia, to provide them with an example and exchange experiences. Companies both here and there have a social responsibility to help their local communities, to guide young people toward success instead of leaving them on the streets, exposed to crime.”
At the end of the interview, Mayor Freddie Wilson said he is proud to be part of an international project with a Serbian company—a project in which all cultural, national, and racial differences disappear—and that he can hardly wait for his first visit to Serbia.
In the meantime, take a look at our on-the-ground report from Ford Heights…
We also learned from Mr. Wilson that there is still a great deal of unused land within his town, with large vacant lots available for sale or lease. He therefore invited other Serbian and Balkan companies in and around Chicago to contact him and relocate their businesses to Ford Heights, becoming part of this project as well.
Property prices are, he says, affordable, while an additional advantage for trucking companies is the immediate proximity of exits to four major highways, as well as the large yards of major companies such as Amazon, XPO, FedEx, and others.
Author: Antonije Kovačević Edit: Ivana Talijan
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