Chicago (CNN) — Abandoned homes, run-down businesses, and vacant lots where condemned buildings once stood: These signs of urban decay are everywhere in Englewood, a community on Chicago’s South Side. It’s one of the city’s most dangerous neighborhoods, with a high poverty rate.

Many people avoid Englewood because of these problems; Quilen Blackwell moved there because of them. And for more than a decade, he’s worked to cultivate opportunities for the area’s young people. Several years ago, he came up with a surprising solution: flowers.

Since 2017, he’s turned vacant lots into eco-friendly flower farms and now employs 25 local young people to grow, arrange, and sell flowers through his nonprofit shop, Southside Blooms . By finding value in neglected spaces, he is giving youth a chanc

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