Weak. I have friends, too, that live there and they are excited about spring and not at all bitching about the quality of life.
It would take one generation -- maybe two. Have standards for schools, pay great teachers like they're really professionals that are important, and have some child welfare funding and terminate neglectful parents' rights and have someone raise the kids with discipline and values -- if private people won't, then the gub'mint should. It would have a profound impact.
What's your solution? Or are you down with poverty, bad healthcare, low life expectancy, and lousy schools?
If you read these boards you'd think it's uninhabitable. It's not just "nice areas" either, some of the south side is cool, and most of everything from the loop and north is cool. That's not counting Oak Lawn and the suburbs. It's absurd to act like Chicago is a failed city. It's an international city with more going on than the entire state of oklahoma could ever dream of.
It's sad you could care less about poor white kids living in poverty.