Politics
Chicago Will No Longer Guarantee Migrants a Bed in City Shelters Under New Unified Approach: Mayor
The city of Chicago’s landing zone for migrants at Desplaines and Polk streets on Jan. 3, 2024. (WTTW News)
Migrants who make their way to Chicago will no longer be guaranteed a bed in a city shelter, Mayor Brandon Johnson announced Monday, as city, state and county officials launch a unified system to assist all unhoused Chicagoans.
Starting Tuesday, only migrants who have been in the country for less than a month will be eligible for a spot in one of the city’s 13 shelters designated for people city officials refer to as new arrivals, Johnson announced at a City Hall news conference at which he sought to declare victory over what he said was a humanitarian crisis he inherited when he took office in May 2023.
“We fought back and showed the world just how welcoming we can be,” Johnson said, noting that Chicago was targeted because it is a self-proclaimed sanctuary city.
Those who do get a spot in a city shelter will no longer be guaranteed a place to live for at least 60 days, as has been the case since the humanitarian crisis began more than two years ago, officials announced.
Only those suffering from illness, disabilities and pregnancy will be eligible for extensions through Jan. 1. No extensions will be offered after that, officials said.
The changes come as city, state and county officials transition to a unified shelter system that cares for the newest Chicagoans as well as longtime residents who are unhoused. That will streamline operations and reduce the exorbitant cost of operating the migrant shelters, officials said. That system, known as the One System Initiative, is set to launch in January.
There are no formal limits on the length of stays in the city’s traditional shelter system.
There were fewer than 5,000 migrants living in 13 facilities as of Saturday, according to city data. More than 3,400 migrants living in city shelters are members of families, while another 1,600 are single men and women, records show.
Once the new system is in place, just 3,800 beds will be available to migrants, in addition to the city’s longstanding capacity of 3,000 traditional shelter beds, for a total of 6,800 beds, according to officials.
That could lead to the eviction of approximately 1,200 people, raising fears of a new surge of unhoused Chicagoans being forced to sleep on the city’s streets just as cold weather begins to settle over the city.
If beds are available in city shelters, those facing eviction with nowhere else to go can apply to enter the new system, Commissioner Brandie Knazze said.
Had Chicago voters approved a ballot measure to give the Chicago City Council the power to hike taxes on properties worth more than $1 million, the city would have been able to use the $100 million it was projected to generate annually to fund 11,000 beds for all unhoused Chicagoans, Johnson said.
“Instead, we can only encumber what our budget allows,” Johnson said. “But imagine the increase in our capacity if Bring Chicago Home had passed.”
Johnson blamed “stingy and greedy corporations” for the defeat.
Once the new system launches, city officials will continue crafting a five-year plan to address Chicago’s homelessness crisis, which worsened during the COVID-19 pandemic and surge of migrants, Chief Homelessness Officer Sendy Soto said.
A rental assistance program that could help unhoused Chicagoans find a permanent place to live is under development, as is an effort to create an intake center that could help connect those struggling to find somewhere to live access services, Soto said.
Starting in August 2022, approximately 50,000 people, many fleeing violence and economic collapse in Venezuela, arrived in Chicago. That strained the city’s social safety net, ballooned the city’s budget shortfall and exacerbated tension between Chicago’s Black and Latino communities.
The announcement represents Johnson’s most significant attempt to reduce the city resources set aside specifically for migrants who crossed the southern border, requested asylum and have permission to remain in the United States while their cases are resolved.
Many arrived in Chicago on buses paid for by Texas Gov. Greg Abbott, a Republican determined to boost former President Donald Trump’s efforts to win a second term in office. Johnson has called Abbott evil.
The announcement comes a little more than a week before Johnson is set to lay out his plan to fill not just the projected $982.4 million shortfall facing the city in 2025 but also the $222.9 million gap in this year’s city budget.
Johnson endured a political firestorm for supporting the city’s efforts to care for the migrants, which has cost Chicago taxpayers $198.7 million since the crisis began. The city’s budget forecast, released Aug. 29, set aside an additional $150 million to care for the migrants in 2025.
The city’s budget will not set aside specific funds to care for the migrants, since they will now be part of the city’s larger efforts to address homelessness, Soto said.
Johnson announced a 60-day limit on shelter stays for migrants in November, saying he would not “sacrifice the needs of Chicagoans in support of those who wish to become Chicagoans.”
The first migrants were not evicted from city shelters until March. All were allowed to return to a state-run intake center at the designated “landing zone” for buses from Texas at Polk and Desplaines streets in the West Loop to reapply for shelter.
Starting Nov. 1, the landing zone will only be open 8 a.m. to 8 p.m. It will end its operation by the end of the year, officials said.
More than 75% of the more than 2,731 migrants evicted from city shelters since March had nowhere else to go, and continued to live in city facilities, according to city data.
A new policy implemented by President Joe Biden has significantly reduced the number of migrants crossing the border without permission to the lowest monthly total along the southwest border since September 2020.
The last bus of migrants from Texas arrived in Chicago in mid-June, officials said.
That change gives the city the opportunity to declare an end to the state of emergency declared by former Mayor Lori Lightfoot days before she left office in May 2023, officials said. The migrant crisis defined Johnson’s first months in office, and shaped the debate over his first budget.
With no beds available in city shelters, nearly 4,000 migrants were forced to live in police stations across the city for months.
At the peak of the crisis in January, nearly 15,000 migrants lived in city facilities after the Johnson administration rapidly opened new shelters to care for the city’s newest residents. Most of those shelters were operated by Favorite Healthcare Staffing under a lucrative contract awarded by Lightfoot and condemned by Johnson.
While Johnson renegotiated that contract to make it less expensive, officials said they had no choice but to continue to pay the Kansas-based emergency staffing firm to care for the migrants who made their way to Chicago. In all, the firm has been paid $342.5 million by the city using a combination of city, state and federal funds, records show.
The new, unified shelter system will not use Favorite Healthcare Staffing, Knazze said.
That will save the city money and ensure a better level of care, Knazze said.
The number of Chicagoans living in city shelters or on city streets tripled between January 2023 and January 2024, according to the annual survey used by federal officials to track homelessness.
More than 18,800 people in Chicago lacked a permanent place to sleep, according to the annual “point-in-time” count, which sends volunteers out to count the number of unsheltered people on the city’s streets on a single night and is used by U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development officials to determine federal funding levels. The 2024 count took place on Jan. 25.
That included more than 3,500 unhoused longtime Chicagoans living in city shelters, and 1,400 longtime Chicagoans who were unsheltered, according to the data.
Contact Heather Cherone: @HeatherCherone | (773) 569-1863 | [email protected]
