Health
Heartland to Close Three Chicago Shelters for Unaccompanied Children, Lay Off About 145 Employees
The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services is pictured in Washington, D.C. (Greggory DiSalvo / iStock)
Due to federal funding cuts, the nonprofit Heartland Human Care Services is closing three Chicago shelters that have been used to house unaccompanied minors coming to the U.S.
Those cuts come from the U.S. Office of Refugee Resettlement (ORR) of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (DHHS), which contracts with Heartland for their “unaccompanied alien children” program. At Heartland, immigrant children who have crossed the U.S. border receive residential and medical care, education and legal services before being connected with permanent homes.
About 145 employees across direct service, management and administrative positions will be laid off, according to Robin Carroll, senior director of marketing and communications for Heartland Human Care Services.
Michael Brieschke, chairperson for United Human Service Workers, the union representing the impacted employees, said the Bronzeville location will remain open.
“It will not affect services at all,” Carroll said. “We do have a very strong program … it’s the largest space that we have, and we will be consolidating a lot of services into that particular facility.”
Heartland plans to close facilities in Rogers Park, Washington Heights and Uptown by April 1, according to state filings with the Illinois Department of Commerce and Economic Opportunity.
“It’s really heartbreaking to us to see that three of our four sites are going to be closed by the end of March,” Brieschke said, who is also a case manager in the housing department for Heartland.
Contract negotiations between Heartland and the federal government are ongoing, and the total of funding cuts is unclear, Carroll said.
Heartland is currently in a $117.9 million contract with DHHS for their residential services for unaccompanied children, according to federal spending records. That contract ends March 31. That’s on top of over $45 million in ongoing contracts Heartland has with the federal agency.
The Office of Refugee Resettlement did not address this lapse in funding and instead directed WTTW News to publicly available information on their grantees.
It’s unclear to Carroll exactly why ORR has cut the funding for this program, but she pointed to fewer border crossings as one possibility.
“We do obviously know that the borders are closed and almost all refugee resettlement has been paused, as well as travel bans happening,” Carroll said. “All of that impacts the numbers of new arrivals for us.”
The shelters have come under public scrutiny for allegations of abuse and lax supervision.
In 2021, employees said some Afghan children housed at their shelters required psychiatric hospitalization and hurt themselves, other children or staff, ProPublica reported. Employees said they were overwhelmed and ill-equipped to care for Afghan children and teens in their care.
In 2018, ProPublica also reported that Heartland had received a citation from the Illinois Department of Children and Family Services after an employee was accused of having an inappropriate relationship with a minor. The state concluded the relationship was unfounded and Heartland fired the employee, according to their reporting. Heartland received another citation in 2016 after DCFS found that children had engaged in sexual activity at one facility. There was at least one allegation of battery, but DCFS told ProPublica that the allegation could not be corroborated.
Eight months later, Heartland announced the closure of four shelters.
“I don’t think that has anything to do with what’s happening right now,” Carroll said.
Note: This article has been updated to remove a reference to the total number of children in DHS care nationally as the original number included was not accurate.
Contact Blair Paddock: @blairpaddock.bsky.social | [email protected]
