Under pressure from City Council members, Mayor Brandon Johnson on Monday pushed back — until mid-March at the earliest — the city’s plan to evict migrants living in the city’s 28 shelters after 60 days.
Nearly 2,000 people were set to be evicted had the policy been enforced as planned beginning Thursday. That number was expected to grow to about 6,000 people by the following week. Evicted migrants would have been able to reapply for shelter.
Johnson postponed that day of reckoning under pressure from more than a dozen alderpersons who last week signed a letter urging Johnson to delay evictions.
“We initially instituted the 60-day limit in conjunction with the state’s announcement of additional resources for resettlement and case management because our plan for temporary emergency shelter was never meant as a long-term housing solution,” Johnson said at a news conference Monday.
“But we want to give every person and every single family that has come to our city enough time to process their work authorization, find housing, start a new life in our great city.”
Johnson added that his administration will “continue to assess this developing situation as we move through these winter months.”
Family and Support Services Commissioner Brandie Knazze said the 28 emergency shelters Chicago has opened for nearly 14,000 new arrivals were “built on the premise that shelter stays would be short term.”
She also elaborated on the mayor’s decision to postpone the 60-day eviction policy.
“Due to the extreme cold weather Chicago experienced over the last two weeks, we extended the exit dates for new arrivals who were set to leave shelter throughout the month of January,” Knazze said. “The new 60-day exit policy is as follows: Residents who have an exit date between Jan. 16 and Feb. 29 will be given a 60-day extension starting from their original exit date. For example, if an individual was scheduled to leave on Jan. 16, their new exit date is March 16. There are approximately 5,673 people who fall into this category.
“Residents who received a 60-day notice and were scheduled to exit shelter on March 1 and March 28 will receive a 30-day extension from their planned exit date,” Knazze added. “There are approximately 2,119 individuals who fall into this category. Anyone new who has entered the shelter system, starting today, will receive the standard, 60-day notice.”
Johnson said what’s driving the 60-day eviction policy that he now plans to implement in late winter or early spring is the fact that the $1.5 million a day that Chicago is spending will exhaust the $150 million appropriated for the migrant crisis for all of 2024 in about 100 days.
“We also want to make sure that we are doing our due diligence to be responsible stewards of our resources,” the mayor said. “Being responsible with the resources that we have — that’s my fiduciary” responsibility.
“Make no mistake about it: Unless the federal government invests in this mission, a local municipality is not designed to carry this mission, yet somehow we’ve managed,” Johnson added. “But it’s not sustainable.”
Johnson again criticized Texas Gov. Greg Abbott for not coordinating with the city and surrounding suburbs when sending migrants to the Chicago area.
“Unfortunately, the governor of Texas has not been a cooperative partner in this endeavor,” Johnson said.
“When migrants are on buses, they don’t know where they’re going. This is the part that’s so raggedy and reckless and evil about the governor of Texas,” Johnson said. “He’s not even giving them the dignity to actually have a conversation about where they might want to go. That is so irresponsible.”
Johnson noted that before he ordered the 60-day eviction policy, “There were still people in shelter from 2022. It’s temporary emergency shelter. ... It was never meant to be permanent shelter.”
He refused to say what the city would do when the $150 million runs out, just as top mayoral aides refused to during Council hearings on his $16.7 billion budget for 2024.
Ald. Andre Vasquez (40th), chair of the Council’s Committee on Immigrant and Refugee Rights, told the Sun-Times he is “really grateful” the mayor is willing to “collaborate and listen.”
Johnson “leads with his heart,” Vasquez said. “If we had the same type of leadership from the governor and the president, this mission would be a lot more achievable.”
Vasquez said he is not at all disappointed that the eviction policy has only been postponed, not called off entirely.
“Some of what made this extremely urgent was the fact that we’re talking about Chicago winters. So I think it’s fair to have a reassessment period in March,” Vasquez said.
“Our hope is that the governor is able to be more forthcoming as a partner so that other municipalities in the state can take some of the capacity,” Vasquez added. “I know we have a spot in the 40th [Ward] that could be a shelter. ... And we are looking to see what can be done by the president through executive action, knowing that Congress is Congress” and unlikely to act.
At his news conference, Johnson was asked whether a factor in his decision to postpone the 60-day eviction notice was the fact that there are 723 shelter inhabitants connected to rental assistance and in some process of finding housing.
“Being flexible and having some nimbleness in this mission is what we have always set out to do,” Johnson said. “We have studied this policy in regions all over the country. And our goal ... is to continue to build an operation that’s centered around people’s humanity.”
Contributing: Michael Loria
