Chicago’s Attack On The Homeless: After Tent City Evictions, People Are In Hiding

As temperatures drop and the winter months near, the city of Chicago remains committed to ensuring homeless individuals are unable to erect “Tent Cities” in the Uptown area of the city near Lake Shore Drive. Authorities also contend the city has no obligation to offer alternative housing for homeless individuals.

The Chicago Police Department is prohibiting any “protest tent encampments” in Uptown and anyone who attempts to setup tents will be subject to arrest, as of September 19.

Such treatment of homeless people is typical of Alderman James Cappleman, whose ward includes Uptown. In his career as a politician, Cappleman has fought to ban low-rent cubicle hotels, introduced an ordinance to criminalize those at bus stops that are not waiting for buses, and ordered a Salvation Army food truck to stop providing food to homeless people. Cappleman also has overseen the loss of over 1,000 single-room occupancy units of affordable housing in the ward.

The actions of city officials have led to a federal lawsuit submitted to the United States District Court for the Northern District of Illinois. On behalf of Uptown Tent City Organizers (UTCO) and one of its members, Andy Thayer, the Uptown People’s Law Center alleges the city of Chicago has violated their First, Fourth, Fifth, Eighth, and Fourteenth Amendment rights by “denying” the group “any venue to establish their protest encampment, arresting and threatening to arrest those that do so, and threatening to seize plaintiffs.”

“People are in hiding literally because the city has, subsequent to the evictions, tossed out people’s tents and tossed out people’s tarps and done it in a patently illegal fashion,” Thayer told Shadowproof. “Parks Department workers about a week or so ago came upon a place [in Lincoln Park] where people were staying. It was during park open hours and yet they confiscated people’s stuff and threw it into the trash, threw it into a garbage truck.”

Thayer said people are hiding on private property. They are hiding on public ways. At 35th and Federal on the south side, where people were at the viaducts, the police threatened them with arrest. A similar incident happened at the Chicago River by Fullerton Avenue.

Uptown’s homeless population accounts for nearly ten percent of the homeless population in Chicago. In total, there are about 82,000 homeless in the city, according to the Chicago Coalition for the Homeless. There are not enough shelters. It is a “very dire situation,” Thayer added.

A Visible Presence To Protest The Lack Of Affordable Housing

As Thayer described, encampments offer homeless people “collective security” and community. They make it possible for people who work to leave without fearing their property will be stolen. A major complaint with shelters, particularly the Pacific Garden Mission, is that staff will steal people’s possessions.