LITTLE VILLAGE — About 230 people will soon be housed in a new migrant shelter built in a shuttered CVS store in Little Village.
The city and state are working to transform the closed store at 2634 S. Pulaski Road into a shelter for families with children for six months, leaders said at a community meeting Monday night.
The Little Village shelter is being funded by the state — the first one in the city of Chicago, according to officials. There is no move-in date yet, but the hope is to have people in before the end of the year, according to the Department of Family Support Services.
Ald. Mike Rodriguez (22nd); Beatriz Ponce de Leon, the deputy mayor of immigrant, migrant and refugee rights; and city officials with the Department of Family Support Services, Chicago Public Schools and Chicago Police hosted the meeting in Little Village to let neighbors know about the shelter’s opening and to answer questions.
The move to open a shelter in Little Village comes as the city’s previous plan to open a base camp for 2,000 migrants in Brighton Park was scuttled by the state last week. The “winterized” tent camps were proposed by Mayor Brandon Johnson as a way to quickly get thousands of migrants out of police station lobbies.
A spokesman for Johnson said Monday there are no immediate plans to open any winterized tent camps.
RELATED: State Says No Tent Camp For Migrants On Contaminated Brighton Park Site
GardaWorld, the controversial company which has contracts both with the state and city, will staff the Little Village shelter, said Danny Castañeda with the Department of Family and Support Services. They’ll be in charge of things like site construction, providing food, maintaining bathrooms and showers and other basic necessities, he said.
The Little-Village based group New Life Centers will also have members inside the shelter to connect migrants with resources like housing or employment assistance, executive director Matt DeMateo said.
More than 24,500 people have arrived to the city since August 2022, Ponce de Leon said Monday. About 13,700 people are living in the city’s shelters, while just under 600 people are waiting for shelter space in police stations and airports, she said.
The former Little Village pharmacy will join 26 other buildings acting as temporary shelters for migrants citywide — including City Colleges, closed schools and park facilities.
Ponce de Leon said initial checks don’t show any environmental concerns or reason for remediation. But the site won’t open until the Illinois Environmental Protection Agency reviews the reports and confirms the findings satisfy their standards, she said.
Similar community meetings have been seen fierce pushback and disruptions from audience members opposed to the city’s decisions, but the Monday evening meeting in Little Village remained mostly respectful.
In response to questions about when Piotrowski Park, which has served as a migrant shelter since May, could return to regular use, Rodriguez said he’s been talking to city officials about this and supports the conversion of the field house back to community use.
Rodriguez also said a few things were improved at the park after having migrants living there, like the outdoor bathrooms, that will benefit everybody after it’s done being a shelter.
Several neighbors spoke up about safety concerns in the area and asked why officials were only holding a community meeting now about the decision to open a shelter in Little Village.
“You should’ve done this before,” said a neighbor named Rosario, which earned applause from much of the audience.
A few people questioned what was being done about the existing violence in Little Village.
“It’s important for the migrants to have safety, but I, as a citizen — where is my security?” another neighbor asked.
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