News

By Noah Tesfaye and Peter Winslow

For the past six months, Michelle Thomas, a youth case manager at The Night Ministry has been trying to get a new Social Security card for her twenty-two-year-old houseless client. After months of contacting different offices and scheduling an emergency visit to a Social Security Administration (SSA) office that was initially denied, Thomas’s client is still waiting for a card to arrive in the mail.

Continue reading Southside Weekly: Social Security Backlogs Leave Unhoused Populations Vulnerable

By Suzanne Hanney

The Right to Recovery Coalition would agree with Mayor Lori Lightfoot that $1.9 billion of feder COVID relief is “a once-in-a-generation amount of money for a once-in-a-generation crisis.” 

Lightfoot wants to use to half the American Rescue Plan (ARP) funds in her FY2022 budget to pay down debt, but 13 members of the 50-member Chicago City Council would use it all to alleviate poverty in the wake of the pandemic. 

Continue reading Streetwise: Right to Recovery Coalition Challenges Mayor’s Budget

The payments will be part of the city’s efforts to reengage thousands of children who lost consistent touch with their schools over the past year. Yet that financial assistance should only be a piece of the strategy to support homeless students during the pandemic, advocates have said.

By Nader Issa and Fran Spielman

The families of Chicago Public Schools students who are experiencing housing insecurity are now eligible for a one-time $500 check to help with educational and living expenses, the mayor’s office announced Thursday.

Continue reading Chicago Sun-Times: CPS students facing housing insecurity eligible for one-time $500 checks

By Kristen Thometz

A new Illinois law signed this month by Gov. J.B. Pritzker will make feminine hygiene products available for free at homeless shelters.

Continue reading WTTW: Advocates: Providing Free Feminine Hygiene Products to the Homeless a ‘Step in the Right Direction’

By Marissa Nelson

Taishi Neuman experienced homelessness when she was a sophomore in high school. She had a two-year-old daughter and wasn’t able to afford a babysitter, so she couldn’t always make it to class.

Continue reading WTTW Chicago Tonight Black Voices: 1 in 7 CPS Students Experiences Homelessness, Study Finds

You read that right: A new law sets the stage for community colleges to build dormitories and apartments that backers say will improve the odds of success for students facing housing insecurity and other challenges.

By Dennis Rodkin and Elyssa Cherney

Now that he’s a member of the Illinois General Assembly, Nick Smith isn’t embarrassed to say he struggled early in college. As he bounced back and forth between classes and his job, he spent little time on campus.

Continue reading Crain’s Chicago Business: Community colleges can now build affordable housing close to campus—here’s how it can help vulnerable students

By Chante Gamby, Contributing Writer

Bring Chicago Home (BCH), a grassroots advocacy organization within the City of Chicago wants to provide a potential solution to the affordable housing crisis in Chicago, by proposing a restructuring of a current tax fund to be reinvested in Chicago neighborhoods through affordable housing initiatives.

Continue reading Chicago Defender: Bring Chicago Home Addresses Affordable Housing Crisis in Chicago

By Maureen Foertsch McKinney

When he was a homeless freshman at the University of Illinois Springfield, Chicagoan Prince Washington said he had to look for someone who could help find a place to stay.

He eventually did in the form of the vice chancellor for student affairs, the late Clarice Ford, who helped him get a job on a campus cleaning crew so he would have housing during the summer break.

Continue reading NPR Illinois: Pritzker Signs Law To Help Homeless Higher Education Students

By Kristen Thometz

Chatham resident Edrika Fulford knows what it’s like to be homeless. After quitting her job as a family case manager to take care of her ailing mother, Fulford became homeless in 2015. She had by that point lost her mother as well.

Continue reading WTTW: Advocates Call for More Resources for Homelessness as Eviction Ban Ends

By Erica Gunderson

Over the past year, a small group of people experiencing homelessness have established a tent encampment in a an Avondale park known as Fireman’s Park. Last week, the group was given notice that the city planned to clean the park, leaving those living there — many of whom have ties to the surrounding community — concerned they would lose their belongings and their place to live.

Continue reading WTTW Chicago Tonight Latino Voices: End of Eviction Ban Expected to Push More People Onto Streets