GROWING ENCAMPMENTS - UPTOWN

By Suzanne Hanney / photography by Kathleen Hinkel

UPTOWN

Port-a-potties and handwashing stations are the big change at the Uptown homeless community under the Lake Shore Drive bridges at both Lawrence and Wilson avenues since COVID-19, says Tom Gordon, the unofficial mayor.

“Four years ago we couldn’t get washing stations or the port-a-potties,” Gordon said of the period when roughly 75 people living under the bridges were big news. Most of them found housing through a new chronically homeless pilot program run by the Chicago Department of Family and Support Services (DFSS). The encampments were forced out in September 2017, when the Illinois Department of Transportation started repairs on the 1930s-era bridges – and installed bike lanes that advocates said were targeted toward shrinking the space available for tents, forcing them out.

But after floating around the North Side, the encampments are back under the viaducts, albeit in reduced form: just 33 tents in all. Lawrence is full and city workers have told Gordon he cannot admit any more people, even if someone leaves. Wilson is at half-capacity.

“People are here because they lost their jobs due to the pandemic,” he said. “We had new people out here almost every day. People come here because they figure they can get housed here.”

An American flag on display at the Lawrence underpass on Lake Shore Drive.

Kathleen Hinkel

Five housing placements have come via Ryan Spangler, a senior outreach worker and case worker at Heartland Alliance and a skilled assessor for the Homeless Management Information System (HMIS), which coordinates placement into permanent supportive housing (see sidebar). Spangler also puts clients on the Chicago Housing Authority list, where they are prioritized because they are homeless. Spangler comes every Thursday, Gordon said, with Sylvia Hibbard, Street Medicine case manager with The Night Ministry. While Spangler is matching clients to housing, Hibbard makes sure they have the necessary documents: state ID, birth certificate and Social Security card required by housing providers.

Another housing placement has come via Thresholds, Gordon said.

In addition, city workers come monthly and bring a doctor. “Everyone down here has been tested for the virus; I’ve been tested four times.”

Many things are different than they were before, he said. No more posted signs for “bogus displacement cleanups,” street cleaning that advocates termed harassment, intended to make the tent occupants feel so insecure that they would leave. Instead, the Department of Streets and Sanitation makes garbage pickup twice a week: on Mondays and again Friday or Saturday.

“Everything changed with the virus,” Gordon said.

Portrait of Tom Gordon, unofficial mayor of the encampment at the Lawrence underpass at Lake Shore Drive.

Kathleen Hinkel

ENCAMPMENT ASSISTANCE

The Chicago Department of Family and Support Services (DFSS) Homeless Outreach and Prevention (HOP) program visits encampments daily to engage with the residents, provide them supplies and connect them to shelter and other support services.

DFSS facilitates the outreach to unsheltered homeless people living near railroad tracks, bridges, the Chicago River, viaducts and alleys, Chicago Parks and CTA trains, while community-based organizations provide the wraparound services.

“For example, if a resident in an encampment tells HOP they need substance abuse recovery help, the HOP team then will connect them with Featherfist, Haymarket, or another partner that specializes in the area,” said Quenjana Adams, DFSS director of public affairs.

The Night Ministry Street Medicine team, for example, travels to encampments and panhandling sites all over the city; with Ryan Spangler, a senior outreach worker and caseworker at Heartland Alliance, a skilled assessor for the Homeless Management Information System (HMIS), it has found housing for people in various encampments, including three at the Lawrence Avenue viaduct over Lake Shore Drive, two at the Wilson viaduct, six at Belmont-Kedzie under the Kennedy Expressway and five at the Dan Ryan-Roosevelt encampment.

DFSS also funds eight agencies that operate daytime drop-in centers that offer meals, showers, laundry service and quiet safe places to homeless people.