Tents still in place at Gompers Park weeks after moving event began

CHICAGO (WGN) — Six weeks after the start of what the City of Chicago dubbed an “Accelerated Moving Event” – tents at a Northwest Side park remain in place and others have even been set up. 

WGN Investigates visited Gompers Park on Wednesday and found more than two dozen tents still in place, even as the city began the work to clear the park. 

City agencies descended on Gompers on March 5th, offering services and housing – an approach the city’s Chief Homelessness Officer Sendy Soto talked about during a one-on-one interview with WGN Investigates last year.

“We are not in the business to arrest people who are unhoused, that is just not going to solve, one, the issue that people want to see solved,” Soto said during the interview.

WGN Investigates has been following what happens at the park since September when cameras captured a glimpse into the lives of those who call the Northwest Side grounds home. 

While some have moved on to housing, many more remain at the park.   

Recently, through a Freedom of Information request, WGN Investigates obtained a “coordinated outreach plan” from the city’s Department of Family and Support Services (DFSS). 

“Shelter has been offered consistently but residents have declined due to shelter beds not being in the Northwest Community area,” the outreach plan said.

The plan also detailed a timeline that points to June as the beginning of a lagoon restoration project and with it the coordinated clean-up and removal of tents. 

Currently, yellow signs are letting park residents know about what’s to come, but even that hasn’t been enough to persuade them to clear out. 

“They’re not forced to leave in the sense that if were offering housing, that is really the option that we would want them to pursue. If that’s not where they would like to go, then they can choose to go somewhere else, but that site eventually is going to be cleaned up and brought back to its original state,” Soto said when asked whether residents would be forced to leave.

For now, at least half a dozen organizations are visiting the park each week trying to convince residents to move before the park is officially cleared out in June. 

In a stamanet shared with WGN Investigates on Wednesday, DFSS said that locations with a lot of public attention tend to have people moving in once an Accelerated Moving Event begins in order to try and secure housing.

“Unfortunately for those who have relocated to the Gompers Park encampment following the park’s March 5 Accelerated Moving Event, this will not speed up access to housing for these individuals, DFSS said in the statement.

The moving event is now on its 43rd day, similar events have gone on for as many as 90 days before the area is completely cleared.