More than 150 immigrants living in two locations in Oak Park, Illinois, will be required to move out at the end of January, a change in approach from one of the only Chicago suburbs housing immigrants.
Oak Park officials said in a memo on Wednesday that the approximately 160 immigrants living in The Carleton of Oak Park Hotel and the West Cook YMCA will be evicted and notified of their specific date this week. The village's Emergency Operations Center said immigrants will be asked to work with a case manager or village staff to find them a new shelter or possibly move them to a different city or state.
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Those who cannot find shelter will be relocated to the Chicago shelter program, effectively sending immigrants back to the city that they trickled out of following a mass influx of immigrants at the southern border.
The village, one of the only suburbs to declare an emergency to provide housing for immigrants, is changing its tune as officials say the effort is unsustainable.
"It’s an unfortunate situation,” village Trustee Ravi Parakkat told the Chicago Tribune. “We’re not leading them anywhere. It’s just housing in a temporary shelter, which doesn’t get them closer to any of the reasons they made their trek to this country. We’re spending money with no resolution in sight.”
Many other village officials agreed that the only entities able to address the immigration issue are the city of Chicago, the state of Illinois, and the federal government. The emergency funding for the housing effort, around $1 million, was set to expire on Feb. 6, and the village never made it clear where migrants would go following its expiration.
“I consider it a humanitarian crisis,” Oak Park Village President Vicki Scaman said recently. “The cold weather in Chicago makes emergency temporary housing necessary.”
Oak Park is making this change just days after the Illinois towns of Rosemont and Cicero rejected busloads of immigrants over the past week. In Cicero, the town approved a measure to fine bus companies $750 per person for letting out homeless immigrants. Other suburbs, such as Schaumburg and Elk Grove Village, have passed ordinances preventing illegal immigrants from being housed in hotels.
The city of Chicago continues to accept busloads of illegal immigrants, but like Cicero, it is suing bus companies and seeking the ability to impound buses and fine owners $3,000 if they don’t follow Chicago's rules limiting the time and frequency of arrivals.
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Oak Park said in a Dec. 7 memo that buses with asylum-seekers would be turned away if they did not provide notice of their arrival. The buses will be sent to the migrant landing zone in Chicago. No such vehicles have arrived in Oak Park so far, according to village spokesman Dan Yopchick.
“The village does not have the capacity to accept additional new arrivals,” he told the local news outlet. “Anyone who comes into Oak Park seeking shelter is redirected to the city of Chicago landing zone as set forth in the memo.”