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Embattled Kenwood shelter housing migrants and homeless Chicagoans to close in coming months

Embattled Kenwood shelter housing migrants and homeless Chicagoans to close in coming months

Chicago Tribune20-06-2025
A Kenwood shelter housing both migrants and Chicagoans experiencing homelessness will close in the coming months following a divide amongst neighbors, according to an email update from state Sen. Robert Peters.
Located at 4900 S. DuSable Lake Shore Drive, the shelter opened in summer 2023 to accommodate migrants sent to Chicago by Texas Gov. Greg Abbott. Its opening drew sharp pushback from residents concerned about how newcomers from crisis-affected regions would integrate into the neighborhood.
Tensions deepened when the facility was later expanded to include homeless Chicagoans, part of the city and state's One System Initiative aimed at merging shelter services for both populations.
Early months of combined migrant, homeless shelters in Chicago see success, structural challengesPeters said he was notified of the closure by city and Illinois Department of Human Services officials at 3:15 p.m. Friday. Those currently housed at the shelter will move to new facilities over the next three to six months, he said.
Neither the city nor the state was immediately able to provide a comment Friday afternoon regarding the reason for the closure or the number of people affected.
'We've always believed that housing is a human right,' Peters said. 'But also, at the end of the day, what matters most is being transparent with everybody.'
As tens of thousands of people arrived by bus over roughly two years, the city and state scrambled to open enough shelters to stave off a full-blown homelessness crisis in Chicago. The city and state were running 28 migrant-exclusive facilities at the peak of arrivals in January of last year, according to city census data.
The idea of a combined system was championed by some who said it would spread out resources to a wider range of people. There are dozens of shelters in the new system.
The closure announcement also comes as President Donald Trump has ramped up immigration enforcement in and around the city, targeting courts and offices where people are reporting for check-ins. Many of the migrants being housed by the city are from Venezuela, a country that Trump has repeatedly singled out in immigration policy.
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The Texas way: why the most disaster-prone US state is so allergic to preparing for disasters
The Texas way: why the most disaster-prone US state is so allergic to preparing for disasters

Yahoo

time15 hours ago

  • Yahoo

The Texas way: why the most disaster-prone US state is so allergic to preparing for disasters

Greg Abbott, the Republican governor of Texas, has had plenty of consoling words to offer following the tragic flash floods in the Hill Country that have killed more than 120 people, including 27 girls and counsellors at the stricken Camp Mystic. 'Our hearts grieve for this community and surrounding areas,' he wrote on social media. 'May God bring comfort to every family affected.' Amid such refrains, Abbott's response so far has been notably lacking in one regard: any assurance that Texas will tackle the problems that contributed to the calamity in Kerr county over the Fourth of July weekend, when the Guadalupe River rose like a torrent 26ft in 45 minutes. Accosted by reporters, the governor has indicated he will allow debate in the Texas legislature on the state's flood warning systems, but has given no guarantees on the outcome. Texas lawmakers came painfully close to introducing a statewide initiative to improve emergency alerts just a few months ago. The bill, HB 13, would have set up a network of outdoor sirens of the sort that were fatally lacking in the Hill Country, but the plan was killed in the state senate where members griped about its cost. To observers of what might be called the 'Texas way' – the singular devotion of its political leaders to rugged individualism and their equally passionate disdain for government action – there is a familiarity to all this. Take the massive winter storm Uri that struck Texas in 2021, which brought the state's notoriously eccentric power grid to a standstill, leaving almost 5 million people without heat and more than 200 dead. After that catastrophe the state did make limited efforts to prepare power generators for further extreme weather, allowing Abbott to boast that 'everything that needed to be done was done to fix the power grid in Texas'. Yet four years later, the state's main grid operator, Ercot, is still warning that a repeat Uri would carry with it an 80% likelihood of rolling blackouts. The same pattern of relative governmental inaction stretches back to 2008, when Hurricane Ike battered the Texan coast. It only narrowly bypassed Houston, then home to 2 million people, avoiding a catastrophe of monumental proportions. In the wake of the storm, there were calls for the construction of a barrier across Galveston Bay to protect the city from future storm surge. Seventeen years on, 'Ike Dike' remains on the drawing board. For Andrew Dessler, a professor of atmospheric sciences at Texas A&M University, this repeating cycle of environmental disaster followed by scant preparation for future events is not coincidental. 'Texas will spend a lot of money recovering from disasters, but they'll spend very little trying to avoid the next disaster,' he said. Such an absence of forethought would be less serious were it not for Texas being, literally and metaphorically, in the eye of the storm. The state's long Gulf coastline renders it vulnerable to hurricanes and sea level rise, its southern location makes it hot and growing hotter, the west of the state is in the desert south-west region which is liable to droughts, and the Hill Country, as has been seen with such heart-wrenching results, is home to 'flash flood alley', one of the most dangerous flood-prone areas of the US. 'We have everything other than maybe avalanches,' Dessler said. 'Every other climate disaster you can think of, like wildfires – you name it, we have it.' The state's vulnerable topography is reflected in the statistics. Texas is the most disaster-prone state in the country, recording 190 extreme weather events between 1980 and 2024, each inflicting more than $1bn in damage. Now the climate crisis has begun to bear down on Texas, turning this perennially at-risk state into a calamity zone. Warmer oceans are leading to greater atmospheric moisture and hence rain dumps and flooding, rising temperatures are exacerbating droughts and wildfires, and all of it is supercharging both the frequency and intensity of extreme weather events. That has combined with the state's steadily rising population, which is straining resources and putting more people in harm's way. Despite the perils, large numbers of Americans continue to pour into Texas, attracted by its zero income tax and open spaces; since 2010 it has grown by 5 million people, to 30 million. This moment begs for a political culture that can confront the challenge head on, experts say. But that is not the prevailing mood in Texas. 'Our elected representatives are not forward looking on climate issues,' Dessler said. Dessler, who specialises in climate change, traces the source of the resistance to the fossil fuel industry, which with its mega-donations to Republican politicians wields a big stick. 'It's the political power of fossil fuels, and their ability to keep everybody in line.' The official platform of the Texas Republican party is explicit. It proposes the abolition of the federal Environmental Protection Agency, supports the reclassification of carbon dioxide as a 'non-pollutant', and opposes what it calls 'environmentalism, or 'climate change' initiatives that obstruct legitimate business interests and private property use'. Abbott and other top state Republicans are openly skeptical of climate crisis science. In 2022, when Dallas was hit by colossal floods, reporters tried and failed to get the governor even to utter the words 'climate change'. 'Texas Republicans are increasingly opposed to the idea that climate change is man-made, and therefore there's nothing we can do about it,' said Calvin Jillson, a political scientist at Southern Methodist University in Dallas. 'They see climate issues as requiring more taxes, more regulation, more spending – and as a party of small government and deregulation they don't want to deal with it.' The combination of small government ideology and climate crisis denial has distorted the politics of the state to the extent that basic decisions that might bolster climate resilience are shunted aside. The impact is seen at all levels, from the state capital in Austin down to local neighborhoods. Almost half of Texas's 254 counties have no mitigation plan in place to lessen the blow of environmental disasters, the Texas Tribune found. Rob Kelly, a local elected official in Kerr county at the epicenter of the Hill Country floods, said that warning systems had been considered but were rejected on grounds of cost. 'Taxpayers won't pay for it,' he told the New York Times. Wes Virdell, the Republican representative whose Texas house district covers much of the devastated flooded area, voted against HB 13, the failed bill which would have set up a siren alarm system. He told the Texas Tribune three days after the tragedy that his experience of such grief and suffering had shaken his confidence in his decision. 'I can tell you in hindsight, watching what it takes to deal with a disaster like this, my vote would probably be different now.'

Texas Housing Market To Change in September: What To Know
Texas Housing Market To Change in September: What To Know

Newsweek

time18 hours ago

  • Newsweek

Texas Housing Market To Change in September: What To Know

Based on facts, either observed and verified firsthand by the reporter, or reported and verified from knowledgeable sources. Newsweek AI is in beta. Translations may contain inaccuracies—please refer to the original content. Texas lawmakers trying to solve the state's housing affordability crisis passed a bill during the last legislative session that experts say will be a "game-changer" for the development of multifamily homes. Senate Bill 840 or SB 840, which was introduced by Republican state Senator Bryan Hughes and signed into law by Governor Greg Abbott in June, would streamline the process of turning non-residential commercial buildings in the state into mixed-use and multi-family residential ones. Under the new legislation, any land that is already classified as a zone for office, commercial, retail, warehouse or existing mixed uses could be turned into mixed-use residential housing without the need for a zone change. Essentially, the legislation does away with a process that some have complained can be time-consuming and expensive—at least in some cases. The mixed-use housing and office property The Republic is seen undergoing construction downtown on October 9, 2023, in Austin, Texas. The mixed-use housing and office property The Republic is seen undergoing construction downtown on October 9, 2023, in Austin, To Know About The Bill "SB 840 aims to tackle the state's widening housing shortage by allowing underused commercial land and buildings to be repurposed for multifamily development 'by right,'" Fawaz Bham, real estate law expert and partner at Dallas-based law firm Hunton Andrews Kurth, told Newsweek. "More pointedly, it rebalances the power dynamic between developers who are eager to create new mixed-use projects or convert existing commercial properties against the desire of municipalities to closely negotiate, guide, and shape build sites in their cities," he said. The bill applies only to cities with more than 150,000 residents that are in a county with more than 300,000 residents. That means that the legislation will impact less than 20 cities, including the Texas capital, Austin, where proposals to add thousands of units to two sites—almost 900 residential units 200 East Riverside Drive and up to 2,400 in Anderson Square—have already been approved. But SB 840 does more than reforming zoning regulation. It also prohibits certain restrictions on density, building height and parking for multifamily and mixed-use developments. Under the bill, municipalities cannot require more than one parking space per dwelling unit or a multilevel parking structure. They must allow the multifamily density to be the highest allowed in the municipality or 36 units per acre, whichever is greater; and the heights limits must allow the greater of the highest height allowed on the side by the zoning code or 45 feet. "By removing these barriers for the repurposing of these vacant and underutilized properties, the legislature has opened the door to a significant opportunity for developers to meet the ever-growing housing needs in Texas," Clay B. Pulliam, partner at Dallas-based law firm Troutman Pepper Locke, wrote in a recent report assessing the bill. The bill is expected to go into effect on September 1, 2025. Newsweek contacted Hughes for comment by email on July 4 for comment. How The Bill Could Change Texas Real estate experts believe that the bill will spark a "revolution" in the Lone Star State's multifamily market, where it is being hailed as a likely "game-changer." The most significant impact of the new legislation would be to allow developers in the state to utilize vacant or underutilized office buildings—which became a problem for some cities in the state, like Houston, during the pandemic years—retail centers and warehouses for multifamily housing. "There are suburban and infill areas with empty big boxes or underutilized retail and office buildings which have become acquisition targets as developers realize the potential upside of SB 840 and other companion bills that have recently passed," Bham said. Julia Parenteau, Director of Public Policy at Texas Realtors, told Newsweek: "While commercial conversions are a more niche issue, I'd anticipate the allowance of mixed-use and multi-family by right in certain zoning areas will have a positive impact by way of more multi-family housing developments going onto the market in the coming years. "Additionally, zoning by right shaves approximately 18 months off the time frame for development, allowing the conversation to focus on what amenities and designs the municipality wants or needs in the development, not whether the project is feasible." This infusion of new inventory could, in turn, help first-time and lower-income homebuyers in the state, as multi-family homes tend to be more affordable than single-family housing. "SB 840 is part of a broader suite of bills that the legislature passed, all designed to infuse the market with additional supply so that affordability improves for Texans," Emily Brizzolara-Dove, a policy adviser at Texas 2036, a nonprofit, nonpartisan public policy organization dedicated to improving lives and opportunities for all Texans through 2036, told Newsweek. "Home prices in Texas have gone up 35 percent, 40 percent since the beginning of the pandemic, and that is simply unsustainable," she said. "Housing affordability is really one of our biggest competitive advantages in the state, but that is a very tenuous advantage. Ohio has cheap houses, too. "So, if our housing supply gets to the point where families are really cost burdened by their rent and by their mortgage, we are at risk of losing that competitive advantage." SB 840 helps Texas build more housing where people want to live, Brizzolara-Dove said, by essentially reducing red tape. The big impact of the new legislation, she said, is going to be allowing residential in commercial, retail and warehouse zones—areas that are already developed and which would become more livable, more walkable, and more-resident friendly once more homes are introduced at little to no additional cost, as key infrastructure is already in place. "When you can do something that will make a really significant impact on housing prices for Texas families, and you can do it with no fiscal note, then you're in a good spot," Brizzolara-Dove said. 'The Devil Is In The Details' Bham, however, said that whether the legislation would work to fix the Lone Star State's shortage of affordable homes would still depend on how the market reacts to it. By cutting red tape and slashing costs, SB 840 should be able to attract developers willing to pursue new housing projects, but they will still need to ensure that any project is "still economically fruitful, financially viable, and sustainable in the long-run to secure investors, financing, and—ultimately—paying renters," Bham said. Real estate experts also worry that the bill could also have a negative impact on the Texas housing market. While Pulliam says that the bill does "an admirable job of addressing the bottlenecks and administrative burden of converting properties to residential uses," he warned that the legislation might have some unintended consequences. "Zoning ordinances are often cumbersome and sometimes antiquated, but the framework that these ordinances provide gives some degree of certainty to property owners, residents and the municipalities themselves," he said. "For example, no consideration has been given to the impact on public schools when these additional projects result in an influx of students. Will dispensing with the need for traffic studies or traffic mitigation measures create more congestion? Developers who have invested heavily in entitling their multifamily projects must now compete with developers who can skip that entire process. Will owners of existing multifamily or mixed-use projects be at a disadvantage to those who can now bypass barriers to entry quickly and without cost?" he asked. Weston B. Rockers and Benjamin W. McKay of Polsinelli, on the other hand, are concerned about the potential for a sudden surge in converted multifamily to devalue existing multifamily properties and/or saturate the multifamily housing market in some municipalities. "As multifamily supply increases, developers relying on exclusive and/or isolated multifamily zoning classifications will experience less demand," the two wrote in a June report. At the same time, the single-family market could also suffer, they say, as reclassifying commercial sites to multifamily "has the potential to devalue single-family homes, which were planned or developed in close proximity to commercial developments." Brizzolara-Dove remains optimistic about the impact of the bill, even as she admits that "the devil is in the details when it comes to implementing these bills, and there is no state agency oversight of them." It will be "all down" to the municipalities, she said: "We will be able to see in a year from now how the cities have implemented [the legislation], if they are fully embracing the law and if changes would need to be made—and they likely will."

Trump gives FEMA funds for catastrophic flooding as agency's future is up in the air
Trump gives FEMA funds for catastrophic flooding as agency's future is up in the air

Yahoo

time2 days ago

  • Yahoo

Trump gives FEMA funds for catastrophic flooding as agency's future is up in the air

Tampa, Fla. (WFLA) — President Donald Trump has repeatedly said that he planned to start 'phasing out' the Federal Emergency Management Agency after the hurricane in Texas on Friday and meeting with first responders and grieving families, the president was questioned on the federal response to last week's deadly flooding and the future of FEMA. President Trump did not address the agency's future. Close Thanks for signing up! Watch for us in your inbox. Subscribe Now A White House official told NewsNation that a FEMA review council now plans to 'reform' the agency. Trump surveyed the aftermath of last week's catastrophic flooding that left more than 100 people dead.'I have never seen anything like this,' he comes amid the administration facing scrutiny over FEMA's future. Since the start of his second term, the president has made this promise. 'We want to wean off of FEMA, and we want to bring it down from the state level,' he previously has an annual budget of around $30 billion and, prior to layoffs, employed more than 20,000 people. On Sunday, Trump signed a major declaration for Texas, making federal funding available for Kerr County and expanding to now cover five surrounding counties.'My administration is doing everything in its power to help Texas,' Trump said.'Immediately when I made a request for a disaster declaration, you and your administration granted that,' Texas Gov. Greg Abbott said. 'This is the fastest that I am aware of any administration responding.'Abbott said this declaration will allow his state to more effectively respond and rebuild. Florida Democratic Rep. Jared Moskowitz said he's alarmed by how Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem handled last week's tragedy. 'Emergencies and disasters are always locally executed, the state manages them, and the federal government comes in and supports that what we are doing here, sir, empowering the state and the local officials to make the best decision for their people because they know their people and their community,' Noem said. 'When they come in and ask, we support people.' Moskowitz is calling for an investigation into what he said is FEMA's delayed response. With the administration's previous pledge to get rid of FEMA and 'bring it down to the state level,' Pinellas County residents, who repeatedly experienced flooding, fear that if FEMA funds aren't available, how will they get help and from whom?'It's probably going to come in some form of tax, it always does right?' questioned Cody McGehe, Shore Acres Resident. 'I don't know if property insurance will go up or homeowners' insurance will just increase to offset that, but certainly it will come back to us. It always does, like there's no way it doesn't.' President Trump created a 12-member FEMA review council to determine the agency's future role. The council is expected to release a report in November on how to improve federal disaster response. Copyright 2025 Nexstar Media, Inc. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.

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