The Oak Park board of trustees approved spending an additional $200,000 of village funds to aid migrants, which village president Vicki Scaman said she hopes will close the chapter of village aid to migrant community.
“What we’re saying is that this is it,” trustee Cory Wesley said.
The five board members present voted unanimously in favor of spending the funds. Trustees Lucia Robinson and Ravi Parakkat were absent.
The new amount, allocated to the Community of Congregations to help provide short-term rental assistance for migrants, is intended to help fund leases for migrants at Grace Episcopal Church. The amount will also aid migrants staying at St. Edmund School, according to village officials. The shelter at Grace is closing March 15 because of a lack of funding and resources.
The original proposal at Monday’s meeting was $100,000, but Scaman raised the request to $200,000 after disclosing that discussions with state leaders, such as with Illinois Senate President Don Harmon, indicated there was a strong likelihood Oak Park could be reimbursed for some of that spending.
There’s no guarantee, said Lisa Shelley, the deputy village manager. But there’s also no concern that Oak Park would not qualify for some reimbursement she said that state officials told the village. Wesley called it a “perfectly good risk.”
In remarks to Grace’s congregation on March 10, Rev. John Rumple said the village gave the church “no end game, no plans” for the migrants staying there. He said the village has focused instead on migrants in other shelters, many of whom are families and children. The migrants staying at Grace are all men, but many of them have families back home, Rumple said.
“Where is the Village of Oak Park?” Rumple asked. “No person from the village board or office has ever once visited this shelter, to my knowledge.”
Rumple said he is not able to sustain overseeing the shelter and leading the church. The church’s leadership explored every option, he said, but they ultimately had to decide what was possible for the parish. Grace’s shelter has been the last to receive help in the village, Rumple said.
“I struggled with what they [the migrants] needed, and how weak that made me feel, that I couldn’t keep going,” he said.
In addition to help from partners such as Beyond Hunger and Housing Forward, Grace has spent $18,350 on food, $12,071 on supplies, $4,700 on clothing and small amounts on items like medicine and transportation, Rumple said. The church is working with the village to be reimbursed on those expenses.
When he told the migrants the shelter was closing, Rumple said they were shocked. Some panicked. Some even fled.
“We trusted God to provide for us when we began this shelter and we’re going to have to trust God to provide as we end this shelter,” Rumple said. “I encourage these men to do the same thing.”
The men at Grace have been handed “so many empty promises,” Rumple said.
However, the Community of Congregations and Apoya, a group of Oak Park residents trying to find housing for asylum seekers, are now working together to help them. Apoya has been finding landlords to take in the men without a credit check and the Community of Congregations will pay the first year rent up front.
Apoya will also provide starter furniture and some home items, Rumple said, but the migrants will be responsible for their own utilities and food.
“This is a community-wide miracle,” he said. “This is an example to our government leaders that they need to take notice of.”
The Community of Congregations is trying to ensure all individuals at Grace have leases and can avoid going to the City of Chicago’s landing zone, an area where transportation vehicles with migrants drop off new arrivals.
The organization already received $150,000 in village funds and $300,000 from a Supporting Municipalities for Asylum Seeker Services grant for migrant rental assistance. The grant funds must be spent by June 30, but village funds do not have those constraints, Shelley said.
That funding was primarily intended for migrants previously staying at The Carleton of Oak Park Hotel and the West Cook YMCA. Both those shelters have closed, with some migrants now staying at St. Edmund School.
According to the village, these short-term rentals are funded by the village, grant funding and private funds secured by the Community of Congregations.
Scaman said the community has worked together “diligently” and “impressively” to support migrants.
Update 3/14/24: Due to new information made available, this story has been updated to reflect that the newly approved funding will help aid migrants at St. Edmund School, too.