Chicago ending Hotel Julian contract to shelter homeless residents, eyes other lodging

Chicago is ending its deal this week with the high-end Hotel Julian that allowed homeless people to take shelter there since February 2021 as the pandemic diminished congregate care capacities.

The program was successful enough that the city is exploring leasing out blocks in other hotels or motels throughout Chicago to run temporary shelters and potentially even buying some in the future to redevelop into housing that could permanently house homeless people, WBEZ reported.

The same idea is already underway elsewhere, including in Dallas, where the city has designated $5 million to transform a hotel into transitional housing for homeless people, The Real Deal reported this week.

Since February 2021, Chicago leased 175 rooms in Hotel Julian at $99 a room per night and about 450 homeless people have stayed there, WBEZ reported. Of those, 106 moved into permanent housing, and another 66 are set to do the same, the outlet reported, citing the city’s Department of Family and Support Services.

Average stay lengths in the hotel through the shelter program are about four months, and city officials have been impressed with what they say is an increased stability, better mental health outcomes and faster transitions to permanent housing among participants.

“Our goal is to make sure that everybody transitions to either housing or another shelter placement … and there are options identified for everyone at this time,” Maura McCauley, a deputy commissioner with the Chicago Department of Family and Support Services, told WBEZ.

There were 117 people living there as of Friday, and some of them are still having a hard time finding shelter elsewhere in the city amid the pandemic, and have called for the Hotel Julian to stay available to homeless residents until that is no longer the case, the outlet reported.

“Today I’m trying to get someone into a shelter – there’s no beds. There’s not a bed in the city,” Jared Flippen, a case worker at Above and Beyond Family Recovery Center, an outpatient substance treatment center, told WBEZ.

The DFSS will be short 242 city-funded beds by March 1, compared to pre-pandemic levels, but “non-DFSS funded shelter partners are adding more beds to their programs,” it said in a statement to WBEZ.

While the Hotel Julian contract is expiring, after several renewals since last year, the city may expand on future hotel-motel arrangements for people without housing. It found the model was a more stable one for participants than awaiting a transition into permanent housing at a congregate care facility, and the DFSS in November made a request for proposals for a social service agency to run a program with a block of at least 15 rooms in a Chicago hotel or motel for the next year, WBEZ reported.

That program was supposed to begin on Jan. 1, but the city hasn’t provided an updated timeline. And Chicago may not stop with leasing hotels and motels to help house people with no homes, as McCauley told WBEZ the city purchasing lodging properties for that purpose is on the table.

“We want to move from leasing hotels to purchasing them,” McCauley told the outlet. “And in some cases, using them for shelter in the short-term while we’re dealing with impacts of the pandemic, but also redeveloping them to permanent supportive housing.”

[WBEZ] – Sam Lounsberry

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