In spite of the powerful forces which have exacerbated issues of houselessness in Uptown for decades, throughout this time various groups have banded together to resist these processes. Many times these resistance actions have taken the form of strategic occupations. This is true in the case of the efforts of the Chicago Indian Village (CIV), a radical native rights organization. CIV emerged in the context of the militant civil rights groups of the early 1970s and in response to federal, state, and local policies of Native erasure. During a period of Native American history known as the “Termination Era,” Through a series of acts between 1952 and 1956 the US government stripped Native reservation land of federal protection, offered it up for private sale, and simultaneously coerced and incentivised Native people to move to cities. In the subsequent decades Native Americans urbanized at higher rates than any other demographic group in the United States. Chicago’s Native population increased twenty-fold during this period, making it one of the most important national urban centers for Native people. In 1962, approximately 49% of Native Americans in Chicago were living in Uptown. Unfortunately, like their Appalachian neighbors, Native refugees faced not only severe material privation but also housing discrimination upon arriving in Chicago, making them especially vulnerable to the condition of houselessness.

The eviction of Carol Warrington, a Native mother-of-six, and her family from their apartment next to Wrigley Field, led to the foundation of CIV when she and others decided to camp on a series of vacant lots adjacent to the ballpark. CIV was active in Chicago in the early 1970s and became well known for a series of strategic and practical occupations. These well-publicized occupations were part of an effort to both directly combat the immediate issue of housing insecurity while also drawing attention to CIV’s larger goals of establishing Native schools and permanent housing. In late 1970, seeking emergency relief for nine Native families, CIV occupied 1142 West Ainslie, a 15-unit condemned apartment building in Uptown. In spite of the building’s shortcomings–it was dilapidated and initially lacking heat–the group pursued its purchase. However, CIV was unable to secure the appropriate funds to buy it before a fire broke out, forcing the group to relocate. 1142 West Ainslie was demolished and a parking lot has since taken its place.

From the mid-1970s to the mid-1980s, Chicago lost over 17,000 SRO units, mostly from the near west side. In the subsequent decades, the relatively high number of SROs remaining in Uptown would continue to shrink, in spite of efforts by various nonprofit groups and some private owners to preserve them. These closures led to a spike in the number of unhoused people in the neighborhood. Lakefront SRO was one of a number of local non-profits making efforts to combat houselessness by rehabilitating and preserving SRO housing in the face of gentrification. Lakefront SRO was later subsumed into Mercy Housing, a national nonprofit that continues to purchase and maintain affordable and supportive housing in the neighborhood. As we will see, others resisted the changes by making a claim on the Chicago Housing Authority’s promise of new public housing.

During the 1980s, gentrification was sapping naturally-occurring affordable housing from Uptown and the Chicago Housing Authority (CHA) was failing in its rollout of new scattered site public housing. To make matters worse, more and more existing public housing was being decommissioned because the CHA had failed to maintain its properties. All of these factors combined to exacerbate the crisis of houselessness in Uptown, and in October of 1988, community organizers took a stand. A coalition of the neighborhood’s unhoused and advocates for the houseless came together to protest the city’s failure to retain, maintain, and produce affordable housing. Together they cut the lock to an empty CHA-owned lot at 4425 North Malden, pitched tents, and demanded a plan of action to build scattered site housing at the site. Listen to Marc Kaplan, who participated in the occupation, describe how it came together.

Today’s Uptown Tent City has primarily occupied the Lawrence and Wilson viaducts at Lakeshore Drive, though it has at times been displaced or moved voluntarily. The encampment was formed in the 2010s and is a practical occupation in response to the shrinking availability of affordable housing in Uptown. The organization by unhoused people into tent city communities emerged as a way to improve the safety of the houseless individuals and has also served as a way of establishing collective political strength.

Uptown Tent City has its own rules–mainly used to discourage theft and violence–and its residents receive support from local community groups and churches in the form of blankets, tents, and food. Unfortunately, the residents of Uptown Tent City have suffered harassment at the hands of the Chicago Police Department and Chicago Park District, often being uprooted unlawfully for irregular cleanings or maintenance. The emergence of Tent City in the 2010s appears to be in direct conjunction with the closure of numerous SRO hotels in the Uptown neighborhood in that decade. Institutions like the Lorali, Wilson Men’s Hotel, Lawrence House, and the Darlington Hotel all closed in the decade, drastically reducing the neighborhood’s table of affordable housing. All of these buildings were converted into market-rate developments with few if any affordable units.

In January of 2021 Weiss Hospital entered into a contract to sell the hospital’s parking lot to a luxury developer. Local community organizers and activists immediately spoke out against the sale, recognizing the importance of affordable development and the risk that losing the lot posed to the hospital’s future moving forward. Throughout 2021, Northside Action for Justice (NA4J) organized fundraisers and circled a petition to raise awareness about the threat of the development and prepare the community to fight the project. In the summer of 2022, a strategic occupation at 4600 N Marine Drive–in the Weiss Hospital parking lot–was organized by members of the Rise Uptown Coalition–a group made up of members of the Chicago Union of the Homeless, NA4J, ONE Northside, and Asian Americans Advancing Justice (AAAJ), among many others. 

Local musician and activist Adam Gottlieb sings the song that he wrote and recorded for the #RiseUptown occupation. Courtesy of Adam Gottlieb (https://www.patreon.com/adamgottliebandonelove)

The lot was sold to developer Lincoln Properties in a controversial deal that divided the local community board. Lincoln Properties’ plan included only eight affordable units, less than 3% of the total 314 units and less than the 10% affordable required at the time (now up to 20%). In spite of this, the plan was approved because of a loophole which allowed developers to pay “in-lieu” fees to avoid up to 75% of their affordable requirements (now 50%). Together they protested the planned luxury development which would provide little affordable accommodations and would contribute to rising rents and shrinking low-cost options. Furthermore, the sale and redevelopment of the Weiss’ parking lot has sparked fears in some Uptown residents that the hospital will soon follow. This fear is substantiated by the fact that Weiss hospital was in fact sold to a new owner, Resilience Healthcare in 2022. While Weiss’ new owners claim they have no plans of closing the hospital, the sale creates uncertainty and some worry about the hospital’s future.

Located just hundreds of feet from the Wilson viaduct Tent City, Weiss plays a critical role in the safety of Uptown’s unhoused. Losing the hospital would be a blow to the houseless community of Uptown and would continue the troubling trend of reduction of mental and physical health services in the city’s neediest areas.

In 2022, The Chicago Coalition for the Homeless released a report showing that their estimate of people experiencing homelessness in Chicago had risen from 65,611 in 2020 to 68,440 in 2021. The Chicago Union of the Homeless has attempted to address the issue by demanding that the Chicago Housing Authority immediately fill unoccupied CHA units with unhoused people and release CHA funds and vouchers to be used for finding housing for those experiencing homelessness.