[Peace-discuss] 15 Children will be Homeless in Champaign within 48 hours as Gateway Studios gets Condemned by the City of Champaign

[Danielle Chynoweth]

15 Children will be Homeless in Champaign within 48 hours as Gateway gets
Condemned<http://www.ucimc.org/content/15-children-will-be-homeless-champaign-within-48-hours-gateway-gets-condemned>
Submitted
by ida <http://www.ucimc.org/user/330> on May 10, 2009 - 9:46pm

At least 15 children, 3 elderly women and a dozen adults, will be
homelessness in Champaign in less than 48 hours.  The shelters are full.
The residents, most of whom work, just paid May rent and have no savings.
And the City of Champaign seems to have washed their hands of the problem.

The City of Champaign plans to condemn Gateway Studios on north Neil Street
on Tuesday, as soon as the power company shuts off the power to this former
motel, turned housing complex.  Residents have been paying their rent, which
includes utilities, but the property owner was not paying the power bill,
running up a debt of at least $44,000.

CU Citizens for Peace and Justice is calling for concerned community members
to attend Champaign City Council meeting this Tuesday night at 7 pm to
insist that the city do more.  "They could find a way to keep the power on,
provide relocation assistance, and sue the property owner on behalf of
residents to get their utility payments back.  People we talked to said they
were working and had incomes, but no savings to deal with this emergency"
said a member of CUCPJ, and one of nine who went door-to-door on Mother's
Day to meet with residents.

On Friday, city staff met with residents to give them a list of places they
could move to and told them to "dig deep and figure out what you are going
to do."  Calls to the local shelters showed that they were full.  A call to
Value Place, one of the few affordable immediate options on the city's list,
showed that it was full.

Karen, who has three teenaged girls who attend school, said "I don't know
where we will go.  I guess I will have to live in my car" and then began to
cry.  Two men who worked as property maintenance said they had not been paid
in weeks and would likely sleep outside.  One elderly woman said she would
not leave, even after the power was turned off.  A young woman holding her
one-year-old daughter just shook her head and said "we don't have any
options."

Residents found out on Friday that they had to move by the end of Monday.
"If I had had time, I could do something about this" said Karen, who works
at a local hotel.

There are a number of questions that need to be answered:

- The city received notice a month ago that it was getting $100,000 in
unexpected federal assistance, which is was planning to use on a rental
assistance program.  Why not use 1/10 of that now to provide transitional
shelter?  Or why not use the township or general fund?

- The city has known that this property was in shambles since last September
when the whole first floor was flooded by the Boneyard.  Red Cross relocated
the residents then to get them out of the moldy environment.  But they
returned because they lacked other options, despite the fact that the
ceilings are falling down, there are locks missing from some doors, and the
pool is filled with slime.  Why did the city let this crisis happen without
intervening earlier?

- What are we as a community going to do to house people as the recession
deepens? In Champaign-Urbana, the shelters are full, 1,754 households are on
the Section 8 waiting list, 164 families are on the public housing waiting
list, homelessness is up 15% this year, and at least 210 children are
reported homeless.   Where will the 50 elderly residents of foreclosed Inman
go?

- We have a record number of vacant apartments and a record number of people
in need of housing?  Who is going to play a leadership role in connecting
our local resources and our local needs?  Why do we continue to rely on the
market to fix the problem, when it so clearly can't without some kind of
intervention?
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