Shelter
The City of Chicago has stood up migrant shelters to meet the needs of homeless asylum-seekers arriving to our city. Individuals in need of shelter should contact 311 or visit the nearest police station to request assistance with submitting a shelter request.
The Department of Family and Support Services (DFSS) and the Office of Emergency Management and Communications (OEMC) are vetting suitable City-owned assets to serve as temporary emergency shelters. If there are facilities in your community suitable for temporary shelter that can accommodate 200+ people daily, please fill out the following form. DFSS and OEMC teams will follow up to vet all possible options.
- 200-person capacity,
- no major repairs needed,
- access to showers or the ability to support a shower trailer
Preferred, but not required criteria:
- Space Use/Zoning
- First Preference: Residential (including residential clusters and institutions)
- Second Preference: Commercial/Retail (including commercial campuses)
- Close to Public Transportation
- ADA Compliant
- Has sufficient showers for the number of people sleeping in the facility
- Has ample parking
- Has either one large congregate area or numerous individual rooms to support sleeping, feeding, and service provision
- A location for eating, a cafeteria space would be ideal; or communal area for gathering
- Minimal effort to set up WiFi
- Space/ability to hook up commercial laundry machines
- Ideally a discrete outdoor area for smoke breaks
- Easily accessible entrance for buses, ideally discrete/private from the road
- Primary front-door entrance with space for security desk and easy monitoring of in/out flow
New Arrivals - Available Buildings or Spaces (office.com)