CHICAGO — In recent years, a homeless encampment has expanded at Gompers Park on the city’s Northwest Side. Neighbors say it started with a small number of tents but now has grown to include more than 20.
For months, some residents have been calling on the city to clear the camp, claiming it poses serious health and safety risks.
But there are no immediate plans to do so.
“I just don’t understand why this is going on for so long,” said Lenny Morgan, who lives near the 42-acre park.
Gompers is not the only encampment location. Tents are visible at parks and open spaces throughout the city.
Mayor Brandon Johnson’s Administration has cleared encampments, including one near the Dan Ryan Expressway, just north of Roosevelt Road.
But others like ones at Humboldt and Gompers parks remain.
“It is incredibly frustrating when they’re only cleaning up the areas that are very politically visible,” said Stephanie Samuel, who lives near Gompers.
“It’s not just the tents and the environmental impact,” she said. “It’s a lot of drug use and increase in crime.”
City data reviewed by WGN Investigates shows the number of reported crimes this year at Gompers Park jumped 33 percent, compared to all of 2023. And there’s still more than three months remaining in the year. Alleged crimes include theft, aggravated assault with a handgun and attempted criminal sexual abuse.
In California, state agencies recently started removing tents in some areas following a U.S. Supreme Court decision that ruled it was not unconstitutional for cities to ban encampments. But there are no plans in Chicago to clear camps in that manner or arrest people for living in the parks.
“That is not going to solve the issue,” said Sendy Soto, Chicago’s first Homelessness Officer. “It’s going to create more because once they leave detention, where are they going to go.”
Soto said a city task force is forming to determine how to best help the unhoused. But she acknowledged that will take time.
“I’m optimistic that we will have a lot of different solutions to address the needs of unhoused residents,” Soto said. “We have this five-year plan that we are working on.”
In the meantime, Soto said the city is working to move residents out of certain encampments by offering other housing options.
Northwest Side neighbors near Gompers Park have asked for a so-called “accelerated moving event” at that location.
But it’s unknown if and when that will happen.
WGN Investigates recently visited encampments at Humboldt and Gompers parks, speaking with numerous people who live there.
We observed that a majority are men. Several acknowledge they are battling drug addiction.
Others said they choose to live in the encampments, versus a shelter, for example, because they don’t like certain rules such as a curfew.
But there are exceptions.
At Gompers, a middle-aged man named Brian said he had been living at the park for about a month after losing his job as an at-home care provider.
He said he had no savings. His adult children live in the Philippines and were not aware of his situation.
“This is just temporary,” he said. “Hoping, wishing and praying.”
Another man named Michael said he had been living off and on at Gompers for about two years, while battling drug addiction.
On the day we visited Gompers, he was cooking a meal of eggs and meat for residents of the camp on a grill.
Michael predicted the city would eventually clear the tents. If that happened, WGN reporter Lourdes Duarte asked him what he would do.
Michael replied, “So, then we’ll move elsewhere. So many thousands of locations.”