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October 31, 2005
Great!
If you've ever visited me at my palatial apartment, you'll know that I live across the alley from a church. The church runs a homeless shelter, and in the evening there are usually a few homeless guys milling around the back. This isn't normally a problem for me, unless I think they're peering through the windows at me.
But it is a problem for some of my neighbors, because they're trying to shut down the place:
In Lincoln Park, a small band of old-guard homeowners and well-heeled newcomers have singled out the shelter as a major cause of crime in the affluent neighborhood. They launched Lincoln Park Neighbors for Safety and filed suit in June alleging that the program is operating illegally and unsafely.
The legal attack has appalled shelter officials and supporters who decry the suit as Not-In-My-Back-Yardism run amok.
"Many of the increasingly affluent people moving into the community ... do not realize what city living is all about. We do have crime," said 32-year resident Pat Terry. "They think Lincoln Park is fairyland."
Colleen Day, a plaintiff who said she was aggressively panhandled and sexually harassed by a shelter client near her house July 14, countered that shelter opponents simply want "to control whatever crime and harassment we can within our neighborhood."
Founded in 1985 by Lincoln Park residents and parishioners from three of the neighborhood's high-profile churches--St. Paul's United Church of Christ, St. Clement Catholic Church and Lincoln Park Presbyterian Church--the shelter has grown from a warming center to a year-round program. Church of Our Savior Episcopal also supports it.
It splits its operations between the Presbyterian church, 600 W. Fullerton Pkwy., and St. Paul's, 2335 N. Orchard St., which donate their basements, kitchens, showers, storage rooms, laundry areas and office space.
It doesn't surprise me that people are trying to close it down, but I don't know if it's necessary. I've lived there for more than a year, and the only problem I had was once getting hassled by a drunk guy. Clearly I can't speak for anyone else, but it seems to me the vast majority of the shelter's visitors are well-behaved. I'd hate to see a good and useful service ruined because a few people can't follow the rules.
I'd hope the reason behind this has nothing to do with the increasing home values in the neighborhood, but it wouldn't surprise me. Who wants to pay $500,000 for a condo and have to deal with homeless riff-raff? This is the North Side, where everything is grand!!!
As one of the people quoted in the article suggests, I'd also look to the many 20-somethings who populate the neighborhood at night. I'm not going to lie: some of these people are asses. If I had to pick who was the more likely public urination culprit and my choices were a homeless guy and a 22 year old dude, I'd give the 22 year old equal odds. Unless homeless guys are the ones who throw Chipotle wrappers and empty Miller Lite cans in my stairwell, or come in Palatine, get drunk and crash into parked cars, I'm not going to pin all the neighborhood's problems on them.
Posted by oz115 at October 31, 2005 11:59 AM