1,500 vie for 500 slots on affordable housing
waiting list
Chicago Sun-Times
November 14, 2004
BY DAVE NEWBART Staff Reporter
Some began to line up as early as 6 p.m. Thursday. They wore heavy jackets and wrapped themselves in blankets. At one point, the line contained about 1,500 people and looped around three city blocks. One woman actually went into labor while waiting.
The group, almost exclusively low-income and minority, lined up just for a chance to get on a waiting list for affordable housing.
At 9 a.m. Saturday, the nonprofit Bickerdike Redevelopment Corp. for the first time in three years opened its waiting list for Section 8 housing.
Despite the demand, Bickerdike could only accommodate 500 people, sending most home out of luck. And even those with incomes low enough to get on the list -- up to $38,000 for a family of four --shouldn't expect a unit for between six months and five years.
"It's an incredible indication of the need for affordable housing in the city,'' Joy Aruguete, executive director of Bickerdike, said of the throngs of people that flocked to her Humboldt Park office.
That need, she said, is growing dramatically. The Chicago Housing Authority's plan for transformation calls for a net loss of 13,000 units, she said. Housing prices in Logan Square and Humboldt Park have risen 265 percent in the last decade, and 75 percent of Humboldt Park residents pay more for rent than they can afford, she said.
And yet the number of rental units overall is dropping steadily.
Lisa Gomez, 23, who lined up at 6:30 p.m. Friday, puts 80 percent of the $920 in public aid she receives toward rent. After paying her other bills, "that really doesn't leave me anything,'' Gomez said.
Gomez said she had looked for cheaper housing or other Section 8 housing for herself and her four young daughters but couldn't find any in the neighborhood.
"They are trying to take all the low-income housing and turn them into condominiums,'' she said. "They're trying to push the poor people out of the city.''
Residents only pay 30 percent of their income for the units available through Bickerdike.
Sisters Judy and Margarita Martinez, who got on the waiting list, live in separate units in another private Section 8 development. But the owner wants to cash in on growing property values in the Humboldt Park area and announced all residents must be out in a year.
"I don't know where we are going to go,'' said Judy, who lives with her four daughters. One of her daughters complained that as the neighborhood is finally getting nicer and safer, the family might have to leave.