- Dion.
- Yes.
- We're out here in Chicago, at a tent city.
You're homeless, tell me about it.
- Okay, basically I've been homeless for, I wanna say
since May 23rd, I came out here on my birthday.
- On your birthday?
- Yes.
- Oh my god.
So, I met some people,
umm, and the reason why I became homeless
is because of financial issues.
My payee was stealing my money and stuff.
And she wasn't giving me the proper amount.
And I paid, like, $550 just to rent a room.
And then they didn't let me use the washer and dryer
so they told me that I had to go out
and wash my own clothes and stuff.
And at the same time,
I didn't have no food or nothing and then they told me that,
"Oh, if you don't have no money then you don't eat."
So they sent me to the food pantries and stuff like that.
- So you were in some kind of housing?
- It's like, umm, it's an agency called a hospital,
but it's like an alternative to a nursing home.
- Okay. So you were in some kind if program?
- Yeah.
- And it was better coming out here?
- Uhh, in ways it was better, but at the same time,
it's kinda, it was still hard.
- Now, how do you survive out here?
- Well there's people that come by, and they drop off food.
And the funny thing is, the food is, it's very decent.
They drop off food, they drop off clothes,
and hygiene supplies.
Umm, then we have advocates and stuff that help us out.
We have what they call a police watch,
or you could call it a cop watch.
Cause you have to deal with police harassment.
And just, I wanna say an hour ago,
we had people that came by and dropped off some food,
cake, and clothes and some water and stuff like that.
And the next thing you know,
the police come up and they just start ticketing them.
And I just don't think that's fair,
because all they're doing is helping us out.
I mean, that's all.
- And, you were talking about, there's housing
but there's not enough
for all you guys so, - right.
- The only choice you have is, can you tell me about that?
- Okay, as far as the housing part goes,
it's supposed to be a 75 person limit.
And, in reality, there's more than 75 people.
So the admin wants to get rid of tent city
by July the 1st.
And the problem with that is,
what are you gonna do with the rest of the people?
Like, that's what we have the advocates for,
to fight for us cause the point
is we have the right to a public space.
- Right.
- So, what are you gonna do with the rest of the people
that don't have a place to go?
What, you gonna make us go back to,
you know, sleeping out there?
I mean, without these tents, you got the snow,
and the rats and stuff.
And, we had what they call a "deep cleaning" one day.
And they was supposed to be spraying for the rats, right?
So, all they did was have those,
um, ya know, the blue street cleaning trucks?
All they did was just did some soap and water on the ground.
They didn't spray no walls,
we still had rats come and just invading tents and stuff.
And eating our food and stuff.
- So you're saying there's room for 75 people,
and there's more than 75 people.
- Yes.
- So at least let us have a tent.
For those that can't get into housing.
- Yes. I mean, well yeah you got the 75 people,
but you got way more than 75 people.
- Right, there's just not enough housing.
- No.
- What's your future like?
- Well, I wanna get from underneath the bridge.
I don't wanna be staying here
cause we have the winter coming and that's kinda harsh.
- It's gonna be here soon. - It's gonna be cold.
- Yeah, three to four months.
- And these tents are, they're technically for summer,
which is camping, or camping stuff.
The snow, the cold air just goes right through it.
And, yeah, we might have the heaters
but they still go on propane tanks
and those are hard to find.
- So, if you had three wishes, what would they be?
- I'm gonna use these wisely, okay?
So the first wish is for proper housing, and equal housing.
Second wish is for food.
Third wish is for equal rights, regardless.
- Well thank you very much for talking to me.
- Thank you.