City swamped with applications for income-assistance program

Chicago City Hall Photo credit WBBM Newsradio

By WBBM Newsradio

(WBBM NEWSRADIO) — The city of Chicago has received more than 176,000 applications from low-income households for a program that will give cash every month to 5,000 families, the Lightfoot Administration said.

The Chicago Resilient Communities pilot program is designed to help the people most affected financially by the COVID-19 pandemic. Those selected will receive $500 a month for one year.

The city says at least 300 applications were submitted from each of the city’s 50 wards, with 68% of applicants identifying as Black; 24% as Latino; 70% as women; 17% as disabled; 9% as housing insecure or homeless.

“It would, for a year, ensure me having a roof over my head where I wouldn’t have to worry about having that,” Tommie Hannah, one of the thousands who applied for the program, told the Chicago Sun-Times. “Because a person in my position, you can’t even think about going back to work or focusing on going back to school or anything like that if where you live is still in question.”

Hannah said he has been living in a shelter, and he would like to use the monthly benefit to help secure his own apartment.

The mayor’s office says most households accepted in the program will get their first checks in late June.

Contributing: Sun-Times Media Wire