An anonymous person made Chicago a little warmer on Wednesday by paying for 70 homeless people to stay in a hotel during the historic cold snap sweeping the Midwest.
It happened after a homeless camp of nearly a dozen tents, set up near Willis Tower, was shut down. A large group of homeless individuals had formed to huddle around propane tanks. When one exploded, the camp was cleared out and the group had nowhere to go.
People sleep in tents in a wooded area near the Dan Ryan Expressway as the temperature drops below zero late Tuesday Jan. 29, 2019, in Chicago. pic.twitter.com/repZH7jzV4
— armando l sanchez (@mandophotos) January 30, 2019
Until a Good Samaritan stepped in and offered to pay for everyone to stay in a hotel for the rest of the week while the cold snap passes. (RELATED: Here Are A Bunch Of Insane Photos From The Polar Vortex In The Midwest)
“Isn’t that wonderful?” Jacqueline Rachev, a local spokeswoman for the Salvation Army, told The Chicago Tribune. “At least they’re warm and they’re safe.”
It’s not clear who the person is, as they insisted on anonymity and acted almost immediately. By the time Sanchez was dispatched to respond to the homeless camp where the propane tank had exploded, he or she had already dropped by and put them up in a South Side hotel.
“All the folks there,” Rachez said. “Some wonderful citizen is going to put all of them up at a hotel for the rest of the week.”
All but one man (who decided to check into a local homeless warming center instead) checked into the hotel.
Chicago has a population of about 80,000 homeless individuals. The city has been taking measures to keep as many of them as warm as possible. Five city buses have been running overnight to offer a makeshift mobile warming center for those who do not have heat. And on Wednesday night, Chicago police officers were seen handing out jackets to the homeless.
Serve and protect in dangerous sub-zero temperatures. Chicago police hand out coats to the homeless. OEMC’s Zone 4 police dispatcher Minka Giles organized a coat drive. pic.twitter.com/TyDv9YfB1G
— Tahman Bradley (@tahmanbradley) January 30, 2019