Chicago has paid vendors $138 million to provide care for migrants for just over a year during the ongoing U.S. immigration crisis. The city faces mounting criticism for doling out more than $90 million to a Kansas firm while local organizations received far less funding.
Kanas-based Favorite Healthcare is owned by a U.K.-based organization known as The Acacium Group, Axios reported.
Chicago officials have accused Favorite of charging taxpayers “exorbitant” fees. Invoices show the company billing Chicago $50 per hour for trash runners and $180 per hour for site managers.
Of the $138 million Chicago paid out to vendors for migrant care, Favorite Healthcare Staffing received $93 million, or 68% of the overall funding, according to NBC Chicago. Local organizations received $24 million from the city.
Local lawmakers want more local workers hired instead of sending money out of the city.
“We want more accountability,” Chicago’s Committee on Immigrant and Refugee Rights Chair Ald. Andre Vasquez told Axios. “We want to know how much money the company is keeping versus giving the workers, who they’re hiring, how they’re hiring and who gets promoted, especially if we’re putting in this many dollars.”
Favorite is not releasing those details, saying the company is “contractually” forbidden from commenting on its city work.
In 2022, then-Mayor Lori Lightfoot signed the initial deal with Favorite for $57 million. The city increased the contract in October, adding $36 million.
The city, Axios said, vowed that by the first week of December it would hire local vendors to run migrant shelters, but it’s still paying Favorite to run all 27 facilities.
Mayor Brandon Johnson now says local vendors will replace Favorite “soon.”
The city paid nearly $1 million in fees for a failed migrant camp in Brighton Park that would’ve featured winterized tents for migrants.
Illinois Gov. J.B. Pritzker (D) shut the camp down in the midst of construction because of contamination concerns.
The city is also paying developers and contractors high rents to host migrant shelters.
Newsweek reported more than 25,000 migrants have arrived in Chicago in the past 16 months.