JOLIET — For the second time in the past two weeks, city of Joliet officials found themselves being called to the vacant Steak N Shake property on South Larkin Avenue after readers notified Joliet Patch that the two adjacent properties have turned into filthy public nuisances.
By late Thursday afternoon, city of Joliet’s neighborhood services department had crews on the site removing the garbage and materials that was strewn across the property behind the empty strip mall where the old J.J. Fish restaurant used to be. The entire strip mall has sat vacant for at least three or four years ago and an out of town real estate agent has his signs on the windows.
In addition to the squalor behind the strip mall, Joliet Patch realized that several homeless people had several up beds and living rooms inside what used to be the Dumpster of the now-permanently closed Steak N Shake. The Steak N Shake will be torn down in the coming months to make way for Joliet’s second Chick-fil-A double-drive thru restaurant.’
By early evening, the city of Joliet had completely cleaned up the filth behind the strip mall next to the Steak N Shake. Two of photos of the neighborhood services division cleanup are posted among the photos taken below.
Earlier, Joliet Fire Chief Jeff Carey told Joliet Patch that the city’s Community Care Program, spearheaded by the fire department, has tried to help at least 96 homeless people so far this year. Of those, 67 people graduated through the program and about 20 people are still in the program. Another 10 to chose to leave the program and not get any help to overcome their homelessness through city intervention and help.
“Some of them are not going to take it,” Carey explained.
The Community Care Program has successfully cleaned up at least four major areas of Joliet that were being overridden with homeless people. One area was behind Al’s Steakhouse and the former Bill Jacobs auto dealership along West Jefferson Street near Hammes Avenue, Carey said.
Another area was along Hammes Avenue near the BP gas station, a third spot was on the east side in the 600 block of Cass Street near the creek. A fourth location was along Stryker Avenue closer to Interstate 80 and the Prayer Tower Ministries Church.
Now that the Steak N Shake property and adjacent strip mall are known problem spots, city employees will continue to make regular rounds to ensure that those locations do not remain as public health and safety hazards, the fire chief said.
“We have had successes with at least four of these places. Sometimes, it takes a few tries,” he said. “Slowly, we are getting some of the people the help they need. “
The Community Care Program works with the homeless to help them find shelter, food, drug rehab, if necessary, but “not all of them want it,” Carey said of Joliet’s homeless population. “There are certain groups of homeless unfortunately, that won’t take our services.”
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Besides the Fire Department, the Joliet Police Department and Neighborhood Services Division is also intricately involved in the Community Care Program, Carey said.
He said the city was able to immediately intervene after Joliet Patch notified them of the squalor behind the Steak N Shake and the strip mall because it’s unsafe and unsanitary. And since city staff found none of the homeless people there on the property, “then we consider it an abandoned property. (Normally) if it’s private property, we give them a couple of days to vacate the property.
“We consider it abandoned right now,” Carey said of the Steak N Shake property.
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