A new 45-unit affordable housing building in Chicago is set to finish construction this fall, aimed at fulfilling commitments made to Indigenous people seven decades ago under the Urban Indian Relocation Act of 1956. Native Americans were offered access to housing, employment, and other support in return for relocating to major cities, according to Visionary Ventures, the nonprofit organization leading the project. The building at 2909 W. Irving Park represents the first phase of a broader effort to tackle one of Chicago's Indigenous population's most pressing challenges: finding homes they can afford.
Chicago experienced a 3.1 percent yearly rent hike as of June 2026, the steepest among top metro areas nationwide, according to the Illinois Policy Institute. Half of all Native American renters in the city meet the definition of "rent burdened," meaning they spend over 30 percent of their earnings on housing costs. The City of Chicago provided $6 million from Mayor Brandon Johnson's Housing and Economic Development Bond, $950,000 in permanent supportive housing funds, and $2.5 million in low-income housing tax credits for the project's construction. Units in the building, named Jigzibik: At the River's Edge, are designated for residents earning at or below 60 percent of the Area Median Income—$35,580 annually for individuals or $50,760 for families of four. The structure offers studios plus one-, two-, and three-bedroom apartments.
"We wanted to bring additional resources into a community that's been severely underserved in Chicago," said Pamela Silas, board chair of Visionary Ventures and a member of the Menominee and Oneida Nations. The organization has marketed the building to the Native community over four years, though city tax credit requirements make units available to all eligible Chicago residents. Executive Director Shelly Tucciarelli, who is Oneida and worked two decades at the Illinois Housing Development Authority, explained that organizers are "affirmatively marketing to one of the most underserved communities in Chicago." Mayor Johnson confirmed that "promises were made over 50 years ago to provide housing, and the city came through for us," according to Silas.
Rising rents have scattered Native families across Chicago and into surrounding suburbs, breaking apart a community that originally coalesced in northern neighborhoods like Uptown following the 1956 relocation program, the report explains. In 1970, the eviction of Menominee mother Carol Warrington from her Wrigleyville apartment sparked an occupation of Chicago Cubs Stadium, highlighting the severe housing conditions Indigenous residents faced. Today's affordability crisis creates a similar diaspora, with loan application failures and rent burden reaching what Silas described as "really abysmal" levels. Visionary Ventures partnered with Full Circle, a Midwestern affordable housing nonprofit, and Chicago architecture firm Canopy to design a building that serves not just as shelter but as cultural infrastructure, featuring a gathering hall, fitness facilities, elder and youth programs, and regalia-making space.
The project extends beyond Jigzibik's 45 apartments. Visionary Ventures is already developing an 80-unit building in Chicago's Rogers Park neighborhood and a 55-unit structure converted from an old elementary school in West Allis, Wisconsin, located two miles from the Oneida Nation of Wisconsin's Milwaukee office. The Wisconsin project received state tax credits in June. The Oneida Nation has contributed significantly, and the Prairie Band of Potawatomi Nation, which recently reacquired ancestral land near Chicago, also supports the initiative. Jigzibik will include office space for the California Indian Manpower Consortium, an employment resource, plus a seventh-floor gathering hall with river and downtown views opening onto a roof deck planted with native species and garden plots. The building's design reflects what Silas called a vision of "housing not being transactional, but being a community built within the community."