After an ICE processing center located in west suburban Broadview became a flash point in protests against the Trump administration’s Operation Midway Blitz, village officials are moving to require that local prisons and detention centers allow for religious worship inside their walls. Beyond the requirement that any prison or detention center operating within the village would not be able to prohibit religious worship inside the facility, a draft copy of the proposed changes to Broadview’s zoning code sets out a number of requirements around parking, distance between a prison or detention center and other institutions like schools, other places of worship, day care centers and public housing. The proposal, set to come before the village zoning board Thursday night, comes on the heels of several attempts by clergy and other faith-based activists to celebrate Communion and provide other religious guidance to people being detained at the processing center during the Trump administration’s immigration operations in and around Chicago.  Broadview Police Chief Thomas Mills has occasionally acted as a mediator between the clergy and ICE facility administrators, who have refused the requests. Those refusals have created significant media attention and even prompted Pope Leo XIV to call for clergy access to the processing center, where detainees have reported inhumane conditions and treatment by federal authorities. Mayor Katrina Thompson said the proposed changes were part of a routine update to village code, but acknowledged that these changes attracted significant attention “because of everything going on.”   “We’re doing our due diligence for the times that we’re in in the village of Broadview,” she said.   Broadview Mayor Katrina Thompson is photographed in her office at Broadview Village Hall on Oct. 9, 2025. She is in her eighth year as mayor in the town of about 8,000 residents. (Stacey Wescott/Chicago Tribune) As far as what power local authorities would have to enforce the requirements on a federally run building, Thompson said, “We don’t control federal operations.”  That said, she continued, “they still have to follow our local laws as they relate to zoning.” Village spokesperson David Ormsby noted that the proposed ordinance coming before the board Thursday was still a draft and that other changes were possible. Ormsby said he couldn’t speak to what prompted the ordinance or how it would apply to the existing processing center, which has been located in Broadview for many years. A marginal note in the draft copy states that the regulations “would also apply to the existing facility if they try to expand it or do anything other than interior repairs (or) remodeling.”  Activists had taken note of the proposal by Thursday afternoon, making plans to protest at the meeting on the suspicion that federal authorities planned to ask the village to expand its building there.  Rumors have circulated periodically over the fall that the federal government was considering expanding its footprint in Broadview. Videographers embedded with federal officials’ entourages have posted footage of them walking through buildings and discussing a possible expansion of holding space.  Neither Thompson nor Ormsby was aware of any moves by the federal government — or any other public body — to establish a new prison or detention center in Broadview.  The low-slung brick building with boarded-up windows has been in the tiny suburb for at least 20 years, Thompson said. While neighbors of the facility have grown used to periodic protests and activism around the site, Operation Midway Blitz brought regular clouds of tear gas and hailstorms of pepper balls to 1930 W. Beach St. as federal agents tried to subdue furious protesters outside. Illinois State Police and the Cook County sheriff’s office personnel have largely taken over law enforcement around the building alongside municipal police. The shift has forced politicians like Gov. JB Pritzker to walk a thin line between public safety needs and vociferous opposition to the administration of President Donald Trump and the tactics and mission of the immigration operation. While protesters and advocacy groups have criticized the role state and local police agencies have played, Pritzker and others have countered that those agencies are working to protect protesters and curb the use of chemical crowd controls and other less-lethal ammunition that characterized the first weeks of demonstrations. After several weeks of chaos outside the building and a legal battle with the feds over an illegally constructed fence on Beach Street, Thompson sought to curb protests with an executive order restricting when people may and may not demonstrate outside the building. On Dec. 3, she adjusted that order to permit gatherings of under 25 people from 9 a.m. to 9 p.m. and gatherings of more than 25 people from 11 a.m. to 7 p.m.  Inside the processing center, detainees and their attorneys reported what one witness called “a human rights emergency:” filthy living conditions, overcrowding and abusive treatment by guards against people kept in the building far longer than it was designed for, according to a federal lawsuit filed in October. Attorneys have repeatedly attempted to get inside the facility to meet with their clients and been denied access, the lawsuit alleged.  If the ordinance clears the Broadview zoning board Thursday evening, it would be recommended for approval by the village board. The board’s next meeting is set for Jan. 5, 2026.    ...read more read less