The Chicago suburb where Pope Leo grew up plans to purchase his childhood home and turn it into a historic site.

The Board of Trustees of Dolton, Ill., voted unanimously on Tuesday to put an offer on the three-bedroom, three-bath brick house, which is up for auction later this month.

At the meeting — which was livestreamed online — Mayor Jason House called the purchase a “once-in-a-lifetime opportunity” for the village, which in recent years has been plagued by a series of scandals over alleged financial and political misconduct by its previous mayor.

“We can either seize this moment and move it forward, or we can let that moment go to an investor,” House said.

The May election of Pope Leo — the first American-born pope — has drawn national attention to Dolton, a village with an estimated population around 20,000 some 20 miles south of Chicago.

Leo — then known as Robert Prevost — grew up in the home on East 141st Place. His parents bought it new in 1949, paying a $42 monthly mortgage, according to member station WBEZ.

Prevost moved away for college and spent most of his career in Peru before rising through the Vatican ranks. His family sold the house in 1996, and ownership changed multiple times in the years since. Most recently, a local bought it as a flip property in 2024 and had been trying to sell it earlier this year — as the Roman Catholic Church was undergoing a seismic change in leadership.

According to WBEZ, the house was listed for $219,000 on May 5, just days after Pope Francis’ death and before the start of the papal conclave. But the listing was taken down by the time Leo emerged as the new pontiff.

Broker iCandy Realty and real estate auction firm Paramount Realty are offering it to the highest bidder by July 17, with a reserve price of $250,000 — the minimum the seller will accept. They say it was renovated in 2025, but remains a part of history.

“Pope Leo XIV’s journey from this humble neighborhood to the Vatican is a testament to faith, perseverance, and purpose,” its informational brochure reads. “Now, you have the rare chance to own a tangible piece of his inspiring legacy.”

Neither village authorities, the realtor or the auction firm involved have responded to NPR’s requests for comment about what Tuesday’s vote might mean for the property’s sale and future.

Some locals don’t see the house as a top priority

While the unanimous motion drew a smattering of applause in the room, not everyone is thrilled about this use of village funds.

Dolton has been plagued by financial and political scandals since well before the new pope put it on the map.

Its previous mayor, Tiffany Henyard, is the subject of multiple lawsuits and a federal investigation over alleged corruption, financial mismanagement and political retaliation during her four-year tenure.

Residents voted to recall her in 2022, but an appeals court later ruled that election invalid. In 2024, the Board of Trustees hired former Chicago Mayor Lori Lightfoot to investigate Henyard’s conduct.

Lightfoot shared the results in January, outlining a pattern of unchecked spending and deception by Henyard. One of her findings was that Dolton’s general fund balance had dropped from a surplus in 2022 to around $3.65 million in debt.

Henyard’s attorney accused Lightfoot of “political theater” in an effort to thwart her re-election campaign, which was unsuccessful. House beat her in the Democratic primary with 88% of the vote and was sworn in in May. And while Henyard’s legal troubles continue, House has pledged to get the village back on track.

His priorities include rebuilding trust between the local government and residents, as well as bringing new businesses to the area.

It’s against this backdrop that several concerned citizens came forward on Tuesday to question the house purchase, saying they would rather see an investment in basic infrastructure improvements, like fixing roads and filling potholes.

“We need to be mindful of addressing the issues that the city has while we’re trying to address the debts and the lawsuits,” the Rev. Ryan Reese said from the crowd. “I’m not sure that this is the first priority.”

Another resident, Mary Avent, said that while buying the house is “admirable,” she worries about whether the village can afford it.

“Even if we have the money, who’s going to maintain that?” she asked.

House said police and public works have been maintaining the property and will continue to do so.

“We’ve had charters come in here, we want to make sure that anybody that comes into our community is safe,” he said. “That’s a cost we will incur whether we own the property or not … Why would we not want to participate in that and get the benefit of this historic moment moving forward?”

House assured worried residents that the project will not derail from the board’s other priorities, adding that some roads would be repaved within days.

Officials hope history can fund the future 

House said he wants the community to benefit from its history, and spoke of opportunities to get state and federal funds to do so. He stressed that attracting visitors would create much-needed revenue for the village, saying “you cannot cut your way out of a deficit.”

Several board members compared the pope’s house to the childhood homes of figures like Martin Luther King Jr. and Michael Jackson, and the tourism opportunities it could create. The Jackson home in Gary, Ind., is unoccupied and owned by the family, while the King family sold two of MLK’s Atlanta homes — where he was born, and where he later lived with his family — to the National Park Service within the last decade.

“When we do it the correct way, in the long run, it will pay for itself,” trustee Tammie Brown said, adding that she’s already heard from supporters of the idea who want to donate.

Since May, camera crews and Catholic tourists have traveled from across the country to visit and take pictures outside of the two-story house (although some mistakenly flocked to the wrong one), according to local media reports.

On Tuesday, the Village of Dolton posted photos to its Facebook page of workers repairing the building’s roof. It said the house continues to attract visitors, “bringing new energy and attention to our village.”

“This increased traffic represents a new day in Dolton — full of potential, progress, and promise,” it said.

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Russia launched the most extensive aerial bombardment of Ukraine since its full-scale invasion, according to Kyiv, signalling a sharp escalation in Moscow’s campaign and further undermining fragile hopes for a negotiated resolution to the war now in its fourth year.

Ukraine’s air force said Russia had fired a staggering 537 aerial weapons in a single overnight barrage that began late on Saturday, including 477 explosive drones and decoys and 60 missiles of various types. Ukrainian air defences intercepted 211 drones and 38 missiles.

The scale of the assault marks a dramatic intensification in Russia’s strategy. Ukrainian officials say Moscow aims to systematically degrade the country’s limited air defence network and exhaust its western-supplied arsenal.

Ukraine’s air force said one of its F-16 pilots, Lieutenant General Col Maksym Ustymenko, was killed after his aircraft sustained damage while downing seven aerial targets. He steered the plane away from populated areas, it added, but was unable to eject in time.

To the south in Kherson, regional authorities said one man was killed in a drone attack. In Kharkiv, in the north-east, two men were killed when a drone struck their car, according to the regional governor. Residential buildings sustained damage in several other cities.

In Kyiv, residents took refuge in bomb shelters and metro stations deep underground, while the booms of air defences intercepting Russian drones reverberated above. Several missiles and drones struck critical infrastructure in the western city of Lviv, which sits close to the border with Nato member Poland, according to the mayor.

Ukraine has used fighter jets for air defence in part because of its dwindling supply of surface-to-air defence systems and interceptor missiles. The Trump administration has so far declined to sell Kyiv more of the prized Patriot air defence systems, a few of which were provided in security packages under President Joe Biden.

Ukraine’s President Volodymyr Zelenskyy called on western partners to step up support for his war-battered nation and reiterated Kyiv’s readiness to buy more air defence systems from Washington.

“Ukraine needs to strengthen its air defence — the thing that best protects lives,” Zelenskyy wrote on X. “These are American systems, which we are ready to buy.

“Moscow will not stop as long as it has the capability to launch massive strikes,” he wrote, adding that “pressure on the aggressor is needed” in the face of Russia’s air attacks and its summer ground offensive.

Russia attacked Ukraine with more than 114 missiles, over 1,270 drones and nearly 1,100 glide bombs in the past week, he said. Most of the drones launched overnight were Russian-Iranian-type suicide drones, he said.

Ukrainian defence minister Rustem Umerov told reporters on Friday that Russia had increased its combined missile and drone strikes in recent months. Moscow’s aim is “to exhaust our air defence”, he said, “and apply psychological pressure”.

Ukraine had been “systematically working for years” on finding effective solutions to counter the Iranian-designed attack drones, Umerov said.

“It has been a constant intellectual struggle.” he said, due to Russia’s ever-evolving tactics. The Russian drones based on Iran’s Shahed design now fly faster and higher, above the range of Ukraine’s mobile air defence units. The drones also pack a larger warhead than the original ones first used in October 2022.

Meanwhile, Ukraine’s top commander, Oleksandr Syrsky, warned that on the eastern battlefields, Russian troops were “attempting to break through our defences and advance in three operational directions”.

Aided by powerful glide bombs and unjammable fibre optic drones, Russian forces have advanced there at the fastest pace since November and are threatening to encircle the strategic eastern cities of Kostyantynivka and Pokrovsk.

Further north, Moscow’s troops are pushing from Russia’s Kursk region into Ukraine’s Sumy region, and are nearly within artillery range of the regional capital.

Senior Ukrainian officials told the Financial Times that they expected Russia’s ground offensive and air campaign to further intensify over the summer.

“Putin long ago decided he would keep waging war, despite the world’s calls for peace,” Zelenskyy said on X.

Zelenskyy also signed a decree on Sunday to withdraw Ukraine from the Ottawa Convention, which bars the production and use of anti-personnel mines.

Roman Kostenko, a member of parliament and military commander, said parliamentary approval will be needed to finalise the withdrawal, but called it “a step long demanded by the reality of war”.

“Russia is not a party to this convention and uses mines extensively against our military and civilians,” he wrote on Facebook. “We cannot remain bound by restrictions when the enemy faces none.”

Welcome to our live coverage of President Donald Trump’s push to advance his agenda through Congress in one “big, beautiful bill” — and do so in time for a self-imposed July 4 deadline.

If you’re just catching up, here’s what to know:

Senate Republicans clear a hurdle: After an hourslong push by Senate GOP leaders yesterday, the giant tax cuts and spending bill advanced from a key procedural vote in the upper chamber, 51-49.

In a late-night post on social media, Trump declared a “GREAT VICTORY,” offering praise to four Republicans who shifted their votes.

What happens next: Republican leaders must now satisfy numerous holdouts in the party still demanding changes to the bill.

Senate Democrats, meanwhile, are forcing a major delay tactic, forcing clerks to spend an estimated 10 to 15 hours reading aloud the entire bill. After the reading, there would be debate on the bill, followed by a marathon “vote-a-rama” before a vote on final passage.

The vote-a-rama is another headache for GOP leadership: The open-ended, hourslong series of votes on amendments will be offered mostly by Democrats and put Republicans on the spot. At least one Republican holdout, Sen. Susan Collins of Maine, has signaled she will offer her own amendments to the bill in an unusual move for a GOP bill.

What’s in the bill: Trump’s multitrillion-dollar bill would lower federal taxes and infuse more money into the Pentagon and border security agencies, while downsizing government safety-net programs including Medicaid.

Read a fact check on some of Trump’s claims about the measure, and compare what we know so far about the House and Senate versions of the bill.

The timeline is extremely tight: Trump has demanded to sign the bill on the Fourth of July, but the measure must still go back to the House if it passes the Senate.

Saturday’s vote allows the Senate to begin debating Trump’s bill, teeing up a final passage vote in that chamber as soon as Monday.

CNN’s Nicky Robertson and Morgan Rimmer contributed to this report.