New York City officials plan to eliminate 10,000 beds for migrants, including closing one of the largest shelters in Brooklyn that had housed up to 4,000 people and drew quality-of-life and crime complaints from the nearby residential neighborhood.
The shelter closures, announced Friday, come as the number of migrants arriving in New York City has continued to decrease and the number of asylum seekers being housed by the city is at the lowest level in 18 months.
The city has seen the arrival of 229,000 migrants since the spring of 2022. But it is now housing just 51,000 migrants, down from a high of more than 69,000 last January. New York City plans to close at least 46 migrant shelters by June, according to city officials, a move that they project will save billions of dollars.
Late last year, the city announced that it would close the sprawling tent shelter that houses thousands of migrants on Randall’s Island, as well as another tent complex that housed families on Floyd Bennett Field in Brooklyn.
The latest round of closures included three large humanitarian emergency response and relief centers — the Hall Street shelter in the Clinton Hill section of Brooklyn; and the Watson and Stewart Hotels in Manhattan — as well as the Brooklyn Vybe Hotel in Flatbush.
But even with the decline in migrant arrivals, the closures meant that the city would need to find someplace else to house the thousands of people who had been living in the tent complexes.
So the city announced on Friday that it planned to open a new shelter on Bruckner Boulevard in the Bronx that will house 2,200 single adult male migrants who were being housed at emergency tent shelters on Randall’s Island and at other shelters that are closing.
“We will continue to do everything we can to help migrants become self-sufficient, while finding more opportunities to save taxpayer money and turn the page on this unprecedented humanitarian crisis,” Mayor Eric Adams said in a statement.
The Hall Street shelter had attracted negative attention after two Venezuelan migrants were fatally shot outside. Two men rode by on a moped and one of them opened fire in an incident that the police believe was tied to Venezuelan gangs.
Crystal Hudson, a councilwoman from Brooklyn who called for the closure of the Hall Street shelter, said residents were relieved that the shelter was closing but also wanted to ensure that migrants were housed humanely.
Diana Ayala, a councilwoman who represents parts of the Bronx and Manhattan, said she had recommended the new Bruckner Boulevard site but hopes that it will be needed only temporarily.
Ms. Ayala, who along with other Bronx representatives has raised concerns about the concentration of shelters in the borough, said she was concerned about the security of the occupants and protecting them from any deportation actions by federal authorities.
Liz Garcia, a spokeswoman for the mayor, said the shift from tents to a brick-and-mortar shelter is beneficial to the occupants and will allow the city to refurbish and reopen athletic fields on Randall’s Island.
Part of the decline in the migrant population in the city’s shelters can be traced to the Adams administration, which placed 30- and 60-day limits on shelter stays that required occupants to reapply. The move caused some emergency shelter occupants to leave the system.
While the city has trumpeted the decline in the number of migrants it is housing, advocates have said the city needs to do more to help migrants integrate into the city. That means more intensive case management services to help occupants qualify for temporary protected status or other standing that would allow them to work and move out of shelter.
Mr. Adams has consistently called for allowing migrants to work, but watchdogs say that case managers are overloaded and that the movement to different shelters caused by the time limits imposed by the city leaves many migrants confused or having to start over.
“What we really need to see is both the city and the state doing more to help families and individuals get out of the shelters and get into housing,” said Dave Giffen, the executive director of Coalition for the Homeless. “The best way to do that is to help them find jobs and integrate into the community.”
Ms. Garcia, the mayor’s spokeswoman, said the new shelter in the Bronx will have a community-based organization to help migrants. The city is also doing more outreach and trying to connect more migrants with caseworkers.
On Friday, President Biden extended deportation protections for hundreds of thousands of immigrants, a move that New York had joined with other cities to push for.
“We are definitely making strides to make sure that people can get out of our shelter system and make their own lives,” Ms. Garcia said.
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