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New York City is prepared to house asylum-seekers in as many as 20 schools with free-standing gyms, Mayor Eric Adams said Tuesday. The attorney representing the city in the case did not issue a comment outside court, nor did an attorney for the Crossroads Hotel and the Ramada Inn in Newburgh, which haven been housing migrants bused from NYC. “This is one of the last places we want to look at,” Adams said. "None of us are comfortable with having to take these drastic steps. But I could not have been more clear for the last few months of what we are facing. Over 65,000 migrant asylum seekers have reached our city." During the pandemic, group shelters made it difficult to comply with social distancing rules, prompting the city to rent out hundreds of hotel rooms as quasi COVID wards.
HUMANITARIAN MIGRANT CRISIS
Still, some parent leaders said ensuring that students and migrants aren’t in contact may require logistical coordination to manage nearby entrances and exits. Increasingly frustrated in recent months, the mayor has criticized President Biden and pushed for federal emergency aid. Officials representing some New York other suburbs also rebuked Adams' plan to send migrants to their towns for shelter. Earlier this year, dozens of migrants staged a protest after being evicted from hotel rooms and forced into barracks set up at the Brooklyn Cruise Terminal, which has poor access to public transportation. They complained about the cold, the lack of privacy and not having enough bathrooms.
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New York (AP) — New York City has begun to convert public school gymnasiums into housing for international migrants, its latest effort to accommodate a growing population of asylum-seekers who have overwhelmed the city's homeless shelter system. Mayor Eric Adams on Tuesday said 20 city public-school gyms are now being eyed to hold migrants, although he claimed it’s just a possibility — despite photos this week showing beds set up in two of them and principals warning parents about the move. Mayor Adams’ administration is eyeing the use of public school buildings that will be empty over the summer to temporarily house migrants, The Post has learned. The decision sparked backlash from some parents and local officials, who said schools shouldn't be used as shelters and that Floyd Bennett Field, the tent shelter’s site, isn’t suitable for housing migrants because of its vulnerability to weather.
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The Roosevelt Hotel will first open this week as a welcome center providing legal and medical information and resources, officials said. It also will open 175 rooms for families with children, then expand the number of rooms to 850. The city said another 150 other rooms will be available to other asylum seekers. A legal mandate requires the city to provide shelter to anyone who needs it. Unlike most other big cities, New York also has a longstanding “right to shelter” that requires the city to provide emergency housing to anyone who asks for it. The city tried in October 2023 to suspend the requirement due to the influx of migrants.
There’s an option for President Biden to add another three months to that clock. And if the company doesn’t find a buyer or refuses to be sold, it will be banned. And TikTok sent out this message to users on the same day that a House committee is going into vote on this bill and whether to move it forward. They go into vote, and they come out, and it’s 50 to 0 in support of the bill.
By Wednesday evening, migrants were moved out of a handful of gyms where they had been staying, mostly located in Brooklyn, though the city said that the plan to use about 20 gyms could be revived as needed for temporary overflow. Josh Goldfein, an attorney with the Legal Aid Society, which helps monitor the city’s treatment of homeless individuals, said there were problems with the city’s decision to go outside their standard shelter options, such as hotel rooms. He pointed to a lack of shower access and compliance with the Americans with Disabilities at some school gymnasiums. City officials did not provide a full list of school gyms under consideration for emergency shelter, nor did they say which buildings are currently housing migrants.
NYC Mayor Eric Adams defends housing migrants at high school amid backlash - ABC News
NYC Mayor Eric Adams defends housing migrants at high school amid backlash.
Posted: Thu, 11 Jan 2024 08:00:00 GMT [source]
Residents needed medical services, like blood draws, and families were concerned about medical waste as well as strangers wandering the hallways and stairwells. The mayor did not reveal all of the locations but the first six appear to be in Brooklyn. “Hotels are not the solution for these situations,” he said, adding that the optics posed problems for taxpayers who might think migrants are living in luxury at their expense. Vijay Dandapani, the president and CEO of the Hotel Association of New York City, said the city needs to come up with long-term solutions. "I feel they should have a different type of building or something for adults," one resident told News 4 New York. “No one wants to disrupt the lives of asylum-seekers nor those of our students, parents, teachers and principals,” he said.
First the city tried hotels, then tents, then a cruise ship terminal, then school gyms. As migrants have continued to cross the border, the mayor pleaded on Wednesday for understanding — and ideas. At least one of them, in Coney Island, was housing migrants on Tuesday. Before the surge in asylum seekers, the city was dealing with increased homelessness, packed shelters and a dearth of affordable housing. New York even announced a plan to send hundreds of migrants to hotels in suburban Orange and Rockland counties across across the Hudson River, angering local leaders.
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At least six more Big Apple schools are set to start temporarily housing migrants in their gyms, prompting all hell to break loose Monday among parents frantic over safety and potential learning disruptions. Mr. Biden has been criticized over his response to immigration by Republicans and Democrats alike in recent weeks, including by Mr. Adams, who said last month that the president had “failed” the city. The Biden administration has moved to restrict the flow of migrants, with new limits on who can apply for asylum in the United States. That would make it all but impossible for many people to qualify if they hadn’t applied for asylum elsewhere.
But back in the city, where two new busloads of migrants arrived Tuesday night, the decision to use school gyms has struck a nerve. In the afternoon, after classes dismissed for the day, the playground was unusually quiet. Parents said their kids were told they couldn’t play outside and that all after school programs were being held indoors. In Chicago, where officials have reported nearly 9,000 people arriving since August, hundreds of migrants who have come since mid-April have slept on the floors of city police stations. This month the city turned several park fieldhouses into “temporary respite centers,” canceling or relocated summer programs, prompting complaints from some parents.
Local, state and city officials have voiced concerns about a lack of planning to accommodate the migrants as New York operates a shelter system above capacity and vows to send migrants to counties that have already declared a state of emergency. The decision from the judge came as a senior staffer with the Adams administration had called Neuhaus and told him seven more buses were heading up there. The county executive told the staffer to talk with the city's attorney, as the judge had already put the temporary skids on the busing plan. Those facilities are built for children — with kid-sized restrooms and sinks, and without showers — but are being prepped for adult migrants.
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