New York considers housing 95,000 migrants in Brooklyn, Central Park

By Al Mayadeen English
Source: The Messenger
4 Aug 2023 16:40

This comes as New York City Mayor Eric Adams has been repeatedly called on the Biden administration for the past few months to provide financial aid to tackle the migrant housing crisis.

A photo of Central Park's Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis Reservoir in an undated photo. (AP)

According to The Messenger, New York City officials are considering plans to house more than 95,000 migrants who arrived in the past 15 months in Manhattan’s Central Park and Brooklyn’s Prospect Park, in a shelter crisis.

Masses of migrants were seen sleeping outside the Roosevelt Hotel in midtown Manhattan on Tuesday, as Gothamist published the news the next day that the two parks are possible shelters for the asylum seekers, alongside “major public green spaces.”

At a press conference, Deputy Mayor for Health and Human Services Anne Williams-Isom said in response to possible plans: “Everything is on the table", adding that the sites are among 3,000 locations being reviewed.

This comes as New York City Mayor Eric Adams has repeatedly called on the Biden administration for the past few months to provide financial aid to tackle the migrant housing crisis, as speculation indicates that the city has been intentionally allowing them to sleep on the streets in an attempt to pressure the Biden administration - but that was denied by Williams-Isom.

The Adams administration would never use the asylum seekers’ situation as a “stunt," she argued.

A May report from the Gothamist revealed that many of the migrants who recently arrived have few familial ties or community ties, thus raising homelessness numbers.

As of July 30, New York's shelters were housing almost 107,9000 people, which is double that from January 2022. Around 56,600 of the city’s current shelter residents are migrants.

After he made statements encouraging migrants to move to other cities in late July, Adams was accused of breaching the city's right-to-shelter rules and undermining the spirit of New York, represented by the Statue of Liberty, which formerly welcomed immigrants by sea.

More than 93,000 migrants, largely from Central and South America, have landed in New York since April of last year, and the city is obligated by law to provide free lodging to anybody who asks for it.