New York City begins evicting some migrants from shelters

New York City on Wednesday stepped up its efforts to remove migrants from its overcrowded shelters, beginning to enforce a new rule that limits the stay of some adult asylum seekers to a month in the system before they are forced to find accommodation on your own.

Childless migrants will now have to leave hotels, tent complexes and other city-operated facilities and find other accommodation after 30 days — or 60 days for asylum seekers ages 18 to 23 — , unless they can present evidence of “extenuating circumstances” and are granted an exemption.

As of Wednesday night, 192 migrants had requested an extension after reaching their deadline, of which 118 have been approved, Mayor Eric Adams’ office reported. Thousands more are expected to receive eviction notices in the coming months.

Mamadou Diallo, a 39-year-old Senegalese man, said he is not sure where he will go once his time in a shelter in the Bronx district expires later this week.

He hopes to receive an extension, noting that he just filed his asylum application and has been taking English classes, but he cannot yet apply for a work permit, as federal law says five months must pass from when he applied. asylum.

“I have nowhere to go,” he said Wednesday. “I go to school. I am looking for a job. “I do the most I can.”

The new restrictions were implemented after the Adams government managed to alter last March the city’s “right to shelter” guideline – a particular regulation of this city – which requires it to provide temporary housing to anyone who requests it.

Before the new rule went into effect, there was still a 30-day limit in shelters for unaccompanied adult migrants, but they were allowed to immediately reapply for a new bed with no questions asked.

The city also limits the stay of migrant families with children to 60 days, but they are not affected by the new measure and can still submit a new application without providing any justification.

However, an audit revealed that implementation over the past six months was “chaotic.”

Immigrant and homeless rights activists say they are closely monitoring the eviction process, which affects some 15,000 adult migrants. The city’s shelter system currently houses about 65,000 migrants, but many of them are families with children.

“Our concern is that people are being turned away for reasons that could be appealed or because of some error, or because they didn’t have all the required documentation,” said David Giffen, executive director of the Coalition for the Homeless, an advocacy group. “We are very vigilant to see if that happens, because no person who needs shelter in New York City should ever be relegated to sleeping on the streets.”

Democrat Adams on Tuesday lashed out at critics of the city’s increasingly restrictive shelter measures, which they have said are inhumane and chaotic in implementation. The mayor said the city simply cannot accommodate migrants indefinitely. New York City has provided temporary shelter to nearly 200,000 migrants since spring 2022, and nearly 1,000 asylum seekers arrive every week, he said.

“People say it’s inhumane to take people out during the winter, so now they’re saying it’s inhumane to do it in the summer,” Adams said. “There is no right time. “It’s never the right time.”

In Denver, another city that has received a wave of migrants, local authorities are embarking on an ambitious migrant support plan that includes six-month apartment rentals and intensive job training for those who do not yet have legal permission to work. For its part, Chicago has imposed stay limits of 60 days for adult migrants, with no option to renew, and Massachusetts limited families to a nine-month stay starting in June.

Adams had asked a court last October to suspend the “right to shelter” requirement in its entirety, but immigrant and homeless rights groups opposed the measure. The parties reached an agreement in March that established new guidelines for migrants.

The agreement still allows local authorities to grant extensions to shelter stays, after a case-by-case analysis.

City officials say migrants must demonstrate they are making “significant attempts to relocate,” such as applying for asylum or a work permit, or looking for a job or apartment.

Migrants can also receive an extension if they are able to demonstrate that they plan to leave the city within the next 30 days, have an upcoming immigration hearing or are about to undergo a medical procedure for a serious health problem or are they recover from one.

Migrants between the ages of 18 and 20 can also receive an extension if they are enrolled full-time in a secondary school.

“While these changes will require some adaptation, we are confident that they will help migrants progress to the next stage of their journeys, reduce the enormous burden on our shelter system, and allow us to continue providing essential services to all New Yorkers,” said Camille Joseph Varlack, Adams’ chief of staff, in an emailed statement Wednesday.

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