The nearly 40 irregular migrant families who left the Row NYC hotel, in the heart of the city’s theater district, are the first of dozens scheduled to leave the city’s shelters in the coming weeks.
Some of those who left on Tuesday immediately submitted a new application for a place to sleep, while others said they had managed to secure more stable accommodation outside the foster system.
Democrat Adams imposed the restrictions on homeless migrant families last October, arguing that the measure was necessary to relieve a reception system overwhelmed by asylum seekers crossing the southern border of the United States.
New York overwhelmed by crisis
The mayor’s office Nueva Yorkoverwhelmed by the immigration crisis, began to implement new rules this week that limit the stay for families to a maximum of 60 days in the same shelter.
After this period, asylum seekers have to start from scratch again to find a place in one of the more than 200 centers set up in the city, where they compete with new arrivals.
“60 days is a very short time for a person who is arriving in the city because with the legal processes it takes much longer, for a work permit, to obtain a TPS (Temporary Protection Statute),” says the Venezuelan. Angelo Chirino, 22 years old, arrived in the city in November with his wife and one-year-old son.
More than 160,000 people, the majority Latino – especially Venezuelan – have arrived in the city since the beginning of the immigration crisis almost two years ago, often on buses chartered from southern states, such as Texas governed by Greg Abbott. in protest of the immigration policy of the administration of Democrat Joe Biden, in a battle that has its sights set on the presidential elections next November.
María Quero, a 26-year-old Venezuelan who is almost nine months pregnant, was at the doors of the Row hotel on Tuesday morning with her suitcase and other personal belongings in tow.
He said his plan was to cross the city towards the Roosevelt Hotel, another accommodation in the city center that has been repurposed as a reception center for recently arrived migrants. According to municipal officials, migrant families there could request another 60-day stay.
“We don’t know what is going to happen,” said Quero, while her husband, David Domínguez, gathered his belongings to make the trip of about 20 minutes on foot. “Its very stressful. “It gives me a lot of anxiety.”
The two, who arrived in the country six months ago and spent five of them at the Row Hotel, said they have no friends or family to stay with in case they don’t get another space provided by the city.
Domínguez expressed his hope of finding a suitable place for his wife, as he noted that he knows of cases of pregnant women who have been housed in tents.
The Adams government has warned for weeks that no one who applies for a new location is guaranteed another bed.
But Adams and other city officials said Monday that they would prioritize families and try to place them near their children’s schools to reduce any impact on their education.
Pro-immigrant march
Pro-immigrant groups have organized marches in recent days, saying the new policy could force families to stand in long lines in the cold for new shelter, the same situation that migrants traveling alone have faced since late last year, when their stay in the city’s shelters was limited to 30 days.
The limits could also affect the education of migrant children, who could be forced to change schools if their families are moved elsewhere, activists say, a situation for which they intend to hold the local government responsible.
City Comptroller Brad Lander said Tuesday he will open an investigation into the Adams administration’s implementation of the 60-day policy, including whether it was adequately explained to families and its potential costs.
“What information is really available to people? Are there protocols for 60-day evictions?” he said outside the Row Hotel as families checked out.
Some 4,800 eviction notices have been sent to migrant families in shelters.
Mayra Martínez, a 40-year-old Colombian mother of three, said her children “are sad and happy at the same time” at the idea of leaving the Row.
Martínez indicated that, on the one hand, the children were happy “because we are going to cook warm food”, something they could not do at the hotel, but on the other hand they are sad about “school because they don’t want to change.”
Free housing
The family I had been living in the hotel for more than a year and has saved enough to rent a three-bedroom apartment in nearby Newark, New Jersey.
The hotel evictions took place as city officials also temporarily evacuated nearly 2,000 migrants housed at Floyd Bennett Field, the former Brooklyn airport, in anticipation of a storm. The Adams government had set up the temporary shelter at the airfield in response to waves of new migrants arriving in the city.
“To be clear, this relocation is a proactive measure that is being taken out of an abundance of caution to ensure the safety and well-being of the people who work and live downtown,” Adams spokesperson Kayla Mamelak said in a statement. “The relocation will continue until any weather conditions that may arise have stabilized and the center is again fit for habitation.”
The residents, many of them families with children, were sent to James Madison High School, also in Brooklyn.
The presence of immigrants has sparked protests from city residents.
Source: With information from AP and AFP
