Clean mattresses, sheets and pillows. Towels, soap and toilet paper. These are among the shelter requirements New York State has agreed to waive in instances where no alternative is available—specifically for adults in NYC Department of Homeless Services (DHS) shelters—according to a letter obtained by City Limits.
Under scrutiny from the City Council Thursday, officials described the issuance of roughly 1,500 60-day notices, starting on July 24 at Humanitarian Emergency Response and Relief Centers (HERRCs) run by the Health + Hospitals Corporation.
Desperate to find work, many immigrants pay upfront fees to employment agencies, unaware that requiring payment before a job placement is prohibited.
“As we go into an election year, it is vital that New York prioritize passing legislation that will protect immigrants across our state, like the Dignity not Detention Act, and stop using our resources to detain immigrants.”
Following a closed-door conference Friday, the Legal Aid Society urged the state to step up its efforts to protect the right to shelter in New York City, where tens of thousands of migrants have arrived since last year.
During New York’s Pride Month, several asylum seekers who arrived in New York City after crossing the border finally paraded in a Pride march for the first time in their lives. City Limits spoke with six of them.
The mayor defended the move, saying the city had little choice as it struggles to keep up with a ballooning shelter population. But advocates say the change undermines the city’s social safety net and protections to ensure homeless families with children have access to safe conditions.
“For many asylum seekers like me, the United States is a beacon of hope, providing refuge and safety from the violence many of us experience at home. Yet the sense of relief and security we find here quickly evaporates as we navigate an expensive and confusing court system by ourselves.”
“As doctors working on the front lines of the migrant crisis, we’ve seen firsthand the negative effects of tent cities and the forced movement of migrants across the United States. The harms are physical and psychological, and they are cumulative.”
Following the arrival of more than 27,000 asylum seekers, many of whom have struggled to find attorneys in the midst of a historic backlog of cases in New York’s immigration courts, state officials, affected families, and immigrant advocates launched a renovated campaign to guarantee statewide legal representation in deportation proceedings.
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