New York City Comptroller Brad Lander has launched an investigation into the City’s implementation of its 60-day shelter limit. In a letter sent to City Hall, Lander cites the "potentially harmful impacts of the policy on families seeking asylum, and especially on children who may be displaced from their public school by being transferred to a shelter far from their school."
Lander will investigate the protocols City agencies will use to implement the 60-day shelter limit and reassignment and warned of “the potentially harmful impacts of the policy on families seeking asylum, especially on children who may be displaced from their public school as a result of being transferred to a shelter far from their school.”
The letter cites fiscal concerns of 60-day shelter policy, including the distribution of case management resources, whether shelter relocations will impact migrants’ ability to obtain work authorization and appropriate immigration status, and the costs of moving families from their existing rooms and school communities.
“The Administration is implementing one of the cruelest policies to come from City Hall in generations, evicting families from shelter in the middle of winter, and displacing kids from their schools in the middle of the school year,” said Comptroller Brad Lander in a press release. “How much will the City spend on so-called ‘re-ticketing,’ transfers, and busing?
What will happen to the families? How many kids will be displaced from their schools? How will this affect the effort to help new arrivals get the work authorizations they need to secure jobs? That’s what we’ll be investigating.”
The Adams Administration announced the 60-day notice for families to leave their shelter in October, 2023, which would have initially evicted families around Christmas, but postponed displacing families until the new year with an expected start date of January 9.
Due to poor communication from the City to asylum seekers at risk of eviction, some families are uncertain about when they are expected to leave, and when and where a new bed will be available. The Administration enacted the 30-day limit for single adults at the end of November which led to long lines of people waiting in the cold for hours to re-apply for shelter.
