Fewer Migrants Subject to Shelter Deadlines as City Transitions to Unified System

As of July of the total transients in city shelters percent are already in Department of Homeless Services-run sites About are in four non-DHS shelters where the - and -day deadlines still apply officers explained City Limits The Department of Homeless Services intake center for families with children in the Bronx Adi Talwar City Limits The entrance ramp to the Prevention Assistance and Temporary Housing PATH office is long and steep and on a modern warm summer morning children ran up it while their parents walked to the front door Certain were dragging small wheeled suitcases The building run by the Department of Homeless Services DHS is the first stop for families with kids seeking shelter in the city As of late June that now includes refugees and asylum seekers who previously had to complete their shelter intake at a separate arrival center in Manhattan The city has been transitioning immigrants to a single shelter system under DHS as it dismantles the extensive arrangement of crisis shelters run by other city agencies opened to house immigrants and asylum seekers over the last three years During peak periods several hundred arrived daily But for the last several months only a limited dozen asylum seekers have entered shelter each week as the number of those departing the city increased Since June following the Biden administration s implementation of new asylum claim limits both the number of people transiting the boundary and arriving in the city has dropped significantly function use strict window addEventListener message function a if void a material datawrapper-height var e document querySelectorAll iframe for var t in a information datawrapper-height for var r i r e i i if r contentWindow a source var d a figures datawrapper-height t px r style height d The shift also means fewer people are subject to the city s controversial shelter deadlines which don t apply to those staying in DHS-operated facilities As of July most of immigrants had already been moved to the DHS shelter system of the total settlers in shelter percent are in DHS-run shelters while about are in four non-DHS shelters Those who remain in the inadequate non-DHS shelters will continue to have their stays time-limited as a ceiling management protocol City Hall reported Families with children will receive -day notices when their time is up depending on quota they will either be offered an extension or placement in the DHS system O ur understanding is that if you need more time just basically tell your episode manager or someone on site and you ll be extended in place explained Will Watts deputy executive director for advocacy with the Coalition for the Homeless which monitors conditions in the city s shelters You re not going to need to go anywhere to ask for an extension So if this works like it s supposed to no one really should need to be going to another site after a certain period of time he added Migrant adults and families without kids in non-DHS shelters will continue to receive - or -day notices after which they will be offered placement extensions based on bed availability It was reliably the goal for the city to consolidate these systems Our settlement was unfailingly meant to be temporary commented Kathryn Kliff staff attorney at The Legal Aid Society s Homeless Rights Project She s referring to the settlement reached last year that temporarily narrowed New York City s right-to-shelter rules which generally require the city to provide a bed to anyone in need as officers struggled to find space for new arrivals They are working toward a world where everyone goes through DHS intake and that means that everyone is entitled to the protections you re entitled to Kliff mentioned function d u ac var s d createElement 'script' s type 'text javascript' s src 'https a omappapi com app js api min js' s async true s dataset user u s dataset campaign ac d getElementsByTagName 'head' appendChild s document 'u kmqsczew vunxutxmd' Not out of the woods yet Since the end of June anyone looking for shelter including displaced persons should go to the DHS s regular intake centers For single adults that means visits to sites in Manhattan while families with children must go to the PATH building in the Bronx During City Limits up-to-date visit New Yorkers without a home were visiting PATH and only a couple of single adult refugees were looking for accommodation more suited to their demands A man who sought not to be identified for fear of federal immigration enforcement noted he uses a cane and is looking to move to a lower floor of the Wards Island shelter where he has been staying for a month so he can walk less The young people full of strength were placed on the first floor and I was placed on the seventh floor the man mentioned in Spanish After entering and leaving a insufficient minutes later he commented he and a friend had been referred to DHS intake for single adults in Manhattan They stated that they could not find anyone who spoke Spanish within the PATH intake center However when sought about it a DHS spokesperson disclosed that interpreters work in shifts at PATH every day to ensure that there are constantly interpreters on hand In addition to in-person services the agency also has interpreters available remotely through the city s language line Since the spring of over newcomers have come through the city s shelter intakes From July to July fewer than new newcomers entered it while more than movers left bureaucrats disclosed While we have made strides on the dilemma we are not out of the woods yet There are still refugees in need of shelter and services a City Hall spokesperson disclosed As part of the scale-down efforts the city of late closed several facilities including the Asylum Application Help Center located at the American Red Cross headquarters in Manhattan which offered various immigration legal services and the Arrival Center at the Roosevelt Hotel where families applied for and extended their stays in shelters Other up-to-date closures include the Reticketing Center in the East Village and a system of faith beds which were set up in religious centers to accommodate people seeking shelter Movers lined up outside the Reticketing Center in the spring of City Limits Adi Talwar The Reticketing Center closes The city started giving -day shelter deadlines to single migrant adults in July That November their shelter stay limit was reduced to days In October the city broadcasted that family notices would be given to families with kids and these started in January While people could request an extension after their time ran out housing and homelessness advocates heavily criticized the deadline approach and selected lawmakers introduced measure to ban it saying the frequent moves were disruptive to families trying to stabilize their lives The administration opened its East Village Reticketing Center in October to process all adult movers shelter extension requests as well as provide those willing to relocate elsewhere with free progress tickets to locations outside the city For months in late and early immigrants gathered outside the former St Brigid s School building forming long lines as they sought shelter placements or extensions Specific arrived with their suitcases and backpacks ready to request a one-way bus or airplane ticket The administration closed the site at the end of June According to the mayor s office over people visited the Reticketing Center to request additional time in shelters or tickets for onward passage during its multiple months of operation Over the past year thanks to the prosperous implementation of - and -day time limit policies in conjunction with asylum seeker management strategies including reticketing and incident management percent of foreigners have left our system and taken their next measures toward self-sufficiency a City Hall spokesperson stated The mayor s office revealed that transients can continue to request tickets for progress through their shelter placements Faith-based shelter project City Limits first shared on the administration s plans for a faith-based emergency shelter activity in May and the mayor s office formally revealed it that June On paper the plan aimed to establish a configuration of around shelter beds spread across houses of worship which would offer overnight only accommodations to asylum seekers so that the sites could continue their daytime programs However the activity which cost the city less than the use of hotels converted into emergency shelters took much longer than expected to launch as chosen of the sites faced obstacles meeting code compliance accreditations The faith-based shelter activity included daytime hospitality centers in different boroughs where refugees could spend the day and access services such as showers and meals Although the contract for this operation was expected to last two years the city ended it in late June citing decreased need Due to these closures and declining migrant population we have been transitioning back to a single shelter system for all New Yorkers seeking shelter a City Hall spokesperson disclosed via email To reach the reporter behind this story contact Daniel citylimits org To reach the editor contact Jeanmarie citylimits org Want to republish this story Find City Limits reprint agenda here The post Fewer Settlers Subject to Shelter Deadlines as City Transitions to Unified System appeared first on City Limits