City’s homeless-hotel plan still has holes, advocates say
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Mayor Bill de Blasio Talks with homeless outreach workers. Photo via Mayoral Photography Office
By David Brand
A new city plan to move 1,000 homeless adults per week out of shelters and into hotel rooms still has some issues to address, say advocates who have monitored the first phase of the city’s gradual effort to stem the spread of the coronavirus inside its shelters.
Mayor Bill de Blasio announced the 1,000-moves-per-week effort Wednesday, after stating that the city had achieved its initial goal of shifting 6,000 homeless New Yorkers from densely packed shelters and into hotels. “We want to make sure people are safe,” de Blasio said.
But the majority of the New Yorkers counted in the 6,000 “move” initiative were already living in hotels that contract with the Department of Homeless Services before the coronavirus began to spread, according to DHS. Only 2,500 people have been moved into hotels as a direct result of the coronavirus plan.
The initiative has moved too slowly and is “conspicuously lacking hotel options for people on the streets and trains,” said Coalition for the Homeless Policy Director Giselle Routhier.
At least 763 homeless New Yorkers have tested positive for COVID-19, including 649 people in city shelters, as of April 27, according to DHS statistics. At least 55 homeless New Yorkers identified by DHS have died as a result of the illness.
More than 17,400 single adults stayed in a Department of Homeless Services shelter or hotel on April 27, according to the most recent daily census report published by DHS.
The first phase of the city’s hotel program shifted shelter residents from dormitories with an average of eight beds and into two-person hotel rooms, according to DHS.
“These aren’t isolation hotels. They’re being used to make space less dense,” said Homeless Services United Executive Director Catherine Trapani. “The effort is more appropriately called ‘de-densification.’”
It remains unclear whether the city will begin moving individuals into private rooms as part of the 1,000-moves-per-week plan. The city can potentially use money from the Federal Emergency Management Agency to pay for the rooms.
DHS spokesperson Isaac McGinn referred to Department of Health and Mental Hygiene guidance that allows for the use of “double-occupancy commercial hotel rooms.”
“Our strategies are effectively identifying cases, and connecting individuals who need it to care, and we will continue this client-focused approach to relocations,” McGinn said.
But other advocates say that the shared-room policy continues to endanger homeless New Yorkers.
“While these are certainly steps in the right direction, they are nowhere near what the city could and should be doing right now,” said Craig Hughes, a supervising social worker at the Urban Justice Center Safety Net Project.
Hughes also criticized the city for a crackdown on street homeless New Yorkers. De Blasio has proposed closing some subway stations while assigning more police officers to prevent homeless New Yorkers from sleeping on trains or in transit hubs.
“This punitive policing approach is never justifiable, and it is certainly the wrong move during a pandemic,” Hughes said, adding that many street homeless New Yorkers avoid going into shelter or temporary “Safe Haven” sites because they fear exposure to the coronavirus.
“Individualized hotel rooms and permanent housing are the solutions,” he said.
