May 22, 2024 NYC Office of the Mayor
Steve Lacy: Hundreds of migrants now facing eviction from shelters. The mayor says the move is necessary in order to ease the strain of the migrant crisis on the city.
Natasha Verma: Some critics say that the evictions are inhumane and will lead to a rise in street homelessness. Joining us now to talk about these concerns is Mayor Adams. Mayor, thank you so much for joining us.
Mayor Eric Adams: Thank you. Great to be on with you again.
Verma: The migrant crisis has really divided the city and we know that it's placed such an enormous strain on the city's budget. Who's going to be part of this first wave of evictions?
Mayor Adams: Those after 30 days or 90 days, they are told that it was time to transition to the next step on their journey. As we stated, over 65 percent of the people who reach this level have gone on to the next step of their journey. That can include housing, going to other municipalities, staying with family members, loved ones, and this has been a successful tool that we had to use to bring down the over 194, actually almost 198,000 migrants and asylum seekers into the city.
Lacy: Yes, I know it's a huge issue, no doubt about it. Everyone will agree on that. Some of the numbers our reporter, Morgan, spoke about earlier: 250 migrants were up for eviction today, 200 applied for the extension, and 100 received an extension for housing. Is that sort of in line with how you envision this working out? That, over time, more and more people will move on from the city housing?
Mayor Adams: That's the goal. Can you imagine if we didn't use these types of tools? We would still have almost 198,000 people in our care. We already had a $4 billion price tag associated with this. Staying in permanent shelters, or HERRCs as we call them, is not what we need to do. We need to allow people to get the support they need, and then transition to the next step in their journey.
Verma: Of course, some of the critics, Mr. Mayor, are now arguing that this 30-day rule is not going to give migrants enough time to find alternative housing. How's that being addressed, and where are they able to go?
Mayor Adams: New York, 8.3 million people, 38 million opinions. You know what I find fascinating? Some of the same people that are saying don't do the 30-day time rule, they're saying they don't want shelters in their location. We have to be consistent. New York can't say you can come from anywhere on the globe, stay as long as you want on taxpayers' dime to feed, house, clothe an individual. That is just not right for New York taxpayers. We should all be unified about allowing people to work. And national leaders, national immigrant leaders, have looked at what we have done and said this is one of the most humane, well-organized initiatives that they have witnessed.
Lacy: Yes, it's interesting. Along that line, have you seen people's tolerance maybe for the cost of housing migrants go down as they've seen the budget issues it causes elsewhere, whether it's school cuts, library cuts, et cetera? Are you getting a sense that people are coming to a different position on this when it comes to there has to be some sort of time limits on housing?
Mayor Adams: New Yorkers are saying that. We are extremely benevolent as a city. Our heart is endless but our resources, we can't just think that it can last forever. There must be tools that we use to allow people to transition. When you stay in the system this long, you begin to normalize that. We can do it in a humane, compassionate way, and we have. I think New Yorkers have extended themselves. I met with a group of faith leaders this morning who want to be a part of this initiative, and we're going to continue to do so.
Verma: Absolutely, no easy task, Mr. Mayor. Okay, so there is some positive housing news today. For the first time in 15 years, the city will reopen its waiting list for Section 8 housing choice applications. What's this going to mean for New Yorkers?
Mayor Adams: 200,000 potential people could have an opportunity to see what we're doing with NYCHA, everything from the NYCHA Land Trust to free high-speed broadband for those who are in NYCHA, to looking at the other programs to deal with the multi-billion dollar gap. We want New Yorkers to see NYCHA as part of our overall housing goal. We included it in our housing plan for the first time this was done, and we believe that opening up this waiting list has said a lot for those who have been waiting for so long to have sustainable housing like our public housing system.
Lacy: Yes, and along the housing issue, which is such a key issue and always has been really for New York when it comes to the cost of housing, affordable housing, et cetera, there have been some interesting developments as far as the City Planning Board saying the owners of 64 New York City office buildings have expressed interest in converting their properties into housing. Tell us about how this can work, because this does really seem to solve a host of problems all at once. You've got the empty skyscrapers in Midtown. They're not, technically can't be used to turn them into housing right now, but there's an effort to sort of take all that space and put it to better use, it seems like.
Mayor Adams: Well said, and hats off to the governor, Speaker Heastie, and Majority Leader Andrea Stewart-Cousins, and the team up in Albany. We went there, we presented the plan with Deputy Mayor Maria Torres-Springer and Tiffany Raspberry, and they said this is a good thing to do. 138 million square feet of vacant office space, converting it into houses, similar to what we did back when I was a lieutenant in the Police Department after September 11. That was a daytime community, now it's a 24-hour community. We saw more housing, and those office spaces can be converted into housing. We're really excited about this. It's a win-win, as you indicated, on both ends.
Verma: Yes, it is really interesting. We do want to talk about, really quickly, your federal corruption investigation into your 2021 campaign. There's now a report that a former aide is cooperating with the federal corruption investigation. Have the feds reached out to you?
Mayor Adams: No, not at all, and we are clear. Listen, I spent 22 years as a police officer, state senator, lawmaker. I'm going to follow the law and follow the rules. I sleep well at night, because I know that's what I do, and we're going to cooperate with every way possible with this inquiry.
Lacy: There's one thing, there's a new statewide Siena poll came out today that showed support for peaceful demonstrations on campus, but also favored police breaking it up if it went too far. I'm just curious how you felt about that, and now that this dust has sort of settled a little bit from all the tensions we saw on campus only a few weeks ago, what your reaction is to how that all went down and the role the city played?
Mayor Adams: It was the same thing I was hearing every day as I walked the streets. New Yorkers, we really take pride in our ability to protest. I have protested in my life, and I have protected protesters, but when you start using hateful terminology of violence, when you start to spit in the face of police officers and call for the eradications of groups and destroy property like we saw on our college campuses, that's not acceptable. You're not rioting on top of buses, you're not destroying property. If you want to peacefully protest, we're going to be here to make sure you can do that, but you're not going to be disruptive to your neighbors in the city. That's not acceptable.
Verma: Yes, makes sense. Mayor Adams, thank you so much for joining us. We appreciate your time.
Mayor Adams: Thank you. Take care.
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