From: lessgovt@gmail.com   
      
   Racetracks, Parks, Offices: A Frantic Search for Migrant Housing   
   By Dana Rubinstein, May 8, 2023, NY Times   
      
   New York City is the only major U.S. city with a “right-to-shelter law.”   
   As of Wednesday evening, 61,000 migrants have come to the city in the past   
   year, according to City Hall officials. Over 37,500 of them are now in city   
   care at more than 120    
   emergency shelters and 8 larger-scale centers.   
      
   The city is now scrambling to make room for even more.   
      
   Late Sunday afternoon, Mayor Eric Adams’s chief of staff, Camille Joseph   
   Varlack, gave the head of every city agency until 5 p.m. Monday to identify   
   “any properties or spaces in your portfolio that may be available to be   
   repurposed to house asylum    
   seekers as temporary shelter spaces,” according to a copy of an email   
   acquired by The Times. Those spaces should be at least 10,000 square feet in   
   size, contain “no known health hazards” and have running water.   
      
   Mr. Adams underscored the urgency of the problem, telling agency leaders in a   
   meeting Monday afternoon to alert his staff about any suitable space, even if   
   those spaces currently hosted programs.   
      
   The search for help has stretched well beyond the walls of City Hall.   
      
   At a hastily arranged meeting on Monday morning, city officials asked leaders   
   of the New York real estate lobby for assistance, asking if landlords might   
   repurpose empty office space to house migrants.   
      
   “I think they and different owners are going to take a look at that,” said   
   Jim Whelan, president of the Real Estate Board of New York, which represents   
   nearly every major landlord in New York City, though he warned, “It’s not   
   easy to do.”   
      
   City officials have also sought help from the Partnership for New York City,   
   the business group whose board is populated by Wall Street executives.   
      
   The city has asked the Port Authority if it could use airplane hangars to   
   house migrants at John F. Kennedy International Airport, which the Port   
   Authority controls, and is weighing whether to place tents in Central,   
   Prospect and Flushing Meadows Corona    
   parks; in the parking lots of Citi Field, where the New York Mets play; and at   
   Aqueduct Racetrack, according to a report in CNN that a city official   
   confirmed on Monday.   
      
   City officials have also asked state and federal officials for a list of all   
   armory and military bases in the city and have discussed using the now-closed   
   Kings Park Psychiatric Center in Long Island, the city official said. They   
   have even talked about    
   shutting down city streets to accommodate tents and commissioning cruise   
   ships, the latter an idea that has long intrigued the Adams administration.   
      
   Many of these ideas are easier said than done.   
      
   The city on Friday announced it would relocate some migrants to hotels in   
   Rockland and Orange Counties, on a voluntary basis — a plan that local   
   officials immediately contested.   
      
   In March, the mayor announced a partnership with SUNY Sullivan, a community   
   college in Sullivan County, to house and provide job training to 100 migrants.   
      
   On Monday, Jay Quaintance, the SUNY Sullivan president, said that the city and   
   the school were still in contract negotiations.   
      
   Repurposing underused office space to house migrants is also complicated. It   
   would probably require a fully empty office building, Mr. Whelan said, and   
   even then, the buildings are designed for commercial use, not residential.   
      
   It is a challenge compounded by others.   
      
   “This weekend alone, we received hundreds of asylum seekers every day, and   
   with Title 42 set to be lifted this week, we expect more to arrive in our city   
   daily,” said Fabien Levy, a spokesman for the mayor. “We are considering a   
   multitude of    
   options, but, as we’ve been saying for a year, we desperately need federal   
   and state support to manage this crisis.”   
      
   https://www.nytimes.com/2023/05/08/nyregion/migrants-shelter-flatiron-nyc.html   
      
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