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Migrant shelter on Washington and Rector will close by June
The mayor announced earlier this month that 13 migrant shelters across the city — including the Holiday Inn at 99 Washington and Rector — will close by June. In December, he announced that 16 other shelters will close by March, including Floyd Bennett Field, which housed 1900 people and Hall Street in Brooklyn, which held 3500. These sites add up to 20 oercent of the locations opened since 2022, when the migrant crisis began.
“Our intensive and smart efforts have helped more than 178,000 asylum seekers — 78 percent of the migrants who have ever been in our care — take the next steps on their journeys towards pursuing the American Dream,” Mayor Adams said in a press release on Jan. 10. “We will continue to do everything we can to help migrants become self-sufficient, while finding more opportunities to save taxpayer money and turn the page on this unprecedented humanitarian crisis.”
The Holiday Inn Financial District at 99 Washington has 492 rooms and is the tallest Holiday Inn in the world. The license that the Department of Citywide Administrative Services (DCAS) had with the owner expires on April 30. But what happens after that is unclearly. In 2022, that hotel was facing foreclosure. The owner, Chinese developer Jubao Xie, was trying to sell it, along with the 8,500-square-foot St. George Tavern next door, for $187 million, Crain’s reported at the time.
The city is still operating a shelter at 52 William, the former 20-story, 289-key hotel Radisson hotel, for migrant families with children under 18. However that building recently sold: The Real Deal reported at the end of December that Slate Property Group bought it from hotelier Sam Chang for $95 million. Chang bought it in 2017 for $94 million, PincusCo reported. The purchase is unusual for Slate, which is headed by David Schwartz and Martin Nussbaum, with The Real Deal calling it “an atypical play for the multifamily firm that may point to eventual conversion plans.”
In his press release, the mayor credited federal executive orders by the Biden administration, which significantly reduced the rate at which asylum seekers are arriving in the city, allowing it to closed some shelters. The city has spent $2.8 billion over three fiscal years on housing and serving more than 229,000 that have arrived here seeking city services since the spring of 2022. The press release also said:
- 75 percent of adults (95,000) eligible for work authorization have received it or are applying for it in our system
- The number of asylum seekers in city shelters has decreased for 27 straight weeks and is now at its lowest point in over 18 months
- There are currently under 51,000 migrants receiving city shelter services, down from a high of over 69,000 in January 2024
- The city has also purchased more than 53,200 tickets to help migrants reach their preferred destinations
- Staff have conducted over 781,000 case management sessions with migrants dedicated to helping them identify self-sufficient pathways out of city shelter
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I am so happy. maybe one of these places can house homeless Americans. Instead of putting a ” Safe Haven” shelter right near Peck Slip School. The parents and neighborhood should fight to place them somewhere else. Not near a school. The Taxpaying people are done with freebies to migrants. We have our own here.
I’m sorry but there are not 289+ (Raddison) or 400+ Holiday Inn homeless people downtown. There are enough issues with 99 Washington that a larger scale one would be a disaster for our neighborhoods. I understand Peck Slip is definitely not the place for one either but let’s not advocate for something even larger…
You misunderstood me. I don’t want a larger homeless shelter. I don’t want anymore shelters downtown. We have enough especially near seaport an FIDI. The Safe Haven shelter coming to Peck Slip is a very dangerous one. No one is vetter. The neighborhood should protest and put this all over the news. It should not be next door to a school or a community. The mentally ill and drug addicted homeless will destroy the area.
Maybe others know, but my understanding is that the City is now housing homeless migrants through the City’s regular shelter system run by the Department of Homeless Services.
Previously (due to administrative, capacity and funding reasons ) immigrants were housed in designated hotels and shelters – not the regular DHS system (shelters, residences, hotels)
The City’s DHS homeless census is still quite high.
My understanding: migrants are being housed largely by HHC, the Health and Hospitals Corp. That’s who had the contract for 99 Washington. 52 William is DHS, or DSS, Department of Social Services, which houses the homeless. The Radisson at 52 William has been a DHS shelter since 2021, I am pretty sure. Obviously as time goes on, there could be an overlap here…
Comment from the anonymous moniker “Native” implies that housing Americans in a shelter near a school would be safer than migrants. This is erroneous. There are equally as many criminals among Americans as there are among foreigners.
Oh no Heide, I mean the criminal migrants and homeless Americans at any shelter near a school is very dangerous. Safe Haven shelter is not a good shelter. Anything right near a school is dangerous. This is going to happen. This is going to be very bad for all of us.