A community is outraged and looking for answers as they learned the city went behind their backs to turn an East Elmhurst motel into a permanent homeless shelter.
Last week, the city’s Department of Homeless Services (DHS) approved the conversion of the Westway Motor Inn, located at 71-11 Astoria Blvd., into a shelter to immediately house over 100 homeless families, according to officials. The shelter will be managed by social services provider Women In Need.
“The agreement was that the homeless people would be bused in at night and out in the morning, no permanent housing,” [Rose Marie] Poveromo said. “We have no voice, the government doesn’t follow the will of people.”
“We are deeply troubled by this decision and find it disturbing that neither elected officials nor community leaders were informed or consulted beforehand,” a group of elected officials wrote in a letter to DHS Commissioner Gilbert Taylor after being told about the plan the day before the families were expected to begin moving into the motel. “While we appreciate that DHS is legally required to provide shelter for the homeless, the agency’s failure to provide any notification to the people currently living in the area who are impacted by its implementation is unacceptable.”
The emergency town hall meeting on the Westway Motor Inn homeless shelter will be held on Wednesday, July 23, at 6:30 p.m. at the Museum of the Moving Image at 36-01 35th Ave.
Then there's this from the Daily News about a shelter in Rockaway:
The city's plan to quietly convert a former Rockaway rehab center into a homeless shelter has enraged residents and officials, who say their peninsula is being used as a dumping ground.
“Without any talk of essential services being added to Rockaway, this is not a good proposal,” said City Councilman Donovan Richards. “We have done everybody’s share for the last 30 to 40 years.”
The Department of Homeless Services is set to begin housing 155 homeless families at the site of the former Daytop Village drug rehabilitation center on Beach 65th St., officials confirmed Wednesday.
The city drew up a contract with Housing Bridge, a Brooklyn-based nonprofit that operates 16 shelters throughout the city.
Shocked local leaders said they were misled by the city and had no idea the agency was eyeing the site for a shelter.
An official from the Department of Homeless Services told Richards’ office in June there were “no plans to build anything there,” according to emails obtained by the Daily News through a Freedom of Information request.
I've lost count, are we up to 4 shelters for Queens this year, 2 of which the City lied about? It's funny how Comptroller Scott Stringer signed off on these secret shelters then scolded the DHS in a letter for opening them without community input.
This crisis may be due in part to "migrant children".
44 comments:
Don't buy any house near by a hotel. Every hotel is a potential homeless shelter.
Of course no homeless shelters are going up near the mayor's Park Slope home because HE DOES NOT WANT THEM THERE. It's too bad because he could use the help from the fat homeless to do a better job shoveling his sidewalk than his lazy son.
Any evidence that the people being housed in these shelters are the unaccompanied children flooding over the border crappy?
Seems more like Bloomberg ignored the growing homeless population on his watch and bleeding heart liberal De Blasio is doing what he can to get them off the streets, steamrolling over community opposition, using whatever assets are available now, not what could be constructed over the next several years.
Bloomberg might have preserved and constructed 175k 'affordable' housing units in 12 years, but almost none of those were at the bottom end of the market. A surge in homeless was to be expected.
A growing number of homeless are working jobs but still can't afford rent. Maybe a strong push by the city to build out affordable housing at the bottom end of the market could make it possible to close some of these shelters without sending anyone out on to the streets five to ten years out.
Any information from DHS on how long they plan to operate these for?
And Mike if you want to pay higher taxes to cover the inflated cost of getting a hotel in an expensive neighborhood like Park Slope to house homeless families instead of renting to tourists be my guest. We waste enough money on inflated pensions from countless election year gambits at the city and state level. Why do you want to waste even more money? And mine along with yours?
Homeless shelters are filled with people from out of town looking for better benefits than the state where they came from. Bloomberg actually had nothing to do with the current crisis. Read Stringer's letter.
Okay. I read Stringer's letter. It doesn't say the homeless are from out of town. It says that of the 54,439 people in shelters, 43% are children. Nationwide homelessness declined 9% 2007-2013, but is up 51% in NYC. Why do you think Bloomberg had nothing to do with that?
http://comptroller.nyc.gov/wp-content/uploads/documents/20130509_NYC_ShelterSiteReport_v24_May.pdf
As of May 2013:
Bronx has 148 shelters
Brooklyn has 127 shelters
Manhattan has 74 shelters
Queens has 15 shelters
Staten Island has 6 shelters
Unless almost nobody in Queens ever loses their home it seems like the borough must have been exporting its homeless elsewhere, not the other way around.
Commentor three, I agree with that theory about the illegals moving into these shelters. NYC should change it's name to illegal city.... I bet you that the government is going to start housing these illegal children over there. Coming to a city near you....more outbreaks from diseases!
Another task force that the city cannot afford much less oversee. How about fixing our roads, parks, schools,and hospitals first? Send these illegals back to where they came from!!!
Here's some reading material for you:
Out of town homeless families are flooding NYC
City's sheltering of out-of-town homeless
Value of major welfare programs
With Surge in Child Migrants, New York Forms Task Force on Aiding Them
And yes, Queens sends few people to shelters. Only 23% of the homeless at the Pan Am are Queens residents. Queens has a higher median income than the other boroughs.
Charity begins at home. We cannot take care of these illegals!
Community Board 1 doyen Rose Marie has been talking about homeless shelters and airport noise for going on 3 decades while completely ignoring a host of other growing problems in Astoria.
And she has been singularly unsuccessful in her pet projects.
There must be a dozen articles in as many years about this place from her. Like listening to a politician talking about [fill in the blank here] rhetoric accomplishes nothing. Increasingly people are wising up and actually want results.
The politicians can do something about this - city council is a big reason that illegals are coming here as every reader on this blog knows.
So why does Rose Marie do everything she can to support the same people that are making this a problem?
A real civic, Rose Marie, actually DOES something. Headlines solve nothing. Stop wasting people's time.
The crisis is a LACK OF AFFORDABLE HOUSING. Period, that is the culprit, especially considering that many of these people in homeless shelters actually have jobs but are unable to pay rent in this totally ridiculously high priced city that keeps getting higher all the time. I mean what do you expect.
BUT that does not give the city the right to go behind community's back and dump them nor it is right for the city to place these homeless shelters only in certain communities and not others.
The crisis is not the homeless, the crisis is 1) lack of affordable housing 2) lack of jobs and 3) low stagnant wages.
These three things have helped cause the homeless problem. Those three things are the crisis that has ramifications and one of those ramifications are people who are homeless because they are unable to pay rent
There's a major flaw in that theory. If city life gets too expensive, there are 49 other states to choose from. You can make minimum wage in many places and own a house and car. Millions have moved away rather than go to homeless shelters.
When are people going to realize that the whole affordable housing movement is a scam? It's how liberals reward developers and pad their own pockets while making it seem like they give a crap.
Elections have consequences. Ignoring our immigration laws and "right to shelter" are a result of stupidly by our politicians. Keep electing these shitheads into office and we will be the next 3rd world country.
Crapper, I get the other states thing, I have said that before, but those three points are still valid points.
I mean I would move before I would go into a homeless shelter, but there is still some validity to those three points and not just for NYC, but yes, there is always the option of moving somewhere less expensive.
Why some people even move to this city, knowing full way it is very expensive and knowing that they more than likely do not have the education or skills for a high paying job in this city. Of course the logical thing to do is go somewhere less expensive.
But I mean, come on, look at the price it costs to have a place in Manhattan, Brooklyn, even Long Island City, but it is not just NYC, it is San Francisco, LA, Chicago, Boston, Seattle, etc. But yes, you can live in much cheaper places, but also might be less job too. But bottom line you do have a choice where to live and work.
My point to begin with is they are making the excuse that there is a "homeless crisis", when the "crisis" was actually created due to other factors.
Read the links I posted. The total welfare benefits package for NYS is one of the highest in the country, and NYC is even higher. That's why people are coming here and heading straight to shelters. Not to find jobs.
But Joe,
Part of the reason for (2) and (3) are that the city gives away land at $1 with several tax-payer-expensed construction bonds and tax breaks to the developers to build things like shopping malls that the market COULD NOT sustain on its own. Then these malls create low-skilled, low-wage jobs, and the people need somewhere to live. These working poor are in turn being taxed themselves to pay for the above. If the city stopped trying to do "economic development", it might actually have significantly more land and revenue from sale of some to build modest (not luxury) housing and needed infrastructure instead of turning the city into crap for the benefit of the connected few who get the sweetheart deal and live in the burbs or on Park Ave.
The point being it's not _only_ a systemic problem like liberals imply - there ARE specific individuals with a lot of power over public money and public land who make these decisions that make it significantly worse for NYC.
Yea because weve seen a flood of migrant children turn up in NYC.
I wondrer what idiot threw that piece or tea party propaganda in there?
And let me guess some of the trash in Jamaica belongs to the Malaysia aircraft that was shot down over the Ukraine aswell?
migrant children = send them the fuck home.
Enough already
The NY Times is "tea party propaganda" now? You folks crack me up. WAKE THE HELL UP.
One more thing, it seems this whole "homeless shelter" thing in NYC has become similar to the prison system, big money for profit. So to make more money, make more homeless shelters and the situations that come about to keep them in business.
It looks like the homeless shelters have become big business.
Crappy you think Queens produces less than 5% of the city's homeless? If it's even that much then the borough is exporting homeless.
Your link says the share of out of towner families is up to 10%.
And some of the 'out of towners' are not people who came to NYC for a shelter, but rather people who happen to still know someone elsewhere.
The only example of someone coming from out of town direct to a shelter was a woman and her children fleeing an abusive husband. Why would the DN not use a more outrageous example if it had one?
But let's say 10%. Homeless population is up by way more than that since 2007. Still seems like NYC is producing most of the homeless living here, families especially.
The article about the migrant children says the only place in NYS they are considering is in Syracuse. And of the 50k children 43k have been sent to live with relatives. It says nothing about even one child ending up in the NYC shelter system.
You missed this part:
The share of single adults who applied for shelter and listed their last address outside the city rose to 23 percent in December from 19.9 percent in February 2012, the Department of Homeless Services said.
We aren't just talking about family shelters here, and the city does not count the leased shelters run by private groups in its figure. Do you really think CB14 (Rockaway) has ZERO shelters as stated in this document?
Queens doesn't have the least amount of shelters, it has the least amount of shelters directly run by DHS.
Wake the hell up.
This article from 2011 says there are 10 official shelters in Jamaica and 18 in Queens, which doesn't match what you cited. Isn't that curious?
I don't know crappy, which shelters are in CB14?
SI has fewer shelters than Queens.
But these new shelters in Queens seem to be for families, not single adults?
http://www.nyc.gov/html/endinghomelessness/downloads/pdf/queens.pdf
12% of all families eligible for shelter services come from Queens.
Every old hotel in Rockaway is a shelter!
You posted the stats, those are both type of shelters.
So 1362 families are from queens. How many family shelters are there in queens and Howe many beds do they hold? I'm sure we already have enough.
Upstate NY has so much space, let's dump them there! Stop sullying NYC! and if you're out of state, stay there!
Obama is pissed off and is going is make a executive order to federalize HUDs and other things to force neighborhood into taking these hundreds of thousands if illegal children and "family units" from Central America.
Nice areas of Queens and all of Long Island are at the top of the hit list.
See:
http://www.wnd.com/2014/07/new-obama-rule-could-force-cities-to-house-illegals/
To make things WORSE most these so called "children" are sexually active teenagers and gang members. Those not pregnant will automatically be bumped to 7, 8, 9th grades and get special equivalency diplomas in 12th grade.
These people can read or write so how does this work ?
It makes no difference come October, the Democrats or the president via executive order are going to ram this “Affirmatively Furthering Fair Housing Act” up our ass !!!
This means if a city has any suburban areas that are deemed “too white” by HUD’s standards, they’ll be sued.
---Knock knock.
An honest question: why not just send these other states the bill and sue them in federal court if they won't pay? Isn't there some constitutional case law about states paying for the obligations of other states toward their own citizens?
How long does someone have to live in NYC before they don't count as an out-of-towner when they fail at life and lose their home crapper?
I'm very left leaning. But this nonsense with these central american countries just throwing their kids over the wall at us has to end.
Upper ditmars already has the bridge to rikers and all the perps that attracts - now they have to have a shelter dumped on them too?
How many homeless shelters are in park slope and the upper east side?
Rockaway is never going to become a desirable area with even more shelters. May as well blow up the bridges and film 'escape from rockaway' in 10 years...
The last address they lived at that they themselves put down is how DHS determines who was a NYC resident before entering the shelter. Which means 25% of the people are driving/flying/taking train or bus up here and heading straight to a shelter. Nice, eh?
"just throwing their kids over the wall"
Actually they are throwing the kids at the border agents and the gangs are running the adults points east through Texas and Arizona rancher property's at night, groups of 100s all night long.
The gangs crossing the adults are heavily armed threatening the ranchers to "go back inside" and keep their mouth shut.
These US citizens are being invaded and terrorized and the president wont do a dam thing !!
The adults arrive first in city's like New York first and they are reunited as "family units"
Its INSANE, well organized & scripted and the media is banned from taking photos (arrest) or reporting these facts!!
The army is needed on that border to restore order.
diblasio aka warner Wilhelm jr. (red diaper baby)see :discover the net.org....his stalinst form of gov. by the people ,for the people.
recall...recall...
Simplistic is the correct word, because it's been explained multiple times that Queens has more shelters than what is reported in the stats that you Googled. Hell, in the same report you got that from, it explains that. But God forbid you actually sit and read more than a paragraph.
If you take into consideration the total number of homeless, not just families with children, the amount of people from out of state is more than 25%.
Stats are meaningless without knowing how many beds each shelter in Queens has. The Pan Am has 216 rooms, which can hold up to 4 people apiece. That's a shitload of homeless people in one location, especially considering that the Metro Motel down the block houses over 100 families, and the Boulevard Hotel has them as well.
Why should one Queens neighborhood, especially one with a low homeless population, house so many of them?
There are homeless being housed all over Queens in unused hotel rooms. Those are not counted as shelters unless an actual contract is drawn up which the city tries its best not to do.
To say that Queens is exporting more homeless than it is housing is quite ignorant of the way the system works.
Reading Is Fundamental anon#38
Queens:the new dumping ground of the politicians. Window bars and deadbolts coming to a neighborhood near you.
Lets not forget Queens party boss Crowley getting arrested while the government was closed down to open the door to immigration that permits these homeless shelters?
Come to think of it, where are the politicians in this issue?
eh?
Something just does not add up here:
Rose Marie and the Tribune do everything they can for the party, yet come out against this place.
Yet is the very people they help, the Democratic Council, that is responsible for bringing these people into this city.
So is this just show and tell, something to distract the community?
Why doesn't someone ask the Tribune, Rose Marie, and the Gazette for that matter (a screaming two page notice with lots of red ink there) how they can support the very people that are making this happen?
Are they pulling the wool over the community's eyes?
i live in Upper Ditmars and the quality of life in the neighborhood has changed dramatically, for the worse. In fact at 9:30PM tonight I was in a local supermarket, 2 women from the shelter with 6 kids came into the store and plain as day were stealing in the store (isn't there supposed to be a 9:00PM curfew there?) - the owner of the store said he cant keep up - they come in and steal every day. Restaurant owners in the area have mentioned that several times shelter residents eat a meal and refuse to pay for it. An owner of a local laundry mat told me that he was actually spit at by someone from the shelter. A few weeks ago, i witnessed teenagers from the shelter surrounding a young girls car while she was parking it on Ditmars- one of them was wearing a mask- it was scary. I did notify the police at the 114, they told me if they "were not busy" they would send a car. I sent an email to one of ourCouncilmen to let him know what I saw on Ditmars . Someone from his staff sent me an email with the phone number of the group WIN (Women in Need) the group that manages the shelter and suggested that I notify them. When I called the number he gave me- it was a Mitsubishi dealership. I don't feel safe here. Has anyone else witnessed problematic situations stemming from the Westway shelter?
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