The Adams administration is relaxing part of its own policy to evict migrant families with children every 60 days from the emergency shelters where they are residing.
Under a new rule unveiled Monday, families with children in kindergarten through sixth grade that have already been forced to leave their temporary housing once can receive an extension in the same shelters. The policy is effective immediately.
“We’re doing everything we can to make sure that our shelter system serves its purpose as a soft landing spot for new arrivals — not their final landing spot,” Mayor Adams said in a statement. He announced the city’s shelter census has been declining for 19 straight weeks, citing it as proof that “our efforts are working.”
“The new policies we’re implementing today will build on our successes, save taxpayers millions, and help even more migrants take their next steps towards fulfilling their American Dream,” he continued.
The changes come a few months after the city significantly expanded the stay limits to include shelters under the Department of Homeless Services. In a press release Monday, administration officials conceded that dialing back the policy will make it easier for students to remain in the same schools — while saving the city “hundreds of thousands” spent on busing children back to the programs they first enrolled in when they arrived in New York.
Under federal law, the public school system is required to pay for transportation to and from school for any children who are homeless, including migrant students staying in the emergency shelters.
Adams first introduced the 60-day policy over a year ago as an influx of migrants, many coming from the southern border, strained the city’s shelter system. Since it went into effect at the turn of the new year, advocates, shelter providers, educators and many elected officials have slammed the policy as counterproductive for families trying to establish themselves in New York.
Their allies in the City Council were scheduled to hold an oversight hearing on the shelter limits the day after the new policies were announced.
“Although I’m grateful,” said Christine Quinn, president and CEO of Win, the city’s largest family homeless shelter provider. “I’m quite frankly not satisfied. Because what we need is the 60-day rule to be abolished, because it happening even once creates more trauma, more instability, for the children.”
The temporary relief does not apply to the families of the city’s youngest learners in preschool programs, who may have to trek across the city to continue receiving child care and the ability to work.
“This is a glaring oversight,” said Jennifer Pringle from Advocates for Children of New York, who oversees their students in temporary housing portfolio. “Access to quality early childhood education has clear benefits for children, and it also allows parents to focus on their housing and employment search.”
As part of Monday’s announcement, the city is also establishing a centralized mail center, helping migrants stay connected to legal information such as updates on asylum, temporary protection status, or work authorization applications while being shuffled around the city.
Critics of the 60-day policy argued the shelter limits were having an opposite effect because they posed obstacles to migrants obtaining work and establishing financial independence in the city.
“Creating chaos and instability multiplies cost — manifold,” said Naveed Hasan, a parent advocate for immigrant students who sits on the city’s Panel for Educational Policy. “Not only are you being cruel, you’re also being incredibly fiscally irresponsible. So I guess they’re finally listening.”
In the year since the limits were introduced, 42% more families with children in humanitarian relief centers each week have left the city’s shelter system, according to the press release. Less strain on the shelter system has meant the city has been able to shutter or schedule the closure of multiple shelters, including a tent shelter on Randall’s Island for adults.