Mayor Eric Adams eliminated a rule that required homeless people to live in a shelter for 90 days before they could access New York City housing vouchers; the move comes amid the influx of immigrants to the Big Apple
People who are homeless will no longer have to spend at least 90 days in a shelter before they can access a New York City rental voucher, after that requirement was eliminated.
Mayor Eric Adams signed an executive order last Friday to “immediately” waive the rule, saying it will help individuals and their families and will also mean less burden on taxpayers.
The influx of immigrants arriving in the city since last year, which was already facing a lack of affordable housing, has overwhelmed public shelters, so the Adams Administration has had to resort to renting hotels and other spaces in the metropolitan area and upstate to house them.
Adams believes the executive order will help both families and single adults “get the help they need when they need it, with more accuracy and less paperwork and bureaucracy.”
Last month the City Council (local legislature) passed a package of measures, including one to waive the 90-day rule, aimed at helping the homeless leave shelters, which in turn would free up space for the influx of immigrants, as well as another that deemed beneficiaries those who have been sued by their landlords for unpaid rent.
The bills were approved over the opposition of the mayor, who argued that implementing them would be more costly, because it adds more beneficiaries to the voucher assistance and would increase the waiting list for that benefit.
Your Administration then indicated that it was evaluating options in light of the Council’s action.
With today’s executive order, Adams claims credit for the action benefiting shelter occupants (the vast majority of whom are immigrants) and leaves unclear what his attitude will be on the Council’s other decisions.
He also called on the state legislature to evaluate housing projects that were left pending in the session that ended last week.
“We continue to do everything in our power to address this housing crisis, but as we have said, we need you, Albany (seat of state government)” for the projects he believes should be considered, including allowing the conversion of offices (to housing) as well as eliminating the housing cap in Midtown Manhattan, he said.
With information from EFE