Mayor Adams suspends NYC right-to-shelter rules ahead of expected migrant surge

Mayor Adams signed an executive order late Wednesday suspending portions of the city’s longstanding right-to-shelter law — a dramatic move that comes as New York braces for the local migrant crisis to worsen.

Josh Goldfein, a lawyer with the Legal Aid Society, said he was told by Department of Social Services officials that Adams issued the order to prepare for this Friday’s expiration of Title 42, a federal border policy that has allowed authorities to quickly expel many migrants who enter the U.S. from Mexico. Once that policy lifts, Adams has said the clip of migrant arrivals will likely accelerate, even as the city’s already housing more than 38,000 asylum seekers in shelters and emergency hotels.

The provisions being suspended under Adams’ order are a rule requiring the city to secure shelter beds for families with children by a certain time; a prohibition on placing families with children in congregate settings, and a rule regarding unlawful evictions. The order takes effect immediately and stays in effect for five days, though Adams can renew it, according to a copy provided by his office.

Goldfein said he was told Adams issued the order without the intention of immediately flouting right-to-shelter rules.

“They are saying, ‘We have to be ready in case we do need to do that.’ We appreciate the heads up ... but it’d be very concerning if they actually tried to [violate right-to-shelter rules],” Goldfein told the Daily News, adding that Legal Aid may take court action if that happens.

In a statement after news of the executive order broke, Adams spokesman Fabien Levy confirmed the mayor is suspending “the policy surrounding timing for placements in shelters,” but did not address the other provisions at issue.

“This is not a decision taken lightly and we will make every effort to get asylum seekers into shelters as quickly as possible as we have done since day one,” Levy said, adding that the administration has “reached our limit, and we have no other option but to temporarily house recent arrivals in gyms.”

The spokesman also took a new shot at President Biden and Gov. Hochul, who have faced increasingly intense criticism from the mayor for not doing more to help the city deal with the migrant crisis.

“Without more support from our federal and state partners, we are concerned the worst may be yet to come,” he said.

At its root, the decades-old right-to-shelter law requires the city to provide a bed in a shelter for anyone who needs it. The law also contains specific provisions that have to do with housing conditions and the timeliness of shelter placement.

The first provision targeted by Adams’ order requires the city to secure shelter beds for any families with children by 4 a.m. if they arrive at an intake center by 10 p.m. the previous day.

As the migrant crisis began to deepen last summer, Adams’ administration admitted it violated that right-to-shelter rule when it failed to find beds for multiple Latin American migrant families in a timely manner, forcing them to sleep on the floor of an intake center in the Bronx.

By suspending the rule, the administration would not break the law if it fails to find beds by the 4 a.m. deadline.

The second portion of the law that’s being lifted by Adams’ order requires that a homeless family with kids be given an individual shelter unit that has direct access to a bathroom, a refrigerator, cooking facilities and “an adequate sleeping area” that “otherwise complies with state and local laws.”

By lifting that requirement, Goldfein said the city’s opening the door to putting families with kids in congregate, dorm-style shelters, which is not permitted under state law.

Earlier this week, The News exclusively reported the Adams administration has already placed some migrant families with kids in a congregate setting — drawing outrage from advocates who say that practice increases the risk of sexual abuse and violence against children.

“Certainly we’ve been clear that it is never appropriate to put families with children in congregate settings and if that is something that they will try to do that will be a big problem for us,” Goldfein said.

His concerns were shared by Public Advocate Jumaane Williams, a progressive Democrat who called Adams’ order “misguided and harmful.”

“This action will only harm our newest, aspiring and long-term New Yorkers and shift, not solve, the crisis,” Williams said.

The last provision facing suspension under Adams’ order stipulates that anyone who has lived in a residential unit for 30 consecutive days in the city gets certain legal protections against eviction. The order is tailored to make it so that migrants do not attain such protections while in the city’s care, and Goldfein said it’ll ensure the administration can move individuals out of emergency hotel rooms without having to go through eviction proceedings.

The right-to-shelter law dates back to the 1970s and is the foundation for the city’s homeless shelter system.

Goldfein said no previous mayor has ever told Legal Aid, which serves as the city’s de facto right-to-shelter watchdog, that he intends to peel back portions of the law.

“They’ve never said to us that we have such an emergency right now that we have to do this,” he said.

Brooklyn Councilwoman Shahana Hanif, a Democrat who chairs the Council’s Immigration Committee, raised particular alarm about how Adams’ policy shift could impact migrant children.

“The last time families were in congregate settings, there were cases of child sexual abuse,” tweeted Hanif.

“Right-to-shelter exists to protect families and ensure all New Yorkers have their rights respected in our shelter system,” she added. “These rules cannot be ignored.”