6K Homeless NYers To Move Into Hotels As Coronavirus Precaution

NEW YORK, NY — The city will move 6,000 homeless New Yorkers into hotels over the next few weeks to help stop the spread of the coronavirus, Mayor Bill de Blasio announced Saturday.

The 6,000 people, about one-third of the city's single homeless population, will be moved into the hotels by April 20 with a focus on seniors, those with coronavirus or symptoms of the disease and those who have been living in shelters where there isn't enough room to follow social-distancing guidelines, the mayor said.

"We will use those hotels aggressively as a tool to support homeless individuals and to strike the right balance in our shelters to make sure people who need to be isolated are isolated," de Blasio said.

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More than 340 homeless New Yorkers had tested positive for the coronavirus and 20 had died from the disease as of Saturday morning, according to Social Services Commissioner Steven Banks.

There are 58,000 people in the city's shelter system and 4,000 homeless New Yorkers on the streets, Banks added.

The city will also add 230 "safe haven beds," or those immediately available to homeless New Yorkers on the streets, to help get more homeless people into the shelter system, de Blasio said.

"We’re going to remind them and show them there’s a better way and its available to them now," the mayor said.

The Department of Social Services has made 12,000 visits to homeless New Yorkers on the streets since mid-March to try and identify those who might have coronavirus and offer services, Banks said.

The 6,000 hotel beds come after advocates and elected officials urged the mayor and Gov. Andrew Cuomo to use vacant hotel rooms to house the homeless earlier this week.

Those living in the city's homeless shelters described beds 35 inches apart, more and more people coughing, no face masks and no sanitizer.

A Brooklyn group called Churches United For Fair Housing on Monday released a report that tallied 106,000 vacant hotel rooms, 13,000 illegal Airbnbs, about 4,100 empty condos and 727 units listed on the city's housing lottery.

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