NYC Migrant Children Could Be Housed In Outdoor Tents, Mayor Warns

NEW YORK CITY — Migrant women and children could soon be housed in congregate shelter settings that include outdoor tents, Mayor Eric Adams said Sunday.

Hizzoner called the move "unacceptable", but apparently not so much that he won't do it.

"We're about to potentially have to move women and children to sleep in congregate settings outdoors in tents," Adams said on MSNBC. "This is unacceptable. This is not what our city stands for."

Hizzoner and City Hall officials argued the decision was necessitated by the influx of 110,000 people seeking asylum in New York City over the past year and the lack of significant aid from federal and state officials.

City Hall spokesperson Kayla Mamelak said that the city is far past its breaking point, pointing to "heartbreaking outcomes," such as the migrants seen sleeping outside the Roosevelt Hotel this summer.

"Let's be clear: No one wants asylum seeking women and children in congregate shelters," Mamelak said. "But...we cannot continue to do work to solve a national crisis that the state and federal governments have refused to take meaningful action on."

But the mayor's seeming acceptance of the unacceptable wasn't shared by advocates, many of whom spent recent days increasingly gobsmacked by Adams' comments on asylum seekers.

First, Adams said the migrant crisis "will destroy New York City" — an assessment many critics denounced as fear-mongering, potentially xenophobic and against the city's history as a haven for immigrants.

Then, he announced Saturday that city agencies must cut spending by 15 percent in coming months. Doing will be necessary without federal and state aid because the city is projected to spend $12 billion on asylum seeker costs in the next three years, City Hall officials argued.

By the time Adams warned women and children asylum soon could be sleeping in congregate settings, rather than the hotels they've thus far being staying in, advocates had more than enough.

Those shelters are unsafe, inappropriate and simply unacceptable for families, said Christine Quinn, president and CEO of Win.

"Putting kids in these barracks-like shelters is a dangerous decision that will only serve to re-traumatize these children while undermining decades of progress to improve conditions for homeless families," Quinn said in a statement.

"This move is likely illegal, it negates New York City’s well-known status as a beacon for immigrants, and it is not a solution anyone should support."