Shelters and homelessness

“Despite New York City’s reputation as a place of inclusion, LGBTQ+ individuals, particularly transgender and gender non-conforming people, LGBTQ+ youth, and LGBTQ+ people of color remain disproportionately impacted by housing insecurity. Many are forced from their homes due to family rejection. Many face barriers to accessing safe and affirming shelters, and many encounter discrimination when seeking permanent affordable housing.”

“I’m proud to support and celebrate the passage of this legislation requiring greater transparency and accountability in our warming centers. For many New Yorkers, our seniors, families experiencing homelessness, and individuals living with disabilities, warming centers are not optional.”

“In particular, we are aware that many of the security services that are in shelter are contracted services.”

“What happens with undocumented youth who are transitioning out of shelter, who can’t get into NYCHA or things like that?”

“The Speaker and Councilmember Sanchez have been tremendous champions for CityFEPs, and I really, really hope that we can get a deal done because this is a proven and effective strategy to prevent people from going into shelter and getting people out of shelter.”

“I’m going to pull a Tiffany Caban and stand up. Today’s settlement— see, she even shows me how— today’s settlement, the fiscal year ‘27 budget, and this legislation represent a historic agreement that will finally expand housing vouchers for New Yorkers facing homelessness.”

“I think that, yes, it is all hands on deck, but like, just, they don’t have the right to shelter.”

“When it comes to landlord participation and payment delays, many landlords cite late payments, administrative burdens, communication challenges as reasons they do not accept CityFHEPS vouchers.”

“How do you plan to regularly assess and update those numbers so that the shelters are fairly distributed across the city?”

“You’ll have a new development— I’ve seen it in my district and other places where we’re building housing, and then it takes months for like HPD to place someone through Housing Connect. So in terms of the supportive housing, what has been the challenges that you’ve identified?”

“We have been vigilant as a council to continue to fight for that, and it is going to be imperative that the administration comes and pours money into that program so that the most vulnerable folks are getting housed. I know it’s probably going to be mentioned by other folks, but we have thousands of students who live in shelters.”

“Today I’m introducing Intro 816, a bill drafted to address a critical gap in our shelter systems.”

“I have some questions I think best for DSS as well. First is around LGBTQ older adults. In 2017, a survey of queer older adults, you know, nearly one-quarter of the respondents earned less than 30% of area median income. And nearly 1 in 4 of the respondents reported living in substandard housing, and some even in shelters.”

“They have family. They actually, their family bring the meal to where they choose to be homeless.”

“That approach may boost unit counts, But it ignores the lived reality of families across our city. It’s families with children and even multigenerational households. The consequences are clear. Families with young children are leaving New York City at alarming rates, and roughly 70% of people in our shelter system are members of homeless families.”

“3 times a week. And my observation is that most of the residents there are men, and it is my understanding it is a shelter for both men and women.”

“The question before us is simple: who is public land for? The pressure in Upper Manhattan is real. Rents have climbed, families are being pushed out, seniors are holding on month to month, and too many New Yorkers are still cycling through shelters or unstable housing because they don’t have a permanent place to land.”

“We have more— the fastest growing population of homeless adults are seniors, and wanting to know how you can, you know, help provide services to those seniors, not just once they’ve entered our shelter system, to get them out of the shelters and back into whether it’s transitional housing or supportive housing?”

“Not necessarily in the units, but there have been some questionable people that have taken over the building. And so in the conversation, I brought up the possibility of working with the city and leasing up those units to, you know, families coming out of shelter.”

“Obviously, this became a big issue over the last several years. You’ve been a key key figure in that discussion over the last several decades. And the right to shelter, while it exists in our New York State Constitution, was never defined statutorily as those same provisions call for.”

“Tonight, more than 100,000 people, including thousands of young people, will sleep in New York City’s shelter system.”

“That’s, that’s the, the best testimony we can get. On what should be— what improvements we should make there. I don’t believe there should be a Borden Avenue shelter.”

“We appreciate that in the community, but they have significant operational issues. I’m seeing them in the Bronx. Specifically in my district, they have been turned into encampments.”

“I want to ask about asylum seeker adjustments. The preliminary plan includes $20.8 million reduction in fiscal year ‘26 related to asylum seeker response efforts.”

“Code Blue weather emergency notice is issued when the temperature drops to 32 degrees Fahrenheit or less between 4 PM and 8 AM, which we’ve had a lot of unfortunately. No one experiencing homelessness who seeks shelter during a Code Blue in New York City can be denied.”