Eric Adams, New York City’s elected official, declared a state of emergency in an executive order on Friday, October 7, in response to a record influx of asylum seekers into the city, mainly from the southern border of the United States.
The communique was issued Friday, Oct. 7, to formally order all relevant agencies in the city to coordinate their efforts to respond to the humanitarian crisis of asylum seekers and to build humanitarian relief centers on a transitional basis.
The state of emergency will remain in effect for 30 days and may be extended, according to the order.
Adams also called for emergency federal and state assistance to manage the continued influx of asylum seekers, including legislation to allow asylum seekers to work, a border decompression strategy, a coordinated effort to move asylum seekers to other cities, emergency financial assistance and immigration reform.
According to Eric Adams , the city’s shelter system is currently operating at nearly 100 percent capacity, housing more than 61,000 people, and the city is expected to have more than 100,000 asylum seekers next year if current trends continue.
“This is far beyond the capacity to handle that the system was designed for. It’s unsustainable. The city will run out of funding for other priorities,” he stressed.
With at least 17,000 asylum seekers, mostly from South America, have been transported directly to New York from the country’s southern border since April, the mayor said.
To accommodate the asylum seekers, the city has leased 42 hotels as emergency shelters with a humanitarian relief and response center under construction on Randall’s Island, and is working with the New York governor’s office to identify additional locations for relief centers and staffing resources.
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