NEW YORK (NewsNation) — Men, women and children sleep on the sidewalk outside the Roosevelt Hotel in Midtown Manhattan — as the makeshift intake center for asylum seekers and temporary housing for migrant families with children hit capacity this weekend.
The migrants have expressed complaints of hunger, thirst and no restroom facilities available.
Migrants filled the sidewalks surrounding the hotel, sleeping on cardboard boxes shoulder-to-shoulder across three full blocks while waiting to be processed at the site, which also houses migrant families, as NYPD officers monitored the situation, according to the New York Post.
New York City’s Mayor Eric Adams warns the situation is bad and could worsen, as the city struggles to find space for migrants.
The Legal Aid Society claims New York City isn’t meeting its legal obligation to provide housing for asylum seekers, and they may sue the city.
For days, lines have stretched around the historic hotel at 45th Street and Vanderbilt Avenue as people desperately seek a bed in the city’s shelter system.
Over the weekend, the city essentially ran out of room at its more than 200 emergency migrant shelters, and the line stretched around all four corners at the city’s intake center. Cooling buses were needed during the heat wave, NewsNation affiliate WPIX reports.
However, Adams said the city is currently caring for more than 50,000 migrants and the shelter system has reached its maximum capacity.
“It’s not going to get any better, from this moment on it’s downhill; there is no more room,” Adams said.
In May, Adams asked a judge to allow the city to suspend its “right to shelter” mandate, citing the city’s lack of resources and capacity to maintain sufficient shelter sites.
Yet, at the time, the nonprofit Coalition for the Homeless claimed the city had more than 1,000 beds and several family units empty and available.
It’s led some to suspect Adams is prolonging this situation outside the Roosevelt Hotel to gain attention from the federal government.
“We need to control the border,” Adams said. “We need to call a state of emergency and we need to properly fund this national crisis.”
While asylum seekers and migrants have been bused or flown to other places around the country, New York City has processed the largest number — more than 90,000 since last spring.
The U.S. Department of Homeland Security plans to send a liaison to assess the situation, but city officials warn scenes like this may be the new normal in New York City.
“President Biden, please take urgent action to help our city manage the migrant crisis,” said Assemblywoman Jenifer Rajkumar (D-N.Y.)
New York City received $100 million from the federal government, but officials believe it’s insufficient as they’ve already spent more than $1 billion assisting asylum seekers. The cost may surpass $4 billion by next summer.
Even as the city struggles to handle the more than 90,000 migrants who have already arrived, an additional 4,000 migrants might arrive by week’s end.