De Blasio Plans to Build 90 New Shelters, Cut Record Homeless Population
(DNAINFO) Danielle Tcholakian | March 2, 2017 — The mayor also vowed to clear out all cluster sites and stop using hotels to house the homeless.
Mayor Bill de Blasio vowed Tuesday afternoon to open 90 new homeless shelters and cut the city’s homeless shelter population — currently at a record high of 60,000 — by 2,500 over the next five years.
The mayor’s plan, first reported by the New York Times, would expand the current shelter system by roughly a third of its size, while shuttering the 360 controversial “cluster sites” and commercial hotels they are currently using to house the city’s homeless.
“This is a commitment to do something different,” the mayor said Tuesday. “We will make progress, but it will be incremental. It will be slow, but I believe it will be steady.”
The mayor’s plan, outlined in a report released with his announcement, promises to clear out all cluster sites by the end of 2021 and commercial hotels by the end of 2023, while opening 20 new shelters a year in 2017 and 2018.
The plan specifies that of those 20 shelters a year, five will be “new high-quality” sites, while the rest will be opened in existing buildings.
An additional 30 existing shelters will be expanded beginning in 2018, continuing “on a rolling basis” for the subsequent seven years.”
“To avoid disrupting the lives of people already housed in these buildings, the city will open 12 temporary locations for them,” the report says.
There are currently 275 shelters overseen by the city’s Department of Homeless Services, subsidized by a combination of federal, city and state funding.