Evictions from Queens Homeless Shelter Spark Outrage
Recently, twenty low-income families with 37 school-aged children were evicted from a homeless shelter in Queens, despite Mayor Zoran Mamdani’s earnest calls to halt the process.
The eviction at Long Island City’s City View Inn began last week after families were taken by surprise, learning that the shelter would be transformed into one exclusively for single men, according to local officials.
This move elicited strong reactions from community members, who were upset that these families, with children enrolled in nearby schools, were being uprooted in the midst of winter, a particularly harsh time of year.
In response, residents quickly organized a protest. City Councilwoman Julie Wong voiced her opposition, criticizing the evictions as a continuation of policies from former Mayor Eric Adams that had drawn significant criticism and urging the current mayor to reconsider.
Wong stated during the demonstration, “Stop this Eric Adams-era inhumane practice of treating people like property.” She later remarked that the new mayor should end these harsh deportation practices against immigrant families and allow children to remain in the shelters where they’ve built their communities.
City officials defended the decision to repurpose the shelter, arguing that the extreme cold necessitated finding accommodations for homeless men. A spokesperson from City Hall expressed that they acted swiftly to increase low-barrier bed availability and to optimize existing shelter resources in such dire circumstances.
They emphasized that addressing a crisis involves not just providing beds, but also ensuring the protection of lives, education, and stability.
However, the abrupt nature of the evictions has unsettled locals who had grown accustomed to the presence of the Migrant Family Shelter, established as a temporary solution back in 2018.
Tom Mituzas, from the Blissville Civic Association, conveyed community sentiments, questioning why the needs of men took precedence over those of the families already residing there. “What was the need for this change?” he wondered.
On February 11, the Blissville Civic Association requested clarification from Mayor Mamdani and local officials about the permanence of the men’s shelter.
A spokesperson for Wong noted that some families had even been relocated to Jamaica, despite their children attending PS 199 Maurice A. Fitzgerald School nearby.
Wong attributed some of the responsibility to Department of Human Services Secretary Molly Wasow Park, who recently resigned. “Park had a duty to keep families within their communities,” Wong remarked.
“DSS/DHS cruelly removed these 37 children from the shelter without providing them with information regarding alternative shelter options,” she added. As a result, these children are now missing school during winter, cut off from their education and support systems.
City officials mentioned that children in temporary housing from kindergarten through sixth grade have the right to utilize city buses, while older students receive an OMNY card for transportation.
