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City Releases Long-Overdue Scorecard On Homeless Shelter Conditions
By
Emma Whitford
Published Feb 2, 2016
Modified Feb 2, 2016
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Maria Rolon
By
Emma Whitford
Published Feb 2, 2016
Modified Feb 2, 2016
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Mayor de Blasio's office on Monday released a months-delayed scorecard listing the number and severity of building safety violations at the city's 622 shelter sites. As of December 2015, the city's 265 cluster-site shelters, privately owned family shelters notorious for their decrepit conditions, contained the vast majority of these violations—70%, or more than 14,000.
Cluster sites currently house about 20% of the 58,000 New Yorkers in the city's shelter system, according to the city.
This week's scorecard was initially promised last May, on the heels of a city-comissioned Department of Investigation report that found hundreds of building safety violations across 25 city shelters, from vermin infestations to non-working smoke and carbon monoxide detectors and blocked means of egress.
The Mayor's office did not immediately provide an explanation for the delay. NY 1 reported on the lag time last month, prompting harsh words from the mayor, if not a thorough explanation.
"In 2016, the people who are part of my administration will feel the lash because if we make a commitment, we are keeping it. Anyone who doesn't keep it is going to have a problem with me," de Blasio told the outlet in a follow-up in early January. "Those scorecards will happen... by next month. If they don't happen, a lot of people will be in trouble."
The scorecard provides the number of open and closed violations at each shelter site, as well as the service provider and landlord name at each facility. However, violations are not detailed. Rather, the report lists them according to the department that recorded them—HPD, FDNY, DOB.
The city's 357 non-cluster shelters scored better, more than half of them clocking fewer than 10 violations. Still, six traditional shelters and 30 cluster shelters had more than 100 open violations, according to the NY Times' analysis of the report.
Last month, de Blasio announced a three-year plan to phase out cluster-site homeless shelters altogether, describing the system as "broken." Created under former mayor Rudy Giuliani, the program has historically paid landlords as much as $3,000 per month, per unit, for often sub-par maintenance.
The violations detailed in this week's report are not a revelation. Last month, Comptroller Scott Stringer's office announced that it had analyzed all 500 family shelters in the city, and found that the vast majority of them had at least one immediately-hazardous condition—from rats, to exposed wiring, to peeling lead paint. A month prior, Stringer's office had conducted an audit of 101 apartments in the shelter system, and found that 88 of them had hazardous conditions. What's more, DHS inspectors were found to be largely relying on shelters to self-report their violations, rather than make proactive inspections.
Indeed, this week's scorecard might be best interpreted as Mayor de Blasio's effort to prove his investment in fixing up city shelters, less than a month after Governor Cuomo empowered Comptroller Stringer, a de Blasio critic, to conduct yet another "true independent review" of NYC shelter conditions.
"We are determined to give every family and individual in a homeless shelter decent living conditions. We have been increasing inspections to identify problems, and we now have a scorecard to track our progress in addressing them," said de Blasio in a statement.
Already this year, the Mayor has promised to redouble the efforts of his Shelter Repair Squad, which he assembled in May 2015 and says consists of "hundreds" of inspectors and repair workers. Shelter sites will now be inspected twice a year for violations, and a shelter repair hotline was established yesterday.
Also this year, the city says that it will increase its shelter maintenance and repair budget from $37 million to $54 million.
The Mayor's shelter report does not address violence in city shelters, an issue that came to the fore last week after a resident at an East Harlem homeless shelter fatally stabbed his roommate, a former teacher. Reached for comment, the Mayor's office pointed to a separate initiative, announced last week, to increase security and mental health staff at city shelters.
As reports of decrepit shelter conditions pile up, some homeless New Yorkers have balked at the continued investment in improving and maintaining these facilities.
"The answer isn't better shelters, it's more housing," said shelter resident and Picture The Homeless member Charmel Lucas. "Even the best ones are overcrowded and insufficiently staffed. Instead of putting all this energy and resources into making shelters better, they need to be dismantling the whole shelter system.... It's a huge waste of money and it keeps people destabilized."
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homeless shelters
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Emma Whitford
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