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Six Months In, Critics Say De Blasio's Strategy To Help Homeless In Subways Isn't Working
By
Mirela Iverac
Published Jan 22, 2020
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Stephen Nessen / Gothamist
By
Mirela Iverac
Published Jan 22, 2020
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New York City Councilmembers are criticizing a controversial de Blasio administration program that gives New Yorkers living in the subway the choice between receiving a police summons and going to a homeless shelter or engaging with outreach providers.
Last summer, the city introduced the so-called subway diversion program, aimed at the homeless who get summonses for violating transit rules, such as lying outstretched across multiple train seats. City officials said the initiative would keep people out of the criminal justice system while moving them off the subways and into housing. But since then they haven’t been able to point to data that would show whether the initiative was achieving its goals.
During the program’s first five months — July through November — the NYPD issued 1,296 summonses, of which 37 percent got expunged, according to Chief of Transit Edward Delatorre. Summonses were issued for a variety of transit rule violations, such as occupying multiple subway seats or urination, but the NYPD did not provide a detailed breakdown of the violations.
In more than 60 percent of the cases, homeless people chose a summons over accepting services.
“It is apparent that this program has not actually helped the city’s unsheltered individuals in the transit system move into shelter and services,” said Councilmember Stephen Levin, who chairs the general welfare committee, during a City Council hearing on Tuesday.
On the same day, Human.nyc, a group that focuses on street homelessness, released an anonymous letter that it said it received from officers working for the NYPD’s Transit Bureau. The officers attacked the program, calling it “blatant discrimination” against the homeless that they’re being forced to carry out.
But Delatorre assured the committee the initiative was working.
“We’re not going to be able to help everybody,” he said. “But I think [the program is] giving the officers throughout the transit system a tool where they can do something meaningful and help somebody.”
Delatore argued that if the program didn’t exist, people who violated transit rules would only get a summons.
“The bottom line is these are human beings and they deserve the help,” he said. “We cannot overlook them. We have to do what we can to help them.”
The hearing left many questions unanswered about the long-term impact of the program. Officials said 305 people were transported to shelters as a result of the initiative, but they couldn’t say how many even spent a night there, or how long they stayed if they did.
Councilmembers seemed largely unimpressed by arguments in favor of the program and said city officials should have focused their efforts on more swiftly opening “safe havens,” which are shelters that offer more privacy and fewer rules than traditional facilities, as well as permanent housing.
Councilmember Donovan Richards, who chairs the public safety committee, said the program appeared “coercive,” forcing people to accept the services they have already rejected, such as traditional shelters.
“If all we’re doing is giving them a choice between a summons they can’t pay and a shelter they don’t believe is safe, how can we believe we are doing them any favors?” he asked.
Tagged
City Council
bill de blasio
subway
homelessness
Mirela Iverac
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