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(Trends Wide) — New York City will open a fifth Humanitarian Emergency Response and Relief Center (HERRC) amid the influx of asylum seekers in the city, Mayor Eric Adams announced Sunday.
The new center will be located at the Brooklyn Cruise Terminal, one of three cruise terminals in the New York metropolitan area, according to the mayor’s announcement. The center is scheduled to operate until the spring, when the terminal reopens to the public for the cruise season, according to the announcement.
The cruise terminal will accommodate about 1,000 asylum seekers, specifically single adult men who will be transferred from another aid center, in addition to recently arrived single men, according to the announcement. The mayor announced that the location will also offer in-person medical care, food, laundry, reconnections, and a place to temporarily stay.
“With more than 41,000 asylum seekers arriving in New York City since last spring and nearly 28,000 asylum seekers currently in our care, our city is on the brink,” Adams said in a statement Sunday.
A spokesman for the mayor did not provide a timetable for when the new site will open, saying it is expected to be up and running “very soon.” The spokesperson also declined to provide a cost for the new site, but said the city would be contracting with an outside vendor to complete the process.
Trends Wide contacted the New York City Economic Development Corporation (NYCEDC), which leases and manages the cruise terminal.
The cruise terminal structure will be “similar” to the tent structures the city opened on Randall’s Island in October, the spokesman said. The Randall’s Island center closed in mid-November in response to declining numbers of asylum seekers at the time, city officials said in a November news release.
The Legal Aid Society and the Coalition for the Homeless, which have criticized Adams’ plans to put up tent-like structures, issued a statement expressing concern about the new location.
“Not only are we concerned about the ability of Humanitarian Emergency Response and Relief Centers to meet the city’s right to housing obligations, but the next HERRC at the Brooklyn Cruise Terminal announced today is also in a high risk flood zone, according to the city’s own maps, and will unnecessarily expose future residents to inclement weather during some of the coldest months of the year,” the statement reads. “Hotels have always been the best short-term option, as opposed to putting up tents in inaccessible areas of New York City that are prone to flooding.”
Adams’ spokesman said the new cruise terminal structure will be housed within an existing building at the terminal, noting that it will provide “double insulation” from the weather, a concern advocates had raised about previous structures. .
New York City has opened 77 hotels as emergency shelters and four other humanitarian aid centers to manage the arrival of busloads of immigrants from other states, according to the city’s Emergency Management Commissioner, Zach Iscol.
