Mayor Eric Adams is exploring the possibility of using cruise ships as temporary housing for illegal immigrants after New York City shelters reach capacity.
“We’re not going to leave any stone unturned. And once we finalize our plans, we’re going to announce it,” Adams told the press on Sept. 19. “Once we finalize how we’re going to continue to live up to our legal and moral obligation, we’re going to announce.”
Frank Carone, Adam’s chief of staff, discussed possibly housing migrants aboard Norwegian Cruise Line ships with company executives, according to a report from The New York Times. The outlet reported that Carone stayed on one of the company’s boats in Normandy, France in August “as part of the administration’s research.”
“City officials have opened 23 emergency shelters to handle the influx of migrants,” stated the outlet. “But the city recently failed to offer beds to 60 migrants who arrived at the center on East 30th Street in Manhattan where homeless men are assessed when they first enter the shelter system — the first major such lapse in over a decade.”
The cruise ships would reportedly be docked along the Hudson River.
Adams has requested assistance with the increasing number of illegal immigrants in the city from the Biden administration on multiple occasions.
“We just need help. We need help,” Adams said in a press conference in August, per Fox News. “And we’re going to have some specific items that we’re going to go over with the president. But we want assistance. We believe FEMA should step in.”
Current estimations indicate that 11,000 migrants have been bused to New York from Texas as part of a program enacted by Governor Greg Abbott.
Simultaneously, the federal government has resumed flying migrants to Westchester County Airport outside of New York City despite the suspension of the flights last year.
New York officials previously considered using cruise ships to house homeless families in 2002. At the time, officials were sent to the Bahamas to tour retired cruise ships.
Adams’ office is considering housing the illegal immigrant population at summer camps, according to Fox 5 NY.
Josh Goldfein, a staff attorney for the Legal Aid Society of New York, told the outlet that the proposal is “crazy” as placing the migrants “outside of the city would make it hard for people to get to appointments that they need to get to, to get to court, to get to medical services, and would require a lot of transportation for city staff” including lawyers working with the illegal immigrants.
Senator Kristen Gillibrand suggested to Adams last week that the illegal immigrants could be relocated to cities in upstate New York, reports The New York Post. She suggested the move would increase the population and bring additional federal funding into the region.
