An old South Bronx storage facility is being prepared by New York City as a shelter for 2,200 migrants which were originally housed in now-closed tent shelters on Randall’s Island.
“Wrong move,” local resident Serene Bilal told The New York Post. “You need to work with the people already here. We have some issues going on. Why the Bronx? Why pick on the Bronx? It’s going to be dangerous. We don’t know who these people are. We are not talking about 10 people, we’re talking about thousands. That’s a lot.”
“We are concerned,” a local store manager told The Post. “We have concerns just in general because there are people lingering in the streets and there have been reports of thefts. It’s going to get worse. I think they are discarding them in the shadows at the edge of the Bronx where they think people won’t get affected. I’m concerned for the safety of our female workers. I might have to change around some shifts.”
“You are going to see a bunch of people hanging out, drinking and doing you know what and you have to walk by them to go to the train,” one woman said. “We work in a dead-end area and there are no police around here. It’s going to create more problems, I think it’s going to get more violent.”
Local Concerns Around the Shelter
Despite 2,200 representing less than a 400th of a percent of the Bronx’s total population, concerns surrounding a three-tent migrant’s shelter have evidently been mounting. The real concern may be that New York City is not addressing other problems which locals have noted in the Bronx, including “The Hub,” one area which suffers from drug distribution and the presence of addicts.
“Instead of dismantling open-air drug markets in the Hub,” said Bronx representative Ritchie Torres, “the city is treating the South Bronx as a dumping ground for the endless stream of shelters. The Bronx is treated differently than the rest of the city. We are treated as the second-class borough of New York City.”
What New York City Has Been Working Toward
As it stands, New York City plans to pay between $250,000 and $340,000 to prepare the facility for the migrant population. Over the past two years, the city has reportedly converted unused schools and churches into shelters while setting up tents on Randall’s Island and in Floyd Bennett Field in Brooklyn, though both of these “tent cities” are being shut down.
“Thanks to our strong management of this unprecedented humanitarian crisis,” a City Hall representative said, “New York City has seen over six months of population decline in our emergency shelter system, allowing us to close 46 migrant shelters in the span of a year.”
A Slow in Housing Initiatives and Shelter Operation
The number of asylum seekers has slowed down since 2022, but that doesn’t mean that there is no longer a need for housing initiatives across the five boroughs. The temporary setups on Randall’s Island and in Floyd Bennett Field are being replaced with smaller setups in other areas, while other migrants are being moved to shelters.
According to New York City, nearly 230,000 migrants were housed in city shelters since 2022, but there are now a little over 50,000 in the system. Previously, the city was operating 263 shelters, but is now operating 190. Though Bronx locals feel that a migrant problem is being dropped on their doorstep, it is clear that real progress has been made.
A Temporary Decision
If the numbers are anything to go by, New York City’s decision to set up a migrant shelter in the South Bronx is likely to have a temporary effect. Concerns surrounding The Hub deserve to be addressed, but a new migrant shelter does not necessarily suggest that violence will rise in the area as a result of a negligible migrant presence.
