Upper West Siders will cast their votes in city primaries on Tuesday for all sorts of reasons. They may have been swayed by one candidate’s position on education, or their plans for development or bike lanes, for instance. But there’s one local development that some Upper West Siders say is so important, their vote depends entirely on a candidate’s position on that issue: the homeless shelter at 316 and 330 West 95th street known as Freedom House. That 400-bed shelter is now the subject of two lawsuits: one filed by the Bloomberg administration against Comptroller John Liu for rejecting its five-year $47 million contract, and another by Neighborhood in the Nineties against the city for approving it.
Community members and local politicians have spoken out forcefully against the shelter, and the District 6 City Council candidates all think it needs to go away. But when we asked the mayoral candidates today whether they would change the Bloomberg administration’s policy of defending the shelter and pushing for a new five-year contract, we didn’t get many answers back. In fact, most of the candidates didn’t answer at all (understandably, their press people are busy, but we only asked one quick question!). Here was our question: “If you win the election, will you continue to push for a long-term contract for the homeless shelter known as Freedom House at 316 and 330 West 95th Street? Or will you close it within 6 months?”
We did hear back from two candidates. George McDonald, a Republican who is the founder of the DOE Fund and an advocate for homeless people, wrote: “I would stop it and invest in paid transitional work.”
And a spokesman for Bill de Blasio, the current front-runner for the Democratic nomination, wrote this:
“From his time as Chair of the City Council’s General Welfare Committee to his work as Public Advocate, Bill de Blasio has been one of the most vocal critics of the use of ‘scatter site’ housing by the Department of Homeless Services. Mayor Bloomberg’s increasingly wasteful use of such shelters is part of a disastrous and broken homelessness policy that has seen New York City’s shelter population soar to a record 50,000 people.
“As Mayor, Bill will phase out the use of scatter site shelters and return to the proven strategy of moving homeless families from the shelter system to safe, affordable housing.”
We asked him to elaborate — in particular, we wanted to know whether de Blasio would continue Bloomberg’s lawsuit against the comptroller’s office over the 95th street shelter. But we never heard back. “Phasing out” scatter site shelters would imply that Freedom House would be phased out, but it’s not exactly definitive.
De Blasio has a curious relationship with the landlords and operators of homeless shelters. A piece in New York magazine this week noted that he has taken money from people who operate shelters and their associates (though he did give back money given to him by Alan Lapes, the landlord for Freedom House, after West Side Rag and other media organizations asked about it).
Given that de Blasio has campaigned extensively on the UWS and appeared at a forum put on by Neighborhood in the Nineties last year (that’s him speaking above), he clearly knows about the shelter. In fact, one of his favorite hand-shaking spots is the 96th street subway station. Surely, someone mentioned the shelters to him.
This is not to pick on de Blasio. Officials including Christine Quinn could have stood up more forcefully to the mayor on these policies, for instance. But other than Liu (whose spokesperson didn’t respond to our inquiry, but who has stood up to the shelter), it’s not clear where most of these candidates stand.
I mentioned the subject to de Blasio on 96th street, he knew the issue and said the Bloomberg administration was acting desperate and he would reverse Bloomberg’s policies on homeless housing. When I mentioned the sweetheart deal with Aguila he seemed annoyed and hurried. I still think he’s a good choice, but what happens to that shelter is anyone’s guess, we don’t know the back-scratching details of that move.
I hope the new mayor moves these homeless shelters from the UWS to the UES. That way, when the UES residents protest; the UWSers can wag their fingers at those greedy 1%-ers and call then heartless, Romney-loving racists!
I was at the forum at the Thalia theater when Public Advocate Bill de Blasio came to here and speak about the outlaw homeless shelters in the West 90s. When Aaron Biller told the Public Advocate of the numerous homeless shelters in the West 90s, spelling mode Mr. de Blasio acted stunned. As if he had never heard this information before. In truth, numerous copies of the information were hand-delivered to the public advocates office. He kept saying ” I’ll have to look into this.” Unbeknownst to us at the time was that Mr. DeBlasio had received donations from Alan Napes, the owner of the two buildings that house the latest shelters. When the news came out Mr. DeBlasio quickly returned the donations. Now he’s telling a different story about this meeting.
You are surprised? De Blasio is advocating class warfare.
I am sure the destruction of our UWS thrills him and his agenda. Hey it will be like the 70s again and affordable!
I am very afraid for our city if he wins against Lhota.
You’re in favor of Lhota? The crooked leader of the MTA? Yikes…
Who have proven to be crooked and involved in corruption and scandal more then the Democrats of the City Council and of course, Lopez representing NYC in the state.?