Local community offers many complaints about asylum seeker shelter in College Point, Queens
NEW YORK -- With thousands of asylum seekers arriving in the city every week, Mayor Eric Adams has opened nearly 200 facilities to house them, including hotels, an airport hanger, and even a decommissioned Harlem jail.
The latest one is on a quiet residential street in College Point, Queens.
CBS New York's Marcia Kramer went there Tuesday with City Councilwoman Vickie Paladino, whose phone has been blowing up with complaints from the community that arose ever since it opened last Friday.
It was like "Postcards from the Edge," troubling on many levels.
"Coming into the room, she say, 'Everybody go out, go out. Bring your stuff, go out, go out,'" shelter resident Nathalie said.
Nathalie is not an asylum seeker. She has been in the U.S. for five years and until last Friday lived in a Bronx shelter for women. That is until, inexplicably, it suddenly relocated her to a respite center for migrants in College Point, where she says men and women sleep in the same room.
"I'm sick. I no have money," she said. "I no have nobody to help me. I don't know hy"
"I don't understand that. She was forcibly removed," Paladino said. "She didn't cross the border, so why is she here? She was in a shelter, a women's shelter. That was another thing she said, how it's disgusting inside because the men and women are sleeping together and taking showers together. So this is like, no, this can't happen."
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It's just one of several problems as the city tries to deal with the asylum seeker humanitarian crisis here and moves 300 men and women into the former St. Agnes Parochial school. It is across the street from a senior center and around the corner from a middle school and a center for pregnant women.
Paladino said problems started almost immediately.
"People sitting on steps. People smoking pot. People drinking. There's no curfew, which was most disappointing. They can come and go as they please 24 hours a day," Paladino said.
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Several homeowners Kramer spoke to complained about people congregating outside their homes. One homeowner asked to remain anonymous out of fear of reprisals.
"I live right on the corner and, you know, they just seem to get dropped off and go straight to my corner. They congregate there. They hang out. They smoke weed. They're loud. I just don't understand why they get dropped off and just have free rein," the homeowner said.
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Emmanuel Wata is an asylum seeker from central Africa who offered a different, so-called postcard from the edge. He doesn't want to be in the neighborhood. He wants a job, the ability to work. He wants President Joe Biden to let him get work papers so he can find the American dream.
"Many of the migrants here want to work, but do not have the opportunity to work. It's not better to keep us here, give us food. I want to work. I want to pay my taxes," Wata said.
Wata told Kramer he want to get a job taking care of senior citizens. It's unclear just how many more people will be moved to the shelter. However, with hundreds camped out outside The Roosevelt Hotel waiting for placement, it's likely that more people will find their way to College Point.