NYC Mayor, Advocates Spar Over HomelessSweeps
New York City Mayor Eric Adams and homeless advocates clash at Adams’ claims of successfully beginning to sweep the streets of encampments. Advocates say these are “misguided tactics.”
Landwebs
After only a few months in office and a few weeks pushing a new effort, New York City Mayor Eric Adams is claiming success with early progress in his effort to clear the streets of homeless encampments, NPR details. Some of the successes listed in the Mayor’s press release include deploying 30 Joint Response Teams to bring together departments focused on community-based needs; training NYPD officers to interact with people experiencing homelessness; expanding behavioral health emergency assistance, and creating Drop-In-Centers to keep unhoused people off of the transit system.
However, advocates for the homeless, speaking with NPR, claim the approach is a return to “misguided tactics” arguing that police-focused and criminalization strategies inappropriately persuade people to go to shelters, perpetuating a cycle of failure. “All they’re doing is doubling down on a failed policy,” said Jacquelyn Simone, policy director at the NYC-based Coalition for the Homeless. “Policing and criminalization are not the responses to what is fundamentally a housing and mental health crisis.”
