Once again, the City of New York blindsided counties late-Tuesday with another scheme to unload its failed homeless and Sanctuary City policies by exporting its homeless residents to be backfilled with migrants.

New York City’s Department of Social Services (NYCDSS) will allow city-issued housing vouchers to be used statewide by its low-income residents to alleviate homelessness the City is incapable of handling. Under the plan CityFHEPS, participants secure 5-year leases paying 30% of the housing and NYCDSS pays the rest. Typically, CityFHEPS provides landlords three months’ rent upfront plus a 15% bonus, which will inflate housing costs in localities while incentivizing landlords to kick out local residents for the higher paying municipality.

This is another attempt by the City of New York and Mayor Eric Adams to circumvent the laws and shift a problem resulting from its failed homeless and Sanctuary City policies to other municipalities. What Mayor Adams fails to realize is this does not solve the problem; it only spreads it across New York State while incentivizing more illegal immigration among migrants eager to backfill the spots in City shelters as they open. Reports confirm migrants are not just coming from the border, but across the country for the free housing, food, and services being provided by the City.

Our Department of Social Services is already struggling to place low-income individuals in housing in Rockland County due to our well-documented housing shortages that often lead to dangerous levels of overcrowding.

This plan will, without question, drive our price of housing up further and cause competition among our low-income looking for housing.

The City cannot do whatever it pleases and traffic their homelessness to other municipalities, frankly, hurting more people than its helping.
 
Once again, the City failed to cooperate with neighboring municipalities and is looking to launch an initiative that would very likely oust our residents from their homes as landlords strike deals
with the higher bidder.

While we are a country of immigrants those who immigrated to this country prior, did so with support from friends and family and not at the expense of taxpayers. This problem is unsustainable and why I’ve echoed countless times that our immigration system needs to be fixed once and for all or else this problem will have no end in sight.

Landlords considering participating in this be forewarned; it is my opinion this directly violates our State of Emergency as a misdemeanor carrying a daily fine of $2000. I refuse to allow my residents to be ousted from their home or forced into dangerously overcrowded conditions due to the City’s failed policies and will not hesitate to take whatever steps necessary to protect the
people in our County.