Two City Council members entered a homeless veterans shelter in Queens against the staff’s orders Thursday as they and other lawmakers ramped up pressure on the Mamdani administration to explain why it rejected federal funding for beds at the facility.
“We have the legal authority to enter to provide oversight” of city shelters, Councilmember Julie Won, who represents the district where the Long Island City site is located, said in front of a metal detector inside the building. Shelter workers told Won and Councilmember Phil Wong — both Democrats — they did not have permission to go farther inside, but the pair did anyway and later said the conditions they saw were alarming.
“This was not meant for residential living,” said Won, who waited more than three hours to go past the metal detector as the staff told her she could not enter, according to her office. She said the conditions they observed were not “humane living,” the bed areas were cramped and both staff and security guards pressured her and Wong to leave.
The lawmakers’ visit comes after The City Reporter broke the news last week that the city had turned down a federal grant to support the Borden Avenue Veterans Residence over concerns the award would have required the city to discriminate against transgender veterans.
The grant agreement, city officials said, contained clauses from President Donald Trump’s executive orders barring the promotion of “gender ideology” and “denial of the sex binary.” But the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs said the city’s allegation about such a requirement was “false” and the city “voluntarily withdrew from the grant process” after learning of the award’s “terms and conditions.”
Meanwhile Thursday, two City Council committees scheduled an Oct. 21 oversight hearing on the city’s handling of homeless veterans. Councilmember Frank Morano (R-Staten Island), who chairs the veterans committee, said he will make the Borden Avenue controversy a “major focus of the hearing,” where the Department of Homeless Services “will have an opportunity to explain publicly why the city chose to walk away from” the VA’s Grant and Per Diem program, which has funded the site for nearly two decades.
“I also want to understand why this had to be an either-or choice,” Morano said in a statement Thursday. “If the city disagrees with a federal policy, it can challenge that policy, but I want DHS to explain why it couldn’t preserve available federal funding while ensuring that every veteran, including transgender veterans, continued to be served.”
‘No Justification’
The Mamdani administration told The City Reporter that the VA offered about $1.3 million for 44 beds at the Borden Avenue shelter for the grant beginning Oct. 1, the start of the federal fiscal year. DHS said that was down from roughly $4 million for 154 beds for the last grant, out of more than 200 beds at the facility, which also receives city funding.
Mamdani spokesperson Sneha Choudhary said the shelter’s capacity and services will not change and the department will cover the cost of the foregone $1.3 million. She said the city charter does not authorize unannounced inspections of city shelters and Council members must get prior approval to visit them accompanied by a representative from DHS or its parent agency, the Department of Social Services.
Councilmember Joann Ariola (R-Queens), who has been pushing for answers about why the city exited the GPD program, slammed the city for giving up the funding.
“The bottom line here is that DHS walked away from over $1 million, and New York City’s taxpayers are left footing the bill,” she said in a statement. “Even if we accept the DHS interpretation of the VA grant agreement, there would still be plenty of other beds outside the parameters of the GPD grant that would be available for use by transgender veterans.”
In a statement later Thursday, Won and Wong confirmed their visit was unannounced and said Council members “have a mandate under the city charter to perform oversight and investigative duties” over city agencies and operations. They accused City Hall and its shelter contractors of “putting up roadblocks” to their ability to do their jobs.
The VA declined to confirm the figures provided by the Mamdani administration and referred to previous statements saying the department determined it “could not justify a larger award” than what it offered after reviewing the Borden Avenue shelter for “past performance, demonstrated need and ability to provide high-quality service to veterans.”
“The records will show what happened in the funding dispute between the city and the VA,” Michael Matos, president and co-founder of the advocacy group Five Borough Veterans, said in a statement. “Until then, there is no justification for keeping City Council members out. Denying oversight of the veterans in the city’s care is a disservice to them and to the public.”
Shelter Conditions Under a Microscope
After Won and Wong inspected the shelter Thursday, they said they saw multiple tarps and buckets under the ceiling to catch water from roof leaks. They described a general lack of privacy for the residents, including in the bathrooms and showers, as well as dim and flickering lights.
“This is about fixing a decades-old problem,” Wong told The City Reporter outside of the facility. “It has gotten worse.”
In their statement, the lawmakers said they also “heard repeated complaints about poor food, violence, alleged drug activity and other conditions residents say have gone inadequately addressed.”
“Our veterans served this country and deserve dignity, safe conditions and accountability from their government,” they added.
Our nonprofit newsroom relies on donations from readers to sustain our local reporting and keep it free for all New Yorkers. Donate to THE CITY today.
The post Lawmakers Force Inspection of NYC Veterans Shelter Amid Federal Funding Tempest appeared first on The City Reporter.
