City Begins Booting Residents From Hell's Kitchen Hotel Shelters

HELL'S KITCHEN, NY — The city this week began kicking homeless residents out of temporary hotel shelters in Hell's Kitchen, marking the end of a yearlong program that caused a backlash from neighbors but provided a lifeline for the New Yorkers who gained housing through it.

This week's transfers were set to include the Skyline Hotel on 10th Avenue, the Watson Hotel on West 57th Street and the Hilton Garden Inn on West 37th Street, according to a Department of Homeless Services memo that was shared with Patch. (News of those transfers was first reported by W42ST.)

Shelter residents were notified June 17 about the impending moves, which will be complete by the end of July, according to DHS.

In addition, the Comfort Inn on West 44th Street was expected to empty out this week along with five others in Midtown and two elsewhere in Manhattan — amounting to at least 1,500 residents, THE CITY reported.

The hotel shelters were set up last spring to reduce congestion in congregate shelters during the pandemic. Now, their residents are being shipped back to those same dorm-like shelters, which many homeless people avoid due to crowding and crime issues.

Over the past year, hotel shelters became a lightning rod in several neighborhoods — perhaps none more than Hell's Kitchen, where residents complained repeatedly that the influx of vulnerable people had led to open drug use and increasingly visible mental health crises.

Last fall, a new group formed to protest the concentration of shelters along West 36th and 37th streets, saying the placement of more than 800 beds on those blocks had caused safety problems. Months later, the city agreed to move the shelter at the DoubleTree Hotel on West 36th Street.

Residents of the hotel shelters, meanwhile, have described them as an unexpected source of stability during a tough pandemic year. Advocates for the homeless have spoken out against the city's decision to end the program, which comes as COVID-19 wanes.

Some also suggested that the city was surrendering to racist "NIMBY" objections by starting the transfers at hotels in Midtown and the Upper East and West sides — predominantly white, wealthier neighborhoods.

Related coverage:

• City To Move Hell's Kitchen Shelter After Neighborhood Pushback
• Another Shelter Battle Brews In Hell's Kitchen As New Group Forms
• Hell's Kitchen Board Implores City To Reduce Hotel Shelters