Lucerne Shelter On The UWS To Shut Down After Court Ruling

UPPER WEST SIDE, NY — The road to move the remaining men living at The Lucerne shelter on the Upper West Side to a permanent facility in the Financial District has been cleared after a court denied an appeal Thursday that aimed to keep them where they are.

The petition by three former residents of The Lucerne, a former hotel, was ruled "moot" because they had all moved out of the Upper West Side shelter and secured permanent housing during the court case that has lasted months.

"The intervenor-petitioners’ appeal challenging the municipal respondents’ determination to relocate them from the Lucerne Hotel to the Radisson Hotel is moot because the intervenor-petitioners have all moved out of the Lucerne and secured separate housing," read the court's decision.

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The appeal was created after the city moved to transfer the residents of out The Lucerne in the fall of 2020.

In January, a New York appeals court ruled that the homeless men living at The Lucerne could choose whether to stay there or relocate to the Radisson Shelter in Lower Manhattan during the duration of the lawsuit process.

• Court Says UWS Homeless Hotel Residents Can Choose To Leave, Stay

The case came after an ongoing battle around the subject over most of 2021.

During proceedings, Attorney Randy Mastro, who represented the West Side Community Organization, a group of Upper West Siders trying to get The Lucerne shelter closed down, argued along with the de Blasio administration that since the petitioners fighting to stay at the UWS shelter had moved out, the appeal should be thrown out.

Mastro sent private investigators to the new home of one of the petitioners, Ramone Buford — otherwise known as "Da Homeless Hero" — to prove that Buford had moved out of The Lucerne by photographing him in his new Harlem apartment.

• Investigators Dressed As Plumbers Spied On Pro-Lucerne Campaigner

The situation caused intense backlash across the city.

"West Side Community Organization (WestCo) prevailed today in a nearly year-long court case, allowing the City to transfer hundreds of homeless drug-addicted and mentally ill men from the Lucerne hotel on the Upper West Side to a proper shelter with full services," said WestCo in a news release.

West Side Community Organization, a nonprofit that came out of a Facebook group of Upper West Siders who opposed the new homeless shelter in the neighborhood, also said that the Lucerne residents have begun to get notified of their impending move.

UWS Open Hearts Initiative, a group that advocates for the rights of people experiencing homelessness, posted its reaction on Twitter to the court's decision Thursday.

While we are disappointed the court did not consider the merits of the case and the irrational and harmful nature of the city's decision-making, we also think it's important to look back on *how much was won* because @homeless_hero and 2 others stood up to fight. They stopped 1/5 https://t.co/c93Fa6T7Ic
— UWS Open Hearts Initiative (@UWSOpenHearts) June 3, 2021