He's Forcing Them Off The Streets With No Solution In Sight

eric adams
Zain Murdock
April 12, 2022

New York City Mayor Eric Adams already deployed NYPD officers to clear out unhoused people from subway stations. But now he has his sights on erasing New Yorkers from the streets – by destroying housing encampments like tents, boxes, and other makeshift shelters. 

Why is he doing this?

“I’m not abandoning anyone. I’m not going to believe that dignity is living in a cardboard [box] … It’s just so inhumane,” said Adams. “You have a right to sleep on the street. You don’t have a right to build a miniature house.” Huh? 

He’s forcing people into a worse situation than they started with. Where are these people supposed to go? Adams has no solution.

It’s no surprise advocates worry Adams is dragging NYC “back to the Giuliani era,” where Mayor Rudy Giuliani notoriously criminalized sleeping on the street and cut spending for housing services.

Today, Black people have the highest rate of houselessness in NYC – and nationwide. The government already undercounts the unhoused population by millions. And while politicians like Adams claim to care about safety, unhoused people are also targets of violence from civilians AND police.

The reality is this: Adams and other authorities don’t care about people needing shelter. They’re willfully failing to meet the needs of all of us. And instead of finding solutions, they’re using unhoused people as a scapegoat, hoping to make them disappear!

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