Mayor Eric Adams is leaving untold tens of millions of dollars in reimbursements on the desk whereas pinning his hopes on a $1 billion federal grant to pay for the staggering price of coping with town’s migrant disaster.
High Metropolis Corridor officers revealed Hizzoner’s technique throughout a Tuesday finances briefing at which they mentioned town in August requested for — and later acquired — $4.8 million from the Federal Emergency Administration Company.
However Adams determined to not file further reimbursement requests with FEMA as a result of he’s now looking for a particular, $1 billion grant from the company, the officers mentioned.
That software, nonetheless, continues to be being drafted, regardless of the huge spending on 58 emergency shelters to accommodate greater than 17,900 of the 24,600-plus migrants who’ve flooded into the Huge Apple.
Adams’ plan surfaced simply sooner or later after Adams mentioned each President Biden and Gov. Kathy Hochul had been so consumed by “marketing campaign season” forward of the Nov. 8 midterm elections that “nobody needed to speak about” serving to decide up the tab.
Officers have refused to say how a lot cash has been spent up to now to deal with the inflow, together with on Adams’ ill-fated, controversial tent metropolis on Randall’s Island.
It operated beneath capability for lower than a month earlier than Adams abruptly determined final week to shutter it and transfer about 300 migrants residents to the Watson Resort in Midtown Manhattan, which town has rented to be used as a processing facility.
An earlier try to open the tent metropolis at Orchard Seaside in The Bronx was scrapped shortly earlier than completion as a result of fears of flooding there.
Metropolis Corridor has solely acknowledged $650,000 in construction-related bills.
However a Sunday report from the Unbiased Funds Workplace pegged the fee of the Randall’s Island tent metropolis and ancillary migrant companies at about $16 million.
On Friday, Comptroller Brad Lander despatched Metropolis Corridor a letter demanding additional particulars, prompting Adams to final out at him throughout an unrelated information convention on Monday.
“We’re not going to cover the price of something,” Adams mentioned.
That assertion prompted Lander — who has referred to as the tent metropolis venture a “debacle” — to break right into a broad grin and chuckle loudly throughout a subsequent look on NY1’s “Inside Metropolis Corridor.”
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