A Path to Ending Street Homelessness in New York City
As Mayor, I will end street homelessness in my first term.
Every night that homeless people are sleeping in our parks, streets and subways is a stark reminder of the failure of our city government – to help people who are suffering and to help New Yorkers feel safer and more secure.
Every Mayor of this city has promised to address this issue, but despite our city spending $4 billion last year under Eric Adams, it’s only gotten worse.
Our Homeless Bill of Rights, while well intentioned, has created dangerous consequences with its ‘right to sleep outside’ provision. It’s wrecked the quality of life for all New Yorkers, and must be repealed by the city council. The good news is that New York City provides shelter to 90% of its unhoused population. What we’re talking about today is addressing that last 10% – a little over 4,000 people.
Many of them are choosing to sleep outside – some because they are suffering from mental illness or addiction and are incapable of caring for themselves, others because of the deplorable conditions in some shelters. Just this winter, an unidentified man died while sleeping outside in Tribeca during a particularly cold night. This cannot and should not happen.
I’m the only candidate in this race willing to speak hard truths about the street homelessness epidemic: that it’s impossible to end unless we forbid it. But we must lead with compassion to help, not criminalize, the street homeless.
When I take office a year from now, I will give the city government 10 months – until November 2026 – to implement a plan to help the 4,000 New Yorkers sleeping on our streets. I’m a manager, and what our City needs is not just a comprehensive plan to get homeless New Yorkers into shelters and stable housing, but a leader to provide administrative oversight, and root out the systemic corruption, fraud and waste that is plaguing our shelter system.
Homelessness isn’t a crime—it’s a tragedy. The real crime is how Eric Adams and our city have failed the thousands of New Yorkers living on the streets. They need our help, and once elected, my administration will provide it.
As Mayor, I will:
Expand the capacity of short-term drop-in centers. No one in this city should go to sleep without a safe environment and roof over their head.
Introduce a voucher program for the homeless that will empower them to choose the drop-in center or shelter that's best for them. This will result in a better experience for the homeless, faster reimbursement for the nonprofit organizations running the system, reward the best operators so they can expand, and eliminate the worst.
Invest in improving the quality of shelters, many of which are so unsafe that people experiencing homelessness are choosing to be on the streets.
Impose penalties on shelter providers who violate their contracts with the city, rooting out the systemic mismanagement and corruption we’ve seen in this system.
Conduct a comprehensive audit of our five municipal shelter systems, and implement a plan to provide greater data transparency and connectivity between agencies overseeing our shelter system.
Invest in, expand, and massively improve our mental health system. One idea is to create a network of city-wide walk-in mental health clinics, similar to how we provide CityMD today for physical care.
Advocate that the New York State Assembly pass a law banning homeless camping and sleeping outside, similar to what California, Oregon, and Florida have done to reorient our homeless population to a new reality in which sleeping outside is unacceptable
Work in partnership with the state to expand its facilities for long-term psychiatric care. The state has been closing them for decades, with 72% of the reduction since 2000 occurring in New York City. Many of those kicked out have ended up on our streets.
The best thing we can do to reduce homelessness – and ease the affordability crisis that’s plaguing all New Yorkers – is build a lot more housing. With its dense population, 1.4% vacancy rate and high rents, real estate developers would love to invest in building new housing and renovating our existing housing stock, but onerous zoning restrictions and regulations have made it almost impossible. The City of Yes legislation that passed recently is a step in the right direction, but 80,000 new homes in the next 15 years is at best 10% of what we need. When I’m elected, I will have a mandate and will fight for the other 90%.
