New York City is shutting down a key migrant welcome center inside the Port Authority bus terminal, and rerouting new arrivals to a city-established intake operation at The Roosevelt Hotel.
But leaders of volunteer groups who have assisted thousands over the last nine months say they are being cut out of the process.
“They’re going to have their way, which is basically creating a welcome center where we’re not welcome,” said Power Malu, one of the leaders of Artists Athletes Activists, which has coordinated transportation, food and shelter for migrants at the bus depot and the city’s major airports.
The Port Authority welcome center emerged as a crucial hub for thousands of newly arriving immigrants who have made their way to the five boroughs after crossing the southern U.S. border — at times, after being bused to the city by Republican governors. Aid workers there stepped in to assist the migrants with food, medical care, guidance and legal assistance, funded by donations and filling gaps in the city’s fraying social safety net.
Leaders of those same groups said they will continue serving newly-arriving migrants, but without a central hub, for now. Malu said his group will offer a “mobile help desk” as they search for a new location.
But Malu blasted the city’s decision to exclude the volunteers who have been serving migrants for more than a year, often in the absence of city agencies.
“There’s no way that you can justify shutting down operations here, and opening another so-called ‘welcome center’ and not welcoming the people that have really been putting themselves on the line to help the migrants,” Malu said. “Since day one we’ve been picking up the pieces.”
The city will now direct migrants arriving by bus to a soon-to-open “Arrival Center” at the Roosevelt Hotel on West 45th Street, thereby “streamlining” the intake process for shelter and other services, said Adams’ spokesperson, Fabien Levy.
“We’re grateful to all of the…
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