STATEN ISLAND, N.Y. — Despite a Staten Island Supreme Court judge’s ruling that migrants currently being housed in a shelter at the former St. John Villa Academy must vacate the premises, the weeks-long fight over the use of the former school building is far from over.
A representative from City Hall told the Staten Island Advance/SILive.com that the administration plans to immediately appeal the preliminary injunction granted by Judge Wayne Ozzi on Tuesday that barred the site from being used to house migrants.
“While not a single family with children has been forced to sleep on the streets in New York City, this ruling jeopardizes our ability to continue providing shelter at that scale. We are taking steps to immediately appeal this ruling, which we believe is incorrect in key respects and which threatens to disrupt efforts to manage this national humanitarian crisis,” said City Hall spokesperson Kayla Mamelak.
“Instances like this underscore the urgent need for a broader state and national solution, as we’ve emphasized repeatedly,” Mamelak added.
Shortly after the ruling was announced, many of the borough’s elected officials gathered outside the shelter to commend Ozzi’s decision, imploring the city not to appeal, though the administration has since announced its intention to do so.
Instead of appealing the decision, local elected officials said the administration should use it as supporting evidence in another case that will be heard Tuesday regarding the city’s attempt to make changes to the longstanding right to shelter mandate.
“I’m here to say to the administration and to the mayor and to the lawyers that are speaking on his behalf, don’t appeal today’s decision, use it. Use it to help us finally crawl out of this hole and end our open-ended engagement with this migrant crisis,” said Councilman David Carr (R-Mid-Island). “This is an opportunity to turn the corner, turn the page, and get the city out of this crisis, and start…
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