Support for NYC Asylum Seekers

We would like to give an update on RHMA’s work with asylum seekers in NYC, which began in January 2023 when the Brooklyn Cruise Terminal was converted to a HERCC shelter for 2 months.  We began organizing around migrant support again this October, when we learned about a new family shelter here in Red Hook at the Brooklyn Motor Inn.  These community members are among the 120,000+ migrants who have arrived in the last 16 months and 60,000 migrants currently in the NYC shelter system. Despite NYC’s status as a sanctuary city with right to shelter, 3,000 have been told their time is up.

As reported by our friends at Documented, the mayor’s chief of staff argues that “this is a national crisis that New York City should not be carrying on our backs”; we do not agree.  They are here, they need support, and we're all in this together. At our Free Store Thanksgiving weekend, 2023, we met 30 asylum seekers who traveled to Red Hook from shelters all over the city for supplies.  We have become connected to many more at this point and are in direct communication with them through the RHMA Migrant Support WhatsApp community.  

This virtual community serves as a communication and info-sharing system with language and dialect-based groups, moderated by volunteers (both NYC residents and asylum seekers), can be used to express need, and then RHMA project teams hustle to meet that need.  This is aligned with Red Hook Mutual Aid’s original goals and mission: a phone line to increase access to information and aid through inclusive digital and linguistic practices.

We’d also like to share some other needs and ways the community can support.

We’re very pleased to be applying what we learned from our Brooklyn Cruise Terminal project to this new iteration of migrant support.  Thanks to all for the donations and people power that have been provided thus far.