Mayor slams protests over NYC homeless shelters: ‘This is not the deep South’

NEW YORK CITY (PIX11) – Mayor Eric Adams took aim at people protesting homeless shelters for single adult men Monday morning, telling New Yorkers it’s “not the deep South.”

The comment came nearly two weeks after a high-profile protest in Bensonhurst against a shelter that would be the first of its kind in the neighborhood, according to city officials. Adams did not specifically reference the protest in Bensonhurst.

“Every community we go to, we hear the same thing, we will take any group but single, adult Black men,” Adams said. “Look at all the protests. Protests are not for children and family shelters, protests are not for single adult women.”

Other communities have previously opposed migrant shelters, including a shelter in Clinton Hill that experienced two nearby shootings as well as opposition to housing migrants at a school in Williamsburg. 

“Everywhere I go people tell me housing is a right… but as soon as we put a brick down in the neighborhood they say wait a minute not here,” Adams said Monday. “Everyone is telling us no, no, no."

Adams said some neighborhoods bear a higher burden than others when it comes to shelter space.

“This is not the deep South in 1950, Jim Crowism can’t exist in our city,” Adams said. “Every part of the city must have an obligation to build more housing.”

A 2023 report from New York City Comptroller Brad Lander found some neighborhoods have 100 times as many shelter beds as others.

The majority of neighborhoods with no shelters were predominantly white, Lander's report found. 

“As we tackle issues from housing affordability to climate change while building a compassionate and inclusive city, the City’s siting decisions cannot be driven by not-in-my-backyard politics and path-of-least-resistance planning,” Lander said at the time of the report.