Council Member Ariola on homeless services spending and corruption concerns

Thank you, Chair, and very nice to meet you, Commissioner, first time.

And I think DOI's job is very important, and also the money cities spend on DOI should be able to recoup from corruptions.

For New York City has been, I see the report before, New York City spent roughly 81K per person on homeless services last year.

And are you guys doing any investigation on this issue?

It really needs that money.

And I do see some developer.

They are trying to make money from most vulnerable community.

There's a developer, a lobbyist personally come to me and saying, well, we give so-and-so

this much of money.

I see there's corruption.

And a lot of people in New York City have a question mark in their head.

It's why the city spent so much money on every single homeless person.

We want to help a homeless person, but why those...

Has such $81,000 a year, it's a median income,

house family income a year.

So it doesn't make sense to most of people how much the city spend the money, how do they spend the money, is there any corruption there, is those homeless people really get helped.

I just want to get your attention on this issue because it's a lot of

people's concern.

Thank you for raising that.

It's certainly an area where historically we have investigated and put resources to and issued public reports including on

some of the issues surrounding shelters and issued recommendations on how to improve in those areas.

But it's certainly something we've looked at and will continue to look at.

Thank you.

And the public really needs to trust your work because it's not your appointment.

It's not only from the mayor.

It's also public trust.

Absolutely.

Thank you.

Okay, great.