Deborah Berkman testifies on safety transfers and shelter oversight
Berkman, NYLAG, says the city fails to oversee shelters and safety transfers often require legal intervention. She supports Intro 99 to keep families near their communities and schools.
Thank you.
Chair Hudson and staff, good afternoon, and thank you for the opportunity to testify.
My name is Deb Berkman, and I am the director of the Shelter and Economic Stability Project at New York Legal Assistance Group, or NILAG.
At NILAG, we represent New Yorkers who are trying to access shelter, who are living in shelter, and who are navigating public benefit systems.
Through that work, I hear every day from people experiencing homelessness about what it is actually like to live in our shelter system.
Based on our experience, one of the biggest barriers to safety and shelter is the city's failure to adequately oversee the shelter system.
Too often, there's no meaningful way to address unsafe conditions, staff misconduct, theft, harassment, or retaliation.
And as a result, people are forced to endure unsafe situations with little hope that anyone will intervene or they will be forced into the street.
But a particularly significant problem is the difficulty to our clients of obtaining what was called a safety transfer.
And I know Commissioner Dalton testified a little bit about this.
When a placement becomes unsafe, if someone experiences threats, harassment, theft, violence, or other dangerous conditions in shelter, they should be able to move to a safer placement, but too often they can't.
In practice, many safety transfers are only approved after legal intervention, but even we encounter opposition when we're advocating for our clients for a safety transfer.
And many of our clients have been forced into street homelessness rather than remain in shelter where they're just not safe.
Just as importantly, there doesn't seem to be an effective process for investigating and adjudicating complaints of safety issues in shelters.
The city must provide stronger oversight and meaningful accountability for shelter providers.
And without that accountability, the unsafe conditions and mistreatment will continue.
We strongly support Intro 99.
Families should be housed as close as possible to the homes and communities from which they were displaced.
And children should be able to stay connected to their school support system and medical providers.
We have written testimony as well, which we will submit, but thank you very much for your time and your attention to these matters.