Mayor Eric Adams:
I don’t know if you guys understand what’s going on right now.
There’s no housing, folks. There’s no housing.
Are you homeless? Do you have a home?
Who’s going to go to the 50,000 New York City residents that I have in homeless shelters walking around with FHEPS vouchers and don’t have a place to stay?
I will never commit to saying,
“I’m not going to build on every available piece of real estate I have to put NYC in a home.”
… I’m not going to give up on that.
I have a homeless crisis right now in this city, and it is a luxury to say, “Eric, don’t build housing somewhere.” That’s the luxury I don’t have. I got to get New Yorkers in housing.
They don’t have that luxury. I’m building housing wherever I can.”
Lack of affordable housing:
-Historic low vacancy at 1.41% for rental housing in NYC.
-Applications for affordable senior housing units are over 520,000 growing daily.
Homelessness
– 140,134 homeless New Yorkers in 2024 (170% children, 196% Families)
– the number of single adults ages 65 and older in the city’s main shelter system more than doubled from 2014 to 2022. Nearly 3 times as quickly as the number of younger single adults in shelters.
December: about 1,700 people older than 65 in single-adult shelters. The share of residents in those shelters who were 65+ increased (8% from 5%).
Elder Poverty
One in every four older adults in the Bronx is living in poverty (highest rate in NYS). The poverty rate for older adults Brooklyn (20.9%). Manhattan (16.3%). Staten Island increased by 63%. – AARP
Elder Finances
Many older New Yorkers live on fixed incomes and struggle to make ends meet. 65% of older New Yorkers surveyed live on less than $15,000 a year, and 32% don’t receive social security.
Older Women
Women over the age of 65 are 80% more likely than men to be impoverished.
Sources:
Ben Max Podcast City of Yes for Housing Opportunity’ Enters the Home Stretch, with Dan Garodnick
LiveOn NY How Long Do We Have to Wait?
NYTimes: Why More Older New Yorkers Are Ending Up in Homeless Shelters
AARP AARP NY on State of City: 36%+ Growth in NYC’s Older Adult Population Means More Must Be Done
NYState Comptroller DiNapoli New Yorkers in Need.