SHAMS DABARON AKA "DA HOMELESS HERO" RESPONDS TO COURT'S PAUSE OF TRANSFERS

NEW YORK, NY (08/05/2021) (readMedia)-- This afternoon, a court ruled that all transfers from temporary hotel shelters to congregate homeless shelters must be paused until August 19, pending a more detailed plan from the city. In response, Shams DaBaron aka Da Homeless Hero, formerly homeless activist and finalist for The David Prize for his advocacy on behalf of homeless New Yorkers, issued the following statement:

"Thank you to Legal Aid and all of the advocates who are fighting to stop the transfers. The two week stay we just won will save lives. Now, we need to fight to make sure nobody ever has to go back to those congregate death traps. It's not just about disabled folks - everybody deserves to be kept safe from the Delta variant. The city must use this pause to start listening to the homeless New Yorkers whose lives are at stake, and the health professionals warning them that these transfers are death sentences. We need to stop the transfers for good."

BACKGROUND

Dr. Mary Bassett (Mayor de Blasio's health commissioner from 2014-2018), Dr. Oxiris Barbot (de Blasio's health commissioner from 2018-2020), NYSNA, Doctors Council SEIU, and 457 healthcare workers and organizations sent a letter to the city demanding the mayor and Health Commissioner Chokshi stop the transfers before they spur another deadly COVID outbreak. On August 3, per DHS, 17 individuals in the shelter system had positive COVID-19 cases. This number is sure to grow exponentially, as social distancing is virtually impossible in congregate shelters. People sleep 30-50 to a room in beds 3 feet apart, and as of July 1, DHS had only vaccinated 21.5% of those in the shelter system. The city is planning to move 8,000 New Yorkers into crowded congregate settings while the Delta variant, which is much more contagious than the previous COVID strains that originally spurred the moves to hotels, surges across the city. This move doesn't only endanger shelter residents - shelter staff is also now at an increased risk.

Bassett, Barbot, NYSNA, Doctors Council SEIU, New York Doctors Coalition, and more write:

"Repopulating shelters now constitutes an unwarranted return to an inadequate, overburdened system that directly threatens the health of thousands of New Yorkers and, indirectly, that of the entire city. The dangers of this decision were recognized in a recent federal ruling, which stated that the city must investigate reasonable accommodations for individuals with disabilities prior to relocation. This requirement is a bare minimum. If we are to continue to protect the health of the most vulnerable among us and prevent another resurgence of the virus, we must not move forward with the plan to relocate individuals into congregate shelter and, indeed, must reverse the relocations that have already taken place"

The full text of the letter is attached.