The federal has promised to carve out $156 million for New York City to handle the illegal immigration crisis, but only a fraction of that amount was made available because of “stringent” guidelines, the city’s chief budget officer said.
The number was revealed by Jacques Jiha, the director of the mayor’s office of management and budget, as he testified on Monday during a finance hearing that kicked off the months-long process to negotiate a budget deal for the upcoming fiscal year.
During the hearing, Mr. Jiha called the expense generated by caring for illegal immigrants “staggering,” stressing that it pushed Fiscal Year 2024 “far out of balance” and drove the Fiscal Year 2025 budget gap “to a very high level.”
He testified that, in response to that, Mayor Eric Adams has given his administration four “clear directives” to stabilize the city’s finances: no raising property taxes, no layoffs of city employees, minimize disruptions to city services, and “do not expect the federal cavalry to ride to the rescue.”
“The [federal] commitment was about $156 million,” Mr. Jiha told members of the City Council. We have so far collected $49 million.”
“The requirements are so stringent, that it is very difficult for us to do so, but we’re working the collect the remaining $107 million,” he added without elaborating on the said requirements.
The FEMA program works as a reimbursement grant, meaning that municipalities can apply for money to cover the costs that have already been incurred. Expenses eligible for reimbursement under the program include those related to providing shelter, food, transportation, medical care, and other services to support recently arrived illegal immigrants.
The promised $156 million FEMA money may seem like a drop in the bucket when compared to the price tag of feeding and sheltering the 175,000 new arrivals from the southern border since the spring of 2022.
According to Mr. Jiha, the city has already spent more than $2 billion caring for those individuals and will spend over $4 billion this fiscal year, which ends in July.
“We need more help from the state and federal government to cover these expenses,” Mr. Jiha told the city’s lawmakers on Monday, reiterating calls from his boss for Washington and Albany to send more money.
When asked whether New York Gov. Kathy Hochul is doing enough to ease the city’s financial burden, Jiha responded with a clear “No.”
“We should be getting at a minimum a 50-50 share,” he said, referring to Mr. Adams’s demand that the state would shoulder at least 50 percent of the city’s illegal immigrant costs. Meanwhile, Gov. Hochul’s proposed budget plan sets aside about $2.4 billion in aid for illegal immigrants for the city for Fiscal Year 2025, falling short of the mayor’s demand.
During the hearing, Mr. Jiha also urged the City Council to reconsider the effort to remove a policy limiting shelter stays for newly arrived individuals or families. Those rules, he argued, are a “very, very, very critical” strategy to help reduce the flow of illegal immigrants into the city.
The city’s shelters are imposing 30-day and 60-day limits on single persons and families, respectively, in an attempt to drive down costs. This policy is now being challenged by a City Council bill that would ban any city agency from imposing a shelter stay limit on anyone who is homeless.
“It is very critical that we bring down the census,” Mr. Jiha said. “The 30-day, 60-day policies are part of that entire package of bringing down the census.”
