New York City is preparing to spend more than $1 billion on hotel room rentals for migrants over the next three years, marking the latest challenge for the city in its struggle to accommodate the thousands of migrants arriving each week.
The city's new revised contract with hotels will cost around $1.365 billion over the next three years and only cover rental fees for more than 100 hotels that have been converted into migrant shelters, the New York Post reported. It does not include the other amenities and services the city must provide for the individuals who found their way to the city after crossing the southern border.
Migrants have been sleeping in the bar area of one hotel that's been overcrowded amid the surge.
Polling from last month found that 82 percent of New Yorkers believe the recent migrant influxes are a "serious" problem, and 54 percent said it is "very serious."
New York governor Kathy Hochul (D.) recently said that migrants should go somewhere other than New York if they come to the United States.
New York has to "message properly that we're at our limit," Hochul said on CNN last week. "If you're going to leave your country, go somewhere else."
Mayor Eric Adams (D.) said earlier this month the migrant crisis will "destroy" the city.