Immigrants will be housed at a gym in a Brooklyn public elementary school, city officials said Friday as community members complained they’d not been consulted before the decision.
The immigrants — among hundreds arriving in the city every day — were expected to be moved to PS 188 in Coney Island starting as soon as Friday evening, said an official of Mayor Adams’ administration.
City officials say school programming “will not be impacted” and that there will be security on site.
By early Friday evening, the gym had not yet been equipped to take in residents.
The city plans to only house adult migrants at the gym, in a school that serves children from pre-kindergarten through fifth grade, the official said.
But the official couldn’t rule out that children will also end up at the school, since immigrants are arriving in the city at such a rapid pace, officials are having a hard time keeping track of them.
“We have no idea who’s coming in any more,” the official said.
A statement Friday from Brooklyn Community Board 13 complained that its staff had been “struggling all day” to get information about the city’s plans to use the PS 188 gym.
The board’s statement said it would like to know “how many people will be housed there, for what length of time, whether the individuals have been screened for communicable diseases, what measures are in place to provide services, etc.”
City Council Member Justin Brannan (D-Brooklyn), a member of the council’s Public Safety Committee who represents a nearby council district, disputed that adults will be the only people housed at the gym.
“The city is staging the gymnasium building at PS 188 with the intent to house children with families,” Brannan said.
“This is a humanitarian crisis, and we must move fast and be flexible in accommodating asylees,” Brannan said. “But local representatives and, most importantly, our communities and the asylees themselves deserve notice, clear information, and a plan.
“I do not believe housing children and families in an active public school gymnasium is the solution,” Brannan said.
Legal Aid Society lawyers have maintained that housing children in congregate settings like gyms violates state law enacted to prevent sexual abuse of children.
The city has opened more than 130 emergency housing sites and eight “large-scale humanitarian relief centers,” said Fabian Levy, a spokesman for Mayor Adams.
Over the last week, the city has received 4,200 asylum seekers.
“We are opening emergency shelters and respite centers daily, but we are out of space,” Levy said — adding that the city will “communicate with local elected officials as we open more emergency sites.”