Creedmoor Center Parking Lot To Shelter Up To 1,000 Asylum Seekers

QUEENS — Mayor Eric Adams officially announced a new shelter for asylum seekers in Queens following opposition from lawmakers to house migrants in an area that lacks public transportation and other services.

The new shelter in the parking lot adjacent to Creedmoor Psychiatric Center will house up to 1,000 single adult men seeking asylum, Adams said Wednesday.

Last week, Queens lawmakers and residents urged city officials to reconsider its plan to place the tent shelter in Bellrose amid the lack of essential services.

"We stand together, as one voice, to say Creedmoor is not the place to set up tents with 1,000 beds for asylum seekers," said Senator Toby Ann Stavisky. "To drop off huge numbers of people at a site that has no infrastructure or services such as transportation, air conditioning, security, sanitation, laundry, showers or bathrooms is inhumane."

Officials said the state will reimburse the city for the costs of the site including construction, maintenance, and staffing.

The city has opened over 190 emergency shelters, including 12 other large-scale humanitarian relief centers, with a 13th relief center set to open in the coming weeks. There are currently more than 56,200 asylum seekers under the city's care, officials said.

In February, community members were invited to a session to discuss the future of the underutilized space across the Park Island Parkway. The event, organized by the state-run Empire State Development, intended to draw in community input on the plans for the 55 acres of the campus.

But as the influx of asylum seekers in the city continues to increase, the Adams administration has scrambled to set up spaces to shelter families.

The peak patient population reached its peak in the 1950s, and the process of deinstitutionalization at Creedmoor began in the 1960s and accelerated in the 1980s.

The center is within a 15-minute walk to Alley Pond Park and a 15-minute drive to the John F. Kennedy Airport and LaGuardia Airport.