Roosevelt Hotel shelter in Midtown, symbol of NYC's migrant crisis, set to close
Feb. 24, 2025, 10:38 a.m.
The site opened in May 2023, during the height of the asylum-seeker crisis, when the city received an average of 4,000 new arrivals each week.
Mayor Eric Adams announced on Monday that the city will close the migrant shelter and arrival center at the Roosevelt Hotel in Midtown by June.
The hotel is where the vast majority of migrants have applied for shelter. More than 173,000 of the 232,000 migrants who have stayed in city shelters since the spring of 2022 passed through the hotel.
City officials opened the site, which some called the “new Ellis Island,” in May 2023, when the city received an average of 4,000 migrants seeking shelter each week. At the hotel, newly arrived migrants apply for shelter, get screened for illnesses, or receive a train or plane ticket to go elsewhere.
The site became a viral symbol of the city’s migrant influx in the summer of 2023, when migrants crowded outside the hotel intake center. Many slept two and three deep on the sidewalk while waiting for a shelter bed.
“Today marks another milestone in demonstrating the immense progress we have achieved in turning the corner on an unprecedented international humanitarian effort,” Adams said in a statement Monday. “The Roosevelt Hotel has been key in allowing us to effectively manage our operations.”
The site was housing 2,852 migrants as of last week, according to City Hall spokesperson Liz Garcia.
Moving forward, the intake center and other services provided at the hotel “will be integrated into other areas of the system,” a City Hall press release stated.
City Hall has so far closed 36 shelters in recent months. Officials are on track to close a total of 53, including the Roosevelt Hotel, by June.
The Roosevelt Hotel is among nine of 10 large migrant shelters housing over 1,000 people that the Adams administration has recently announced will close in the coming months.
An additional 2,200-bed migrant shelter for men also recently opened in the South Bronx, to accommodate those displaced from other shuttered sites.
The announcement of the Roosevelt Hotel site closure comes as fewer migrants arrive and seek shelter in New York City.
The city’s migrant shelter census has been declining for over seven months, according to Garcia, the City Hall spokesperson. Currently, an average of 350 migrants per week apply for shelter in the city, Adams said.
This article was updated with additional information.
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