During his tenure as mayor of New York City, “street homelessness decreased by 28 percent.”
The Bergen Street shelter was one of the first announced under "Turning the Tide on Homelessness," Mayor Bill de Blasio’s ambitious, five-year plan to revamp the way New York’s shelter system operates. With a long-term goal of reducing the homeless population by 2,500 people (or about four percent of the then-total of 60,000), the plan also aims to end the use of commercial hotels for shelter; shutter all of the city’s shelter units in privately-owned, often far-flung apartments called cluster sites; and replace them with 90 new, purpose-built shelters with on-site supportive services. The idea, the mayor argued, was only fair; get rid of an ad-hoc network of shelter units in favor of high-quality facilities distributed more equitably throughout the boroughs. [...] Banks acknowledges the "problem of affordability" is the backdrop for homelessness in New York, and many other large cities. But he contends homeless prevention efforts, addressing street homelessness, and rehousing with rental assistance and social service programs "are all transforming the system" in the city. During the de Blasio administration, evictions are down 27 percent, which he attributes to a boost in funding for legal help for tenants, and the city says it has helped 95,000 people stay in their homes through new rental assistance programs.