Some New York City legal services providers are worried that the Adams administration’s recent policy of evicting thousands of migrants from homeless shelters after 30 or 60 days and making them reapply for housing could create additional challenges for those eligible for work authorization — a solution city and state officials say is critical to alleviating a crowded shelter system.
City Hall’s new requirement could mean applicants don’t have a stable address where the federal government can send them immigration paperwork, according to several nonprofit groups. Single migrant adults have to reapply for shelter after 30 days and families with children staying in shelters run by NYC Health and Hospitals are limited to 60-day stays.
“That’s sort of one of the big things that people are trying to figure out right now,” said Camille Mackler, executive director of Immigrant ARC, a network of 80 legal providers.
Migrants who have to change their addresses frequently will have to fill out extra paperwork after they apply for Temporary Protected Status, or TPS, a federal designation that allows people from certain countries who’ve lived continuously in the United States as of a certain date the ability to legally remain and work in the country for a certain period of time.
“The work permit is a physical card, and it is going to go to a physical address. And if the government does not know that physical address, they are going to send it to wherever the person used to live,” said Lauren Wyatt, a managing attorney at Catholic Charities of New York.
“We are worried about people submitting their application and then that approval or that work permit going to the former address and then they don’t have any way to get any copies of those things,” she added.
Gov. Kathy Hochul and other state Democrats who lobbied for extended TPS protections argue that while the federal program isn’t a panacea, it would help families find more stable employment and move people out of the city’s already beleaguered shelter system.
The efforts by legal service providers, state and city officials to get migrants to apply for TPS come as Mayor Eric Adams is increasingly raising the specter that people will be sleeping on the streets as the various shelter systems set up by the city run “out of room.”
Social service providers say they’ve mailed hundreds of TPS applications, launched all-day clinics and have wait-lists of hundreds more awaiting legal assistance.
The Adams administration estimates roughly 60,000 migrants are residing in city homeless shelters, and about 15,000 Venezuelans in the city’s care are eligible for the Biden administration’s expanded TPS.
It can take U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services a month to send a confirmation letter, attorneys say, and if a family applies and then moves a few weeks later, they won’t get the confirmation number that they need to submit a change of address form and continue receiving correspondence.
“It’s like a bit of a catch-22, like there’s no way to tell the government where to send the mail for that case,” Wyatt said.
City Hall and the Mayor’s Office of Immigrant Affairs didn’t immediately respond to questions about how legal providers should handle migrants forced to relocate or if it was working on creating a central repository to receive mail.
Masha Gindler, the director of the Asylum Application Help Center, said during a City Council committee hearing on Monday that migrants are being counseled on the importance of submitting a change of address form if they move.
Earlier this month when TPS applications opened, Hochul committed $38 million in state funding to ramp up outreach to eligible migrants, launch application clinics and hire more workers to process TPS applications. State officials are also finding new spaces to open satellite application centers to bolster the city-run, state-funded Asylum Application Help Center in Midtown — all while legal services providers are rushing to meet an overwhelming demand for help.
“We just started doing appointments quite literally the very next morning,” said Andrew Heinrich, executive at Project Rousseau, a legal and social services provider.
The Biden administration announced new TPS protections in late September and began taking applications on Oct. 3.
“So on Oct. 3, we sent dozens of applications that had already been completed a couple weeks prior,” Heinrich said.
U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services, which processes TPS applications, doesn’t have available data yet on the number of applications filed in New York. But in the three weeks since new Venezuelan arrivals qualified for TPS, the city scheduled 600 TPS appointments and submitted 525 applications through its Midtown help center. City officials are also assessing all migrants in its care and signing up those who are eligible for an appointment by the end of the year.
‘A sense of calm’
During an all-day legal clinic at Catholic Charities of New York’s offices in the Financial District last week, Venezuelan families arrived with their photo IDs and folders of paperwork proving they’ve lived in the U.S. continuously as of July 31 as required under TPS eligibility rules. The clinic is among a few TPS-focused clinics that took place this month, with other legal service providers planning more in the coming weeks.
Children colored and drew, while parents holding younger children entertained them with videos on their phones or snacked on free cookies as they waited their turn.
“The first thing is to look for a job, a stable job,” Andreina Gonzalez, 25, said in Spanish as she waited to apply with her family for TPS. “Obviously once you have stability here, you can rent an apartment.”
Gonzalez, who was studying to be a nurse in Venezuela, said she works sometimes two or three days a week when she finds work cleaning houses but only earns $240 a week at most, which she uses to feed her two children. Gonzalez told Gothamist she wants to save enough to move out of the Brooklyn shelter she’s lived in since January.
“If there’s a government form, it’s going to be complicated,” said Monsignor Kevin Sullivan, who leads Catholic Charities in New York. “So that’s why a little help trying to get it right the first time is important.”
The clinic completed 34 applications that Friday.
Paralegals and lawyers sat with individual families for about an hour-and-a-half, guiding them through the 15-page TPS application, the seven-page work authorization form and a fee waiver request for those who can’t afford to pay, which is the case for migrants living in shelters.
The U.S. immigration agency charges $545 per adult applicant for both TPS and work permits and $50 per child under 14 years old. Those who ask for a fee waiver can’t apply online and have to mail in their applications and also receive confirmation numbers, information to schedule a biometrics appointment and their work authorization permits by mail.
Heinrich, Project Rousseau’s lead attorney, said migrants who are able to get lawyers can get a copy of their immigration paperwork sent directly to attorneys as well as a personal address. But not all legal service providers, who are already in high demand, can afford to offer full representation. Most TPS clinics provide “pro se” representation, which means a legal assistant, paralegal or lawyer helps families fill out the applications and sometimes mails them on their behalf.
“Whereas when you’re a full-scope representation situation, you, the lawyer, are actually the one submitting it on behalf of your client,” he said. “I know that’s creating a lot of extra work because we might have to fill out a lot of change of address forms very frequently.”
Taking the pressure off
Venezuela continues to face a humanitarian, political and economic crisis, and is plagued by high levels of crime and human rights abuses. For the last decade, the country experienced hyperinflation — 234% in 2022 compared to the United States’ inflation rate of 6.5%. The United States has also imposed sanctions on Venezuela for the last decade, though the Biden administration reached a deal this month to ease some sanctions.
TPS protections are grants to foreign nationals who cannot return to their countries safely.
It’s not clear how long it’ll take U.S. immigration officials to process TPS applications and work permits, but a DHS official said the department wants to achieve a 30-day median on all applications, including TPS and work permits.
State and local leaders hope the TPS designation alleviates the burden on the city’s shelter system, which currently accommodates 60,000 migrants.
“It’s not if people will be sleeping on the streets, it’s when,” Adams said during a press briefing on Tuesday. “The visual signs of this crisis in our city, people are going to start to see it.”
Immigration advocates cautioned that TPS applications were just the beginning.
“Hopefully takes a little bit of pressure off a very, very, very pressurized asylum system,” Mackler said.
But she said families also need access to affordable housing, legal help pursuing their immigration cases, and better pipelines to connect them with ongoing work shortages in the state.
“I think focusing on work permit applications, which is the impetus for all of this, is short-sighted. It’s not going to get people out of shelters, certainly not off the streets,” she said.
“Work authorization without work doesn’t do you very much good,” Henrich said.
Hochul asked employers across the state to identify job opportunities for new arrivals with work permits. The Department of Labor said more than 670 businesses identified 32,000 jobs.
The governor also asked the Biden administration last week to send additional staff to help get migrants work permits. In September, the U.S. Department of Homeland Security sent staffers for two weeks to man a mobile clinic and help process 2,000 work permit applications.
“Plans are in place to continue this effort once the city and state identify a location that can house this effort,” a DHS spokesperson said.
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