Advocates for the homeless said there are around 460 homeless shelters across New York City, and the Mamdani administration is in the process of building a new homeless shelter in Richmond Hill.
Construction has already started and no further approvals are needed for the city to open the shelter, but still, some residents are pushing back in opposition.
“It’s gonna be a disaster,” said Abdullah Chaudhry.
Chaudhry is talking about a planned homeless shelter directly across the street from his father’s law office. The site in Richmond Hill at 118th Street and Jamaica Avenue is blocks away from P.S. 51, P.S. 56, and a new elementary school, which is still under construction.
“I’m actually very worried,” he said. “There’s families that live here, young children, and it’s difficult to see where we’re headed.”
A few doors down from the law office is the Classic Diner. Co-owner Kosta Fessaras worries the homeless shelter may deter diners.
The city said it notified the community about the location in March. It’s expected to house 127 adult men.
“Foot traffic is going to be affected, and we depend on that. Safety for my employees, safety for our customers,” Fessaras said. “We will not survive this, and we are very worried about that. We have been here for 13 years, put our sweat and our time away from our families to build this.”
The Department of Social Services told NY1 this is the first homeless shelter in this council district and one of the top goals of the Mamdani administration is to make sure shelters are spread fairly across the boroughs.
In a statement, a spokesperson said in part: “As we continue to transform the shelter system — closing substandard sites and opening new, high-quality facilities across the five boroughs — we are squarely focused on upholding our equitable siting goals to ensure that every community has the safety net resources to support their neighbors in need and comply with the city’s legal and moral obligation to provide shelter to anyone in need.”
Dave Giffen, the executive director for the nonprofit Coalition for the Homeless, believes the pushback against the shelter is unwarranted because, he said, every neighborhood in the city needs to be part of the solution.
“There is value in having another homeless shelter going up especially in a community that doesn’t have one,” said Giffen.
“We just don’t need this in this neighborhood,” said Rossella Muto, owner of Alfie’s Pizza.
Muto’s father opened Alfie’s Pizza more than 50 years ago. But she worries a homeless shelter would attract more homeless people to the neighborhood.
“It’s just a reoccurring issue every day, that they come at all times of day, and they ask for food, they ask for money, try to tell these people come back later on in the day when I close, and I’ll give you whatever food I have left, I don’t have a problem with it because that’s what my dad used to do,” said Muto.
Third-generation Richmond Hill resident Regina Santoro has been on the local community board, Community Board 9, for more than 25 years, and doesn’t want the shelter.
“People let their kids walk to the library, people let their kids walk to the school once they’re old enough, and when you have 127 guys that are out of the shelter at 7:30 in the morning, meandering the streets of Richmond Hill with nothing to do — problems do come about,” she said.
The city said there would be around-the-clock security at and around the facility, as well as security cameras throughout the building and across the shelter grounds.
Meanwhile Chaudhry, whose father’s business has been in the neighborhood since the 1990s, fears the homeless shelter will change the feel of the area.
“I deeply care for this community; I don’t like where it’s headed,” he said.
The Department of Social Services said it plans to open this homeless shelter in Richmond Hill in the summer of 2027. The local Community Board said it’s been trying to arrange a public hearing with officials, but no date has been set yet.