Dear John,
New York City is stronger because of immigrants. Throughout history, we have welcomed families fleeing violence, war, and poverty, giving them the chance to thrive and contribute to our city.
Over the past year, the City has spent tremendous resources, energy, and dollars helping asylum seekers get into shelters. But we have spent almost nothing helping folks get out of shelters and into permanent housing, where they can start building their lives.
Why are legal services so important? Of the vast majority of asylum seekers in our shelter system, almost none of them have filed the complex paperwork which they need to receive a work authorization.
It’s past time that changed. New York City needs, at the very least, $70 million for outreach, pro se clinics, direct legal representation, and case management. Asylum seekers need these services to file their asylum applications, get their work authorization, and get jobs to get on their feet.
This was our message at a rally we hosted right outside City Hall, with Council Member Shahana Hanif, Brooklyn Borough President Antonio Reynoso, and coalition partners including WIN, Make the Road, New York Immigration Coalition (NYIC), and Immigrant Arc.
Asylum seekers have one year from their date of arrival in this country to file their asylum application. Right now it is taking our backlogged immigration system years to process these applications, but after six months, you can file for permission to work legally while you go through the process.
If you don't file that application, you will go out of status and become undocumented. And in many cases, the information asylum seekers get about how to navigate this process is unclear.
Funding these types of legal services will save our city money in the long run. It is expensive to provide shelter. The more that we can do to help get families out of emergency shelters and into good jobs, the better off they will be, and the better off New York City will be.
Of course, let's be clear: the obligation to help people seek asylum safely is a federal obligation under international law. It is totally unacceptable that the federal government is not reimbursing the money that New York City spends on shelter.
The federal government should also reduce the amount of time it takes for asylum seekers to be eligible for work authorization. People should immediately be able to work after filing their asylum applications—not forced to wait six months.
New Yorkers can and will keep pushing for that to happen. But in the meantime, New York City cannot wait for the federal government to provide the outreach and the legal representation that folks need to file those applications to get work authorization and to be able to move out of emergency shelters.
We can start doing that ambitiously with an all hands effort but the City has to put in the resources and the coordination to make it happen.
We need to use our voices right now to put pressure on City Hall to fund legal services.
By June 30, the day the City budget is due, a decision on additional funding for legal services will be made. The budget that gets adopted is going to have the $70 million and an all-hands effort—or it's not.
Are we going to be loud enough to make sure City Hall provides $70 million for legal assistance for asylum seekers? I believe we can.
In solidarity,
Brad
