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☆ Montauketts’ Bid for N.Y. State Recognition Is Vetoed for the 5th Time
▼ + stars: | 2023-11-17 | by ( Jay Root | More About Jay Root | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +1 min

For years, a Native American tribe from the picturesque East End of Long Island has fought bitterly for formal state recognition, a designation that was stripped away more than a century ago by court decisions that are now widely considered racist. The New York State Legislature passed a bill four times in a decade to recognize the tribe, the Montaukett Indian Nation, but the legislation was vetoed each time — the first three occasions by Andrew M. Cuomo, and the last by Gov. The bill was written differently, and there were signs that Ms. Hochul might be receptive: She recently named an enrolled member of the Chickasaw Nation, Elizabeth Rule, as the state’s deputy secretary for First Nations. But on Friday, the Montauketts learned that their battle must continue. Ms. Hochul vetoed the legislation, saying that she did not see sufficient evidence to overturn the century-old ruling that the tribe “no longer functioned as a governmental unit” in New York.

Persons: Andrew M, Cuomo, Kathy Hochul, Hochul, Elizabeth Rule Organizations: New, Gov, Chickasaw, First Nations Locations: New York

☆ From Smugglers and TikTok, Migrants Get a Message: Go to New York
▼ + stars: | 2023-10-29 | by ( Jay Root | More About Jay Root | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +1 min

1 choice of where they wanted to go was New York City,” he said. New York, home to the nation’s largest number of immigrants, has long attracted migrants who come here with connections to jobs, relatives or friends — avoiding the city’s shelter intake centers and public scrutiny. That is especially true in New York, which has recently drawn thousands of migrants with no connection to the city. Immigrant experts — as well as many migrants interviewed by The New York Times — said that an underlying reason is the city’s obligation to provide shelter to anyone who needs it. “Imagine if you have no connection to family, someone telling you, you can stay without cost to you in Manhattan, in the middle of the city,” Mr. Chishti said.

Persons: ”, Mayor Adams —, Muzaffar Chishti, The New York Times —, Mr, Chishti Organizations: Migration Policy Institute, The New York Times Locations: New York City, New York, Manhattan

☆ Mayor Adams’s Ability to Freely Spend Money on Migrants May Be Curtailed
▼ + stars: | 2023-09-18 | by ( Jay Root | More About Jay Root | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +1 min

“If we were to revoke the blanket prior approval — yes, then each of those agencies would just need to approach us for approval of any individual contract,” he said. DocGo officials did not respond on Sunday to a request for comment. The company’s contract with the city’s Department of Housing Preservation and Development, which has not been made public, calls for DocGo to provide some of its subcontracted services with no markup. For example, laundry and food service are “billed at actual cost,” with laundry charges capped at $270,000 a month, and three meals costing no more than $33 per person each day, the contract says. But DocGo is allowed to turn a tidy profit from its largest single monthly expense: the hotel rooms housing the migrants.

Persons: ”, shouldn’t, DocGo Organizations: city’s Department of Housing Preservation, DocGo, Ramada Plaza Locations: Albany, DocGo, New York City

☆ DocGo Used Unregistered Guards at Migrant Hotels, N.Y. Officials Charge
▼ + stars: | 2023-09-01 | by ( Jay Root | More About Jay Root | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +1 min

More than 50 security guards hired to protect asylum seekers bused upstate from New York City by a troubled migrant contractor are working without proper authorization, a New York Department of State investigation found. The department on Friday notified the two security companies that hired the guards — Trace Assets Protection Service L.L.C. and Wawanda Investigations and Security Company L.L.C. In some cases, it was not even clear if the guards were employees of the two security firms. “Please take notice that the continued employment of the above individuals, unless properly registered with the Department, is a continued and willful violation of law,” Ms. Clark wrote.

Persons: Whitney A, Clark, ” Ms Organizations: New York Department of State, Wawanda Investigations, Security Company, The New York Times, State, Business Development, Department Locations: New York City, New York, Erie County, Albany County

☆ New York Attorney General Will Investigate Troubled Migrant Contractor
▼ + stars: | 2023-08-21 | by ( Jay Root | More About Jay Root | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +1 min

The office of the New York State attorney general, Letitia James, has begun an investigation of the medical services provider DocGo for possible violations of state or federal laws over the treatment of migrants in its care, according to correspondence obtained by The New York Times. State investigators are looking into allegations that the company gave inaccurate information to them about employment opportunities, made “explicit or implicit threats,” and took “other actions that may jeopardize migrants’ ability to obtain asylum.”They are also looking into reports that DocGo “enrolled migrants in a healthcare plan for which they are not eligible,” the correspondence states. “We write to raise serious concerns with these reported practices, which may violate various state laws and other federal laws prohibiting discrimination and retaliation for engaging in protected activity,” the correspondence says.

Persons: Letitia James, DocGo “ Organizations: New York, DocGo, The New York Times Locations: New York State

☆ A New York City Migrant Contractor Faces Scrutiny in Sexual Assault Cases
▼ + stars: | 2023-08-20 | by ( Jay Root | More About Jay Root | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +2 min

New York City has put DocGo in charge of key tasks, including helping to manage its main intake center at a Manhattan hotel. The police in the Buffalo suburb of Cheektowaga, where some migrants relocated from New York City are staying, say they are investigating the interactions DocGo had with the victims and suspects in two alleged sexual assaults before the police arrived. In one instance, a migrant was accused of assaulting another migrant staying at one of the hotel shelters DocGo operates, and in another instance a migrant was accused of assaulting a DocGo subcontractor. DocGo’s chief executive, Anthony Capone, said the company was “devastated by what happened” and was fully cooperating with law enforcement. After the assault allegations, New York City temporarily halted migrant relocations to Buffalo, and Ms. Hochul has sent National Guard troops to the hotels where they are staying.

Persons: DocGo, Brian Gould, “ We’re, ”, Anthony Capone, Hochul, Brad Lander Organizations: New York City, National Guard Locations: York City, Manhattan, Buffalo, Cheektowaga, New York City, DocGo, Albany, New York, Rockland County

Mr. Adams said that he wanted to “localize this madness” so that people sleeping outdoors were contained to certain parts of the city, without identifying the potential locations or making it clear if people would be sleeping on sidewalks or in tents. “Our next phase of the strategy now that we have run out of room, we have to figure out how we’re going to localize the inevitable that there’s no more room indoors,” he said at an unrelated news conference on public safety. The firm, DocGo, has bused hundreds of asylum seekers upstate to cities including Albany, but many of the migrants there said that they felt misled and abandoned, and that local security guards hired by DocGo had repeatedly threatened them. DocGo, which provided Covid testing and vaccination services during the pandemic, is also involved in running the city’s “arrival center” for migrants at the Roosevelt Hotel. Over the weekend, people were seen sleeping outside the hotel with blankets, and vans were provided so that people could cool off on a hot summer day.

Persons: Adams, DocGo Organizations: New York Times Locations: Albany

☆ New York City Had a Migrant Crisis. It Hired a Covid Expert to Help.
▼ + stars: | 2023-07-30 | by ( Jay Root | More About Jay Root | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: 1 min

Lured by the promise of jobs, legal assistance and a more welcoming environment, hundreds of asylum seekers have boarded buses headed north to Albany, in search of a life better than they had found in New York City. But once they settled in the state capital, many said they realized they had been misled and all but abandoned. Instead of state identification cards, they were given dubious work eligibility and residency letters on what appeared to be a fake letterhead. At the bargain-rate motels where the migrants were relocated, many said they were treated like prisoners in halfway houses, living under written threats that they would be barred from seeking asylum if they were caught drinking or smoking. They complained that crucial mail about their asylum cases had been lost, and worried that they now faced an hourslong trip to the courts where those cases will be heard.

Locations: Albany, New York City

The abrupt maneuver caused a young woman to hit her face on a spike, leaving a gash on her forehead, Ms. Escobar recalled. She said several of the agents stood still for several minutes, until an officer wearing what looked like a soldier’s uniform offered help to the wounded woman. State officials did not immediately respond to a request for comment on the incident. “I was still in the river, about to jump over, when I saw what that agent did and was horrified,” she said of the officer in the cowboy hat. “What I am against is the use of tactics that hurt people.”The tactics by Texas appear to have intensified in the lead-up to the lifting in late May of Title 42, a public health policy imposed during the coronavirus pandemic that allowed federal agents to rapidly expel most arriving migrants.

Persons: “, Escobar, ”, Rolando Salinas Jr Locations: Mexico, Texas, Eagle

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