NEW YORK (1010 WINS) — Mayor Eric Adams signed an executive order Friday morning eliminating a longstanding rule that required homeless New Yorkers to stay in a shelter for 90 days before they became eligible for CityFHEPS housing vouchers.
Adams opted into changing the rule with an executive order instead of signing a legislation package passed by the City Council last month that would eliminate the 90-day requirement and expand the voucher program to tenants at risk of eviction.
Adams claimed the executive order, which suspends the rule for 60 days, is an attempt to speed up the process of nixing the rule while the administration works on a permanent change.
He could have signed the legislation package to achieve the same effect, but that would also involve approving bills he criticized in the past as too costly and likely to make vouchers harder to access for people who are already homeless.
“Removing this rule will help even more people into permanent housing as quickly as possible and will do something without overburdening taxpayers,” said Adams at the signing.
Council Speaker Adrienne Adams argued keeping people in homes is as valuable as housing people without them when working to combat homelessness. She also said it would be more costly to continue to rely on shelters than to expand the voucher system.
"We know uninterrupted growth and homelessness would cost the city a whole lot more," she said. "The numbers are clear that an individual or family living in a homeless shelter costs the city much more than providing them a voucher that pays for part of their rent in an apartment.”
All the bills in the package passed by a vote of 41 to seven, a large enough margin to override a veto from the mayor.
At the signing, Adams refused to say whether he intends to veto the package, but advocates for the legislation speculated the executive order could serve as a compromise aimed at picking off Council members whose main priority is the elimination of the 90-day rule and would be willing to ditch voucher expansion.
If Adams doesn’t sign or veto the legislation by the end of the month, the bills will automatically become law.
In a statement to City & State NY, Diana Ayala, a City Council member who sponsored one of the bills in the package, expressed confidence the Council could override a veto even with the executive order.
“I don’t think that this executive order does anything to pick off votes,” Ayala said. “We still maintain a good hold of our majority to override a veto, if in fact that happened.”
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