Four months ago today our caucus called for Erie County Executive Mark Poloncarz to do what all our neighboring counties did and declare a State of Emergency as it relates to the migrant crisis. He did not. In fact, he called the suggestion ‘morally repugnant.’ We knew there would be problems, and four months later we have been proven right. Today’s informational meeting on the migrant crisis only further proves what we’ve been saying, the Administration’s only plan is chaos, the asylum seekers stay here will last far beyond a year and will cost taxpayers dearly.
School districts are spending hundreds of thousands of dollars on educating the self-proclaimed asylum seekers children. This, after their budgets for this school year were already set. We have others arrested for alleged crimes that include rape, violence, property destruction and theft. They are being housed, cared for and fed in our jails, while also being provided free legal services.
We have no idea how long they’ll be here. Many reports indicate asylum seekers wait years for their day in court, only to have most denied entry. How long will these migrants be here? How long will New York City pay for them? How many millions of dollars will Erie County residents shell out for this? Why is the County Executive now hiding from the issue? Why are the self-proclaimed asylum seekers being placed in neighborhood hotels? Why are those same hotels being paid federal dollars to house the migrants when they are behind on taxes? Why was there no plan put in place and why weren’t communities and community leaders notified of anything? Why won’t DocGo, the agency responsible for managing these migrants, come to our meeting as requested, to respond to our many questions about their mishandling of placing these migrants? Why weren’t they properly vetted?
This has been a crisis that has been mismanaged from the start. The people of Erie County deserve answers.