By Bernadette Hogan and Bruce Golding January 16, 2023 6:42pm Updated

Mayor Eric Adams is turning up the heat on Gov. Kathy Hochul to do something to help tackle New York City’s migrant crisis — promoting a plan to have upstate communities take in a fraction of the now 40,000-plus migrants that have flooded the Big Apple.

Less than a week after Hochul pointedly ignored the ongoing influx of migrants during her State of the State address, Adams exclusively told The Post that spreading them around could provide a shot in the arm to “struggling” cities upstate.

“Some of our cities are suffering. They’re losing populations,” Adams said during a Sunday night phone interview from El Paso, Texas.

“But if this is done, is done effectively, and the dollars come in to support those who are helping migrants and asylum seekers to incentivize this help, we believe we can … help those cities that are struggling and at the same time, give people a good start in this country.”

Adams’ comments came just days after he filed an “emergency mutual aid request” for Hochul to immediately provide housing for just 500 of the city’s migrants.

In his Friday announcement, Adams said the city was “seeing more people arrive than we have ever seen,” including a record “835 asylum seekers arriving on one single day alone” last week.

Mayor Eric Adams is putting pressure on Gov. Kathy Hochul to relocate some of the migrants in New York City to upstate New York communities.
Mayor Eric Adams is putting pressure on Gov. Kathy Hochul to relocate some of the migrants in New York City to upstate New York communities.

City Hall said Monday that its latest official tally showed 40,200 migrants had arrived since the spring, with 26,900 housed in taxpayer-funded emergency shelters as of Sunday.

On Tuesday, Hochul made no mention of the city’s spiraling migrant crisis while laying out her agenda for nearly 50 minutes and later defended the omission by saying the issue wasn’t important outside the Big Apple.

“In my State of the State, there’s hundreds of other proposals for talking about. I was focusing on my key signature areas that have broad, statewide interest — housing, mental health challenges, the child care and the minimum wage,” she said Wednesday.

US Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand (D-NY) first floated the notion of sending some of the city’s migrants upstate in September as a way for struggling communities to qualify for additional federal funding through the Community Development Block Grant program.

Gillibrand discussed the proposal with Adams during a closed-door meeting in Washington, DC, and also contacted Hochul’s office to seek her support, sources told The Post at the time.

City Hall said it was open to the idea but Hochul refused to address it for nearly a month, at which point she merely kicked the can down the road. saying, “I think the question is, how many more times these people have to be shuffled around.”

“When there becomes a legal path and work papers and a different dynamic, certainly there’ll be a lot of places that will want to embrace this community,” she said.

Hochul didn't mention the migrant crisis during her State of the Speech address this month.
Hochul didn’t mention the migrant crisis during her State of the Speech address this month.

Migrants are prohibited from working in the US for at least six months after applying for asylum, although Adams and other pols have called for shortening the waiting period for work permits.

Gillibrand’s office didn’t return a request for comment Monday.

But city Councilman Robert Holden (D-Queens) accused Hochul of being “asleep at the wheel on the migrant issue.”

“She’s got to wake up and she’s not,” he said. “My Democratic colleagues haven’t stepped up – in the city and state – they haven’t come up with any demands on the migrant crisis.”

Holden also said Hochul “should be visiting Washington along with other governors and forcing [President] Biden to come up with some meaningful solution. Not just rhetoric, actual plans!”

Adams said relocating migrants upstate could help "struggling" cities that have seen their populations decline.
Adams said relocating migrants upstate could help “struggling” cities that have seen their populations decline.
According to City Hall, 40,200 migrants have arrived since last spring.
According to City Hall, 40,200 migrants have arrived since last spring.

“The mayor has threatened to cut our budget. The taxpayers are going to lose no matter what, here,” he added.

Council Minority Leader Joe Borelli (R-Staten Island) said that “it will be tough for Hochul to open up a new front on migrants as she’s already fighting the left of her party” over her nomination of Appellate Division Justice Hector LaSalle to be the next chief judge of the Court of Appeals.

“But there is no other choice,” Borelli said.

Borelli then referenced a recent Post exclusive about migrant families flocking to the tiny upstate city of Jamestown, about 70 miles south of Buffalo.

Adams comments come a week after he submitted a “emergency mutual aid request” to the state to provide housing for 500 migrants.
Adams’ comments come a week after he submitted a “emergency mutual aid request” to the state to provide housing for 500 migrants.

“The problem expanded statewide, and the waiter is about to hand her the bill whether she offers to pay or not,” he said.

Borelli also said that as the “Democratic governor of a large state,” Hochul “should be able to leverage the White House for support” as Adams seeks $1 billion in emergency federal aid for the migrant crisis.233

City Hall said Monday that it hadn’t yet heard whether Hochul would grant Adams’ desperate plea to take some of the migrants off his hands.

A Hochul spokesman declined to comment beyond remarks the governor made Sunday, when she told reporters she’d spoken to Adams earlier in the day.

“I told the mayor we will be continuing to help him. We’ve been helping him for many months and will continue to give him support,” she said.