Documented – City Councilmember Shahana Hanif, City Comptroller Brad Lander led a rally in City Hall Park on Thursday morning to demand that the New York City government administration allocate “at least $70 million” for legal services for asylum seekers. Brooklyn Borough President Antonio Reynoso and Immigrant rights advocacy groups — Immigrant Arc, Make The Road NY, Win, New York Immigration Coalition, and others — were there to support their effort.

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News 12 – Officials and lawmakers are calling for $70 million for migrant assistance in the upcoming city budget for the 2024 fiscal year. This push comes after City Comptroller Brad Lander and Council Member Shahana Hanif sent a letter to the Adams administration last month, calling for additional funds to ramp up outreach and legal immigration services.  

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Gothamist – The withholding of more granular and precise information comes amid scrutiny over the reporting and accuracy of the city’s data on migrants. It also raises questions over how Mayor Eric Adams has managed the crisis, which is being overseen by at least three city agencies.

City Councilmember Shahana Hanif, who chairs the council’s immigration committee, also attested to the change in the updates.

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AM NY – I was 17 years old when I was diagnosed with Lupus.

It was the first time I was hospitalized as a teen, and it was the first time my family had to intimately navigate our City’s healthcare system. We were uninsured and unfamiliar, a reality for so many working-class families and working New Yorkers in our City.

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Gotham Gazette – Last week, City Comptroller Brad Lander and Council Member Shahana Hanif, who chairs the Council’s immigration committee, wrote a letter to the mayor, calling on him to invest an additional $70 million in the city budget for immigration legal services. That would include $10 million to scale up pro se legal clinics that help immigrants apply for asylum, work authorization, and Temporary Protected Status;

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New York Post – “We also believe it is critical – not only for those seeking asylum, but also for the City’s long-term fiscal stability – to significantly ramp up outreach and legal immigration services to help asylum seekers navigate the paperwork that will enable them to live, work, and contribute to our city,” wrote City Comptroller Brad Lander and Councilwoman Shahana Hanif in a letter to Adams on May 9.

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Daily News – Brooklyn Councilwoman Shahana Hanif, a Democrat who chairs the Council’s Immigration Committee, raised particular alarm about how Adams’ policy shift could impact migrant children.

“The last time families were in congregate settings, there were cases of child sexual abuse,” tweeted Hanif. “Right-to-shelter exists to protect families and ensure all New Yorkers have their rights respected in our shelter system,” she added.

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CBS New York – The city has welcomed more than 60,000 asylum seekers in the past year and more than 37,000 currently remain in the city’s care.

During a budget hearing on immigration Wednesday morning, Council Member Shahana Hanif said lack of sufficient federal funding does not excuse the ways in which the city has housed asylum seekers.

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Gothamist – The City Council excoriated Mayor Eric Adams’ response to the city’s ongoing migrant crisis on Wednesday amid mounting concerns over the growing number of arrivals.

“Now that we are over a year into the situation, we must be building the long-term infrastructure needed to help recent arrivals succeed,” said Councilmember Shahana Hanif, who represents the Brooklyn neighborhoods of Cobble Hill, Carroll Gardens and Park Slope, during a budget hearing on immigration and youth services on Wednesday.

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Gothamist – The city needs to invest more resources toward resolving the underlying problem areas — shrinking the perennially high shelter population by fast-tracking residents into long-term housing, said Lander and Councilmember Shahana Hanif, the head of the immigration committee.

They also argue that the city needs to invest more money, $70 million by Lander’s estimate, into legal services to clear the biggest hurdle now for many to get a work permit: filing an asylum application.

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