There is no question that the influx of migrants is straining New York City to its limit. Already struggling with providing sufficient employment, housing and affordability for its residents, New York City is now tasked with dealing with another 126,000 migrants. Even the city’s budget, which was strained before this influx, is now facing cuts, causing many to question the city’s capacity to govern effectively. 

First among the difficulties facing migrant families is exorbitant living costs. The most immediate task for the city is to secure a basic level of subsistence for these migrants. Regardless of whether they are American citizens, they have found themselves fleeing war and poverty. The crisis posed by this influx of migrants is hardly new; it is a problem New York has struggled with for the past century and a half. Indeed, the city cannot remedy the crises of homelessness and destitution without addressing the immediate needs of migrants, the group who, by virtue of their situation, are at the highest risk of both homelessness and destitution. Any solution must help both migrants and current residents.

There is also a moral and categorical imperative for city governments to take every measure necessary to ensure this challenge is appropriately met, regardless of the cost. This influx provides an excellent opportunity for the city government to craft and implement a large-scale solution to homelessness and poverty. Poverty and homelessness are a sort of violence of the same horror, and the least those who have ruined lives with their political and economic power can do is contribute to providing a new chance at life. If those in power wish to extol the virtues of self-sufficiency, then let us use their resources so that we may promote self-sufficiency. 

However, there exists a number of facets to this issue, and thus there is no single solution. In the issue at hand, there is the direct solution of providing money to alleviate the immediate effects of destitution — something that cannot be ignored, for the effects of poverty felt immediately are the most severe — but checks alone will not solve the problem of low wages, vampiric landlords, high costs of living and insufficient education. In order to successfully remedy a single one of these, it is necessary to remedy the things that are inextricably linked to it. The proposal of the city to provide migrants with a basic income on which to subsist is admirable and will, without a doubt, provide desperately needed aid. However, it is insufficient.It is also undeniable that providing only migrants with basic income, when there are thousands of families in the city that would also benefit from such a program, is New York City failing its own people. In the immediate interest of all New Yorkers, it is imperative that the city expand the program to include the non-migrant destitute or create a parallel program for non-migrants. A universal basic income alone will not address the persistent needs of housing, employment and education. This is not to say that the program will be useless; but taken alone, it will land in effective failure, to the immense joy of the reactionaries who have forced this critical state on New York. In addition to the prepaid program, the city must also provide housing and employment assistance to provide a basis for living. 

Fortunately, there is a solution sitting immediately beneath the city’s nose. Thousands of public and supportive housing units lie empty. The city has an opportunity to take advantage of these low unit prices and vacancies by providing, in addition to the card, an apartment to those who need it — for example, a family of four would receive ownership of a two-bedroom apartment in addition to the prepaid card — in effect, an upscaling of co-op city. This would solve the immediate issues of housing and food, as well as, by conferring official residency, enable impoverished families to access already existing assistance programs. To provide a sufficiently stable start to a new life, it would be in the best interest of the city to provide the possibility of immediate employment. Without question, among both the new and current destitute, there are those who have precisely the talent the city requires, and the city would certainly benefit by taking advantage of their skills to make its functions more efficient.

There is, lastly, the problem of funding. I make no pretension of ignorance: this will be incredibly expensive, potentially running into the tens of billions per year. It may well be that the city will have to bear the full cost of finally resolving this issue by increasing taxes and taking out loans, however painful they may be. But the city has put off this issue for decades, and it has festered to such an extent that nothing short of herculean expenditure and effort will successfully resolve it.