New York City’s self-made migrant ‘crisis’ and the challenge of housing refugees

New York City’s migrant crisis is turning into something out of a Marx Brothers movie, only it’s not funny and has no end in sight.

The city is facing a massive hotel and food bill for its “newest neighbors” at the same time tax revenue has plummeted.

But instead of pulling in the welcome mat and saying, “Sorry, no vacancies,” we are getting ready to cut spending on police, libraries and other municipal services.

Calling the situation a “crisis” is a misnomer. A crisis comes from something unexpected, like an illness or a widespread financial collapse.

But New York City’s problem — accepting hundreds of thousands of migrants from around the world and taking on the responsibility of feeding and housing them indefinitely — is totally self-imposed.

It’s like lighting your bed on fire and wondering why the house burned down.

Almost a half-century ago New York, facing a series of public-interest lawsuits, agreed to provide shelter to a few hundred homeless hard cases.

That original consent decree mushroomed into the multibillion-dollar shelter system that, until just a few years ago, cared mostly for local New Yorkers — especially single mothers and their children — who couldn’t afford a place to live.

The “right to shelter” is totally unique in America. Until recently, no other jurisdiction accepted the premise it is the public’s responsibility to house and feed anyone who demands it.

The possibility of abuse has always existed, of course, but was balanced by the fact the shelter system was inconvenient and relatively unpleasant.

Nobody, the thinking went, was going to take advantage of the city’s generosity who didn’t absolutely need it as a last resort.

That was until Joe Biden came to the White House promising to reverse his predecessor’s supposedly harsh immigration policies.

His Day One promise to suspend deportations of illegal immigrants and end the “Remain in Mexico” rule prompted a rush of migrants parroting bogus claims of “well-founded” persecution.

Millions of people from all corners of the globe have streamed across the southern border, and a solid percentage of them have headed straight to New York City, where we were foolish enough to rent entire hotels in the middle of Manhattan to shelter these migrants.

News quickly spread down the line that New York City — where we cared enough to make sure that the free food was “culturally appropriate” and the Internet and laundry service were prompt — was the place to come.

There’s an old saying that a luxury indulged in twice soon becomes a necessity. That applies to social services, too.

Once the city established a high standard of accommodation for the “newest New Yorkers,” any cuts to the program were regarded as inhumane.

Mayor Adams’ efforts to draw reasonable limits around migrants’ expectations have failed miserably, as advocates and elected officials condemn time limits on shelter stays as a human-rights violation.

Progressives latch onto proposed solutions that achieve nothing. Turning Floyd Bennett Field into a migrant-housing center was hailed by Gov. Hochul as a slam dunk, but migrants have refused to move there, and the Legal Aid Society calls the facility “not humane.”

Expedited work authorizations were supposed to solve the problem, but it turns out few migrants have applied for them. Why should they?

New York is a sanctuary city, after all, and has always tolerated people working “off the books.” Why sign up to pay taxes when you can work for cash, and there’s no penalty for doing so?

Mayor Adams and the rest of the city’s elected leadership have begged the White House to cover the cost of housing the migrants, but the Biden administration’s attitude is that this end of the mess is our responsibility.

And it isn’t wrong about that. Nobody forced New York to promise to house, feed and clothe the world’s poor, in the middle of the most desirable real estate on Earth, forever.

Adams has the right idea in limiting shelter stays. But until the city ditches the outdated “right to shelter” requirement it has imposed on itself, the trend is totally unsustainable.

The old paradox has finally been realized: You can’t have open borders and a welfare state without collapsing the system.

Seth Barron is managing editor of The American Mind and author of “The Last Days of New York.”