Fury as NYC officials reveal plans to permanently move hundreds of homeless men into Radisson hotel near Wall Street from the Upper West Side after residents complained they were taking drugs and urinating in the streets

New York City officials are facing renewed controversy after unveiling their plan to relocate homeless men from a luxury hotel on the Upper West Side to another hotel near Wall Street. 

The city's Department of Homeless Services announced on Friday that roughly 300 people living at a makeshift shelter in the Lucerne Hotel will be moved to a Radisson hotel in the Financial District after Upper West Side residents complained about drug use and lewd displays taking over their streets. 

Over the past month Mayor Bill de Blasio has gone back and forth about how to address backlash surrounding his decision to place some 13,000 of the city's homeless population in hotels that were left empty as the coronavirus crisis disrupted tourism. 

The move was meant to protect the homeless people, many of whom suffer from mental illness and addiction, safe during the pandemic. 

But many residents living near hotels-turned-shelters voiced outrage over the initiative, saying that the growing homeless populations diminished their security and quality of life. 

The Upper West Side emerged as a flashpoint of the debate as some residents demanded that the homeless be removed from the Lucerne while others insisted they be allowed to stay.   

At the beginning of last week, de Blasio reversed an earlier decision to transfer the homeless out of the Lucerne, but by the end of the week he apparently changed his mind again with the latest DHS plan. 

The mayor's office is now fielding new criticism from residents of the Financial District who say they felt blindsided by the relocation of homeless to their area.  

New York City's Department of Homeless Services announced on Friday that roughly 300 people living at a makeshift shelter in the Lucerne Hotel will be moved to a Radisson hotel in the Financial District after Upper West Side residents complained about drug use and lewd displays taking over their streets

A group of presumably homeless people pass around a bottle of alcohol out in the open at the corner of W 79th Street and Broadway in the Upper West Side earlier this month amid outrage from locals who said Mayor Bill de Blasio's move to house homeless in hotels had led to their streets being overrun by drug use and public lewdness 

Critics formed a Facebook group called 'Downtown NYCers for Safe Streets' shortly after the DHS announced its plan to convert the Radisson on William Street into the area's first-ever traditional shelter.  

'We believe that our residents should have been notified in advance of this possibility and now that it has been agreed to without our knowledge, we need to make our voices heard,' the page description reads.    

One post on the page provides members with a template to raise their concerns with city leaders. The template highlights a number of schools and neighborhoods in the area as an argument for why it isn't a good fit for the shelter. 

Over the past month de Blasio has gone back and forth about how to address backlash surrounding his decision to place some 13,000 of the city's homeless population in hotels

'I am extremely concerned for the safety and welfare of my family and for my community given the reports coming out of the Lucerne hotel this past summer,' the template states. 

'Please don't permit the move on October 5. At the very least the move should be delayed to give the local community, which is already dealing with an increase in crime and unstable people in the street and in the subway, due notice. 

'Many people in the neighborhood are organizing and will be taking this to the press and to court, if necessary.' 

Another post on the page suggests that the group should hire the same lawyer who helped another group on the Upper West Side - the West Side Community Organization - in their fight to remove people from the Lucerne. 

The post asks members whether they would be interested in pooling funds to retain services from the lawyer, Randy Mastro. 

Two Financial District residents voiced their concerns in letters to the editor of the Tribeca Tribune as well.  

'We FiDi mothers have been the pioneers in raising families in what was once a primarily business/tourist destination. We will not stand quietly while the administration imposes such a blatantly dangerous situation on our families,' a woman named Vicki Raikes wrote. 

'I have great compassion for the homeless but moving them in a few blocks from my son where drug use was clear is not appropriate,' another woman, who identified herself as 'A FiDi Mom', wrote. 

'These human beings deserve help not a hotel room with no medical and no counseling. And residents deserve to raise their kids without fear of witnessing drug use and homeless individuals who are ill screaming day and night (oh yes 4am) yelling obscenities on every corner. 

'They are ill, they need help not a hotel.' 

Many Upper West Side residents living near the Lucerne hotel voiced outrage over the move to turn it into a shelter, saying the growing homeless population in their neighborhood diminished their security and quality of life. Pictured: A group of homeless people gather at the corner of W 79th Street and Broadway on September 3

A homeless man sleeps on a chair at the corner of W 80th Street and Broadway in the Upper West Side earlier this month

Meanwhile the West Side Community Organization applauded the new DHS plan, saying that housing homeless at the Lucerne was always meant to be a temporary action to slow the spread of COVID-19.

For weeks the WSCO has argued that quality of life in the neighborhood has suffered ever since the Lucerne was transformed into a shelter due to the pandemic. 

The plan drew a very different response from another Upper West Side group, the UWS Open Hearts initiative, which called the displacement a form of 'segregation'. 

Supporters of UWS Open Hearts staged a protest outside the Lucerne alongside hotel residents on Sunday to decry the plan.

'Neighborhoods are resources: Neighborhoods are jobs, are community support, are networks, are engines of economic opportunity. And when you exclude a group of people from neighborhoods to keep it for yourself and people who look like you, you ensure resources stay in the hands of the powerful,' protest leader Corinne Low told the small crowd. 

UWS Open Hearts also published a statement from an anonymous homeless person living at the Lucerne. 

'What I think bothers me so much is the relationship we built this far,' they wrote. 

'We residents have never experienced such warmth and respect. This is not the norm for any of us. Many of us have fractured relationship with family and friends. This is one of the reasons why we're experiencing homelessness. 

'To have a community come out with open hearts was transformative in so many ways. It touched in ways that a thousand Alcoholics meetings could never touch. Our hardened hearts became soft again and began to beat at a normal and healthy pace. 

'Through the actions of Open Hearts Initiative we were able to know what it's like to be human again. Moving around is normal to us but being cut off from a lifeline of love is like a death sentence. The Mayor has sentenced us to a spiritual and moral, if not physical, death.'

Upper West Side residents and supporters of UWS Open Hearts Initiative gathered at a news conference outside the Lucerne Hotel on Sunday to oppose DHS' latest relocation plan

The UWS Open Hearts Initiative opposes transferring homeless men from the Lucerne, saying they had suffered enough

On September 13, homeless advocates led by UWS Open Hearts staged a protest outside de Blasio's residence at Gracie Mansion after it emerged that the men living at Lucerne were being moved to the Harmonia shelter in Midtown, resulting in disabled residents of the Harmonia being displaced. 

One of the protesters held a sign which read: 'Because you are displacing 900 homeless NYers and think that 'shelters are better environments' please be advised that you will be transferred from Gracie Mansion to a homeless shelter.'

The Department of Homeless Services only paused plans to move families accommodated at Harmonia after Legal Aid filed a lawsuit on their behalf.  

'A lot of us are just trying, like I said, get on out feet and move on,' Harmonia resident Mario Charles told FOX5. 

On September 13, homeless advocates led by UWS Open Hearts staged a protest outside de Blasio's residence at Gracie Mansion after it emerged that the men living at Lucerne were being moved to the Harmonia shelter in Midtown 

A sign read: 'Because you are displacing 900 homeless NYers and think that "shelters are better environments" please be advised that you will be transferred from Gracie Mansion to a homeless shelter'

The DHS said that it has no immediate plans to move residents from other hotels-turned-shelters, of which there are more than 60 across the city. 

'We do not anticipate being in a position where Health experts say it is safe to relocate all the individuals experiencing homelessness who we serve back to congregate shelters by October,' the department said. 

However, officials have indicated that plans to relocate other shelters will be coming down the pipe later this fall.