New York City has seen a staggering influx of more than 223,000 migrants since the asylum-seeker crisis began in April 2022, a figure now double the population of Albany, New York’s capital. The arrival numbers highlight the city’s ongoing struggle to accommodate the unprecedented surge of asylum seeker arrivals.
To put the scale into perspective, the number of migrants equals roughly half the population of Staten Island (490,687) and represents about 15% of Manhattan’s 1.6 million residents, according to recent U.S. Census data.
“Over the past two years, our teams have undertaken the Herculean task of providing compassionate care for a population twice the size of Albany, all while saving taxpayers billions of dollars,” Mayor Eric Adams said in a statement Monday, acknowledging the challenge posed by the latest figures.
Of the hundreds of thousands of migrants who have arrived in the Big Apple since the crisis erupted, more than 58,000 remain in city-run shelters, supported by taxpayer funding. In just the week ending Nov. 10, over 600 new asylum seekers arrived in New York City, where they were accommodated in one of the city’s 210 shelter sites scattered across the five boroughs.
The ongoing crisis underscores the city’s struggle to balance compassion and resource management, as officials work tirelessly to address the needs of a growing migrant population while managing the impact on public services and infrastructure.
