THE NEW YORK POST – The tricked-out tent city Mayor Adams set up for the Big Apple’s migrants is a veritable wonderland compared to the dingy, run-down accommodations in a homeless shelter just yards away, outraged residents revealed Wednesday.
“They’ve got Xboxes? Get the f–k outta here!” fumed Baran Hines, 36.
The Brooklyn native said he’s been living since late August in the HELP Meyer shelter on Randall’s Island in a high-rise that’s just 350 yards away and visible from the new tent city.
“The building I’m in is so f–king awful,” Hines said.
“The smell is awful on every floor. The bathrooms are terrible with piss everywhere and s–t everywhere. There are flies in the bathroom.
“The tents look five times better,” he added.
Hines said he sleeps on “a raggedy bed with a hard mattress” and won’t eat the food that’s served “because that s–t will kill you.”
“Once a month, if I recognize the food, I’ll eat it,” he said. “But you taste some meals and you don’t know what it is.”
Hines, who described himself as an aspiring actor, said he’s been homeless since December, when he was no longer able to stay with his family and “it was impossible to turn right around and find somewhere to live.”
By contrast, city officials on Tuesday showed off the tent city’s rows of gleaming cots with brand-new bedding still in the packaging.
Emergency Management Commissioner Zach Iscol also raved about the three “culturally appropriate” meals of “South American fare” that will be served daily to the migrants, the first two of whom arrived Wednesday morning.
And while the migrants will get to relax on plush couches while watching an array of flat-screen TVs or playing video games in a lounge outfitted with ping-pong and foosball tables, photos shot by Hines inside HELP Meyer show a spartan TV room with molded, hard plastic chairs … READ MORE.
