A decades-old shelter for homeless women is being ousted from Lafayette Street after the building that housed it for 27 years was sold to developers for $27 million, according to the shelter and city records.
The sale was first reported by The Real Deal, which also reported that the building is being marketed for retail use.
Here’s something that might surprise you about our city’s homeless crisis, as we’re reaching numbers not seen in more than 80 years: Close to a third of all homeless families are in fact employed, but their low wages can’t keep up with the steep rise in rents, so there’s no real relief in sight. That puts the onus on the government.
One evening last week, a restaurant owner in Washington Heights and two customers stood chatting on the sidewalk about the changes in the area over the last 25 years. The restaurateur, Peter Walsh, was telling the people, who were coming from a hospital on 168th Street, how much safer the neighborhood had become as he stood in front of his restaurant, Coogan’s, on Broadway between 168th and 169th Streets.
A surveillance video shows what happened next.