October 19, 2023 (NEW YORK, NY) – The Legal Aid Society and the Coalition for the Homeless issued the following statement in response to the court directing the parties in Callahan v. Carey into mediation: “We welcome the court directing the parties into mediation to both build off of the recent solutions we have secured and identify additional resources that will ensure the City’s compliance with the Callahan consent decree and safeguard our clients’ well-being. “Mediation will also allow for many of the measures recently put into place to actually materialize and live up to their full intended promise, including expedited processing of work authorization and the extension and re-designation of Temporary Protected Status for Venezuelans, among other items. “Legal Aid and the Coalition look forward to working with the State, the City and the court through this process to both preserve the consent decree and guarantee that anyone in need of shelter in our city has access to that right, one that has defined New York City for the last four decades.”
