The city is desperately scouring the five boroughs to find space for a record number of homeless — but when officials had a chance a few years ago to open a 400-bed shelter in The Bronx, they took an abrupt pass.
And therein lies a tale, as well as a lawsuit.
Keith DeMatteis, a Long Island developer, said he spent three years and millions of dollars putting together a proposal for a men’s shelter at 359 Wales Ave. only to have the Department of Homeless Services back out at the last minute.
“There were some hiccups here and there,” he recalled. “Finally, we got through everything. Then, in the spring of 2005 — an election year — we get the Dear John letter: Thanks. We don’t need the project anymore.”
DeMatteis is suing the city for $6 million.
His anger at losing a 20-year, $202 million lease boiled over when he read a report in The Post that former Homeless Services Commissioner Robert Hess, who now heads a nonprofit, landed a contract to place 200 families in an Upper West Side SRO despite opposition from local elected officials.
DeMatteis faced similar opposition, which he claims did him in at a time when Mayor Bloomberg was seeking a second term.
“It was election-year politics,” he charged.
DHS counters that it was bad timing, and not politics, that left DeMatteis holding the bag.
In a statement, spokeswoman Heather Janik said it became apparent to the agency in July 2005 that the number of homeless men was decreasing each month, “demonstrating a trend which made it apparent that our capacity needs did not necessitate a 400-bed shelter. Homeless Services only builds shelters in communities when necessary.”
At the moment, it’s very necessary. Shelters are bursting with more than 44,000 residents each night.Single men comprised 6,613 of the total as of last week.
DHS records show that in the month when the plug was pulled on Dematteis, there were 5,966 men sleeping in the shelters.
And that might be that, except that DHS just three months earlier in April 2005 was still sounding the alarm bells about the need for additional beds.
“The reality is there’s a great need for this capacity,” James Anderson, the DHS spokesman at the time, told reporters.
When he uttered those words, DHS had a population of 6,427 men. The number didn’t drop below 6,000 again until May, 2006, when it indeed began a downward decline.
Sharp forecasting or political decision-making?
DeMatteis insists that the census count was never an issue until the very end and that his project was intended to replace 400 beds at the aging Bellevue homeless shelter.
However this case is resolved, it’s clear that when the city, during the Koch administration, agreed to house every and any homeless person who shows up at the door, it took on a challenge that’s almost impossible to meet without enormous expense and a continuing air of crisis.