Brooklyn residents took to the streets on a rainy Sunday afternoon to protest the city’s plans to open a homeless shelter in one neighborhood.
More than 300 people marched along Coney Island Avenue and other local streets against the proposal for a shelter at 2134 Coyle St. in Sheepshead Bay. The site was previously approved for affordable housing, but local residents say the city’s plan now to open a homeless shelter for 169 families amounts to a “bait-and-switch.”
Opponents of the shelter have been attempting to get the site shut down for nearly two months through active protests and demonstrations at the location. Last week, at least two protesters were arrested at the location for disorderly conduct.
Leading the May 4 march were Republican state Sen. Steven Chan and mayoral candidate and Guardian Angels founder Curtis Sliwa. Both took aim at Mayor Eric Adams for moving forward with the homeless shelter plan, and vowed to do everything in their power to stop it.
“Understand the Adams administration, the other people running for mayor, they are trying to put shelters all over the city, in the Bronx, in Queens, in Brooklyn, in Staten Island, but now Manhattan, those are your brothers and sisters,” Sliwa said. “If we have to, we will bring everybody together. We will confront Eric Adams, the mayor, because he won’t come here. We’ll go to Gracie Mansion on a Sunday and say, ‘Come on out. Eric Adams, talk to the people. Don’t be afraid of the people.'”
Chan charged that Mayor Adams was “hell bent on wanting to destroy the last of our good neighborhoods” and urged residents to make their voices heard at the ballot boxes this year.
“You have a superpower. Each person here has a superpower, and that superpower is to use it wisely next month, for our primary election and for our November election, that’s your superpower,” Chan said.
Protest organizers say they plan to take their case directly to City Hall in Manhattan this Wednesday for another protest.
