Comptroller: Gaps persist despite high spending on homelessness in New York

ALBANY, N.Y. (NEXSTAR) — The Comptroller’s Office released reports auditing the state’s oversight of homeless shelters and services. Homelessness in the state more than doubled in the last few years, per the Comptroller, and the audits found that the state continues to fall short.

Comptroller Thomas DiNapoli issued the audits as follow-ups to two previous reports that had shown limited progress by the Office of Temporary and Disability Assistance in addressing long-standing issues with shelter conditions and client support services.

One audit, “Oversight of Homeless Shelters,” examined OTDA’s efforts to improve shelter conditions after the previous audit found widespread health and safety risks. Sixty percent of the 159 shelters visited had unsatisfactory conditions, with structural damage, mold, vermin and bug infestations, and broken smoke detectors.

The follow-up found that OTDA implemented five of eight recommendations from the Comptroller’s Office, partially implemented a sixth, and didn’t implement the remaining two. For example, OTDA updated its inspection policies and checklists in 2024 and now tracks corrective action plans in a shelter management system.

Meanwhile, another example, OTDA hasn’t fixed the inventory of hotels and motels for emergency housing. Comparing with five counties, the Comptroller’s Office found 13 hotels or motels on local lists that were missing from OTDA’s, and 10 on OTDA’s were not on local lists. Although OTDA officials said the list is a “moving target,” the Comptroller’s office said that the agency hasn’t changed processes to stay current.

The other audit, “Homeless Services Housing Needs Assessment,” focused on client support services. An August 2023 audit found that OTDA hadn’t completed needs assessments and individual living plans on time, which evaluate the needs of clients and set goals for self-sufficiency. That audit found missing or late assessments 40% of the time, and individual living plans were missing or late 38% of the time. That 2023 audit also couldn’t find evidence that services listed in those living plans, like medical or mental health treatment, were always delivered, and 70% of clients sampled didn’t move onto permanent housing.

The second follow-up found that OTDA has implemented one of seven recommendations from the Comptroller’s office, partially implemented three, and didn’t implement three. OTDA successfully delivered online training on completing needs assessments and individual living plans to local social services districts in 2023 and 2024, and issued a standardized form for living plans. But the Comptroller’s office found that they didn’t develop any new methods for identifying districts with late or incomplete documents, nor was OTDA proactive enough in working with local districts to complete treatment plans.

OTDA officials said staffing shortages at shelters mean that needs assessments or individual living plans sometimes don’t get completed on time and that local districts are responsible for completing the plans and getting necessary services to clients. The agency argued that existing inspection and corrective processes already include ways to address noncompliance. Yet the Comptroller pointed out that their processes haven’t resolved anything, as missing or late assessments and living plans have almost doubled since the last audits in 2016 and 2020.

These shortfalls coincide with a steep uptick in homelessness statewide, according to a January 2025 Comptroller report, with 158,019 New Yorkers experiencing homelessness in January 2024. That’s about one-fifth of the total homeless population in the U.S., and New York’s homelessness rate of about eight people per 1,000 residents ranks third after Hawaii and the District of Columbia.

The statewide surge in homelessness—particularly a 53.1% jump from January 2023 to January 2024—largely stems from a significant influx of asylum seekers, according to the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development. New York City alone saw its shelter population double between January 2022 and January 2024, with asylum seekers making up much of that increase. In January 2024, 34,057 asylum seekers lived in shelters in New York City.

Other regions also saw increases ranging from 11% in Poughkeepsie/Dutchess County to 138% in Glens Falls, Saratoga Springs, and surrounding counties, according to DiNapoli, driven in part by homeless families with children. Statewide, the number of homeless people under 18 more than doubled, from 20,299 in 2022 to 50,773 in 2024. That works out to almost one-third of the homeless in New York being children.

HUD also blamed the increase on insufficient affordable housing driven by rising evictions and more expensive rents. When moratoriums ended in January 2022, eviction filings rebounded and continued to grow through 2023, before a slight decline to 191,230 in 2024, according to the New York State Unified Court System. Over 38% of households in New York—or 2.9 million—spent over 30% of income on housing in 2022, indicating a widespread cost burden, the Comptroller’s Office said.

New York has the nation’s lowest percentage of unsheltered homeless individuals—3.6% compared to the national average of 43.8%. That’s because of laws in New York City that mandate a right to shelter. The state also operates the largest network of year-round emergency housing beds in the country at 127,759. Still, New York lags in the number of beds for rapid rehousing, designed to quickly move people into permanent housing. New York has 4,887 of such beds, while California has over 28,000, according to HUD data from January 2024.

New York is in the middle of a five-year, $25 billion housing plan to create or preserve 100,000 affordable homes. However, DiNapoli argued in January that “little information is available to track goals, accomplishments, and amount spent on these initiatives.” He said the state should improve reporting on current programs, expand rental assistance, and better fund legal aid for poor households facing eviction.