NYC first moved asylum seekers upstate in May. What's happening at those hotels now?

The first buses came on a Saturday in May, delivering guests to a hotel in the town of Newburgh in the midst of a clash over New York City's new approach to a mounting crisis.

Faced with dwindling shelter beds for steadily arriving asylum seekers, the city had turned to upstate hotels for overflow space. In weeks to come, it would move as many as 2,200 migrants to 14 hotels in seven counties, an enterprise that stalled as the city fought lawsuits by local officials and ran out of hotels willing to act as temporary shelters.

Six months after those first arrivals at The Crossroads Hotel in Newburgh, the suits slog on but the clamor has faded. And the city's stalled relocation effort has settled into something both more prolonged than it first appeared and more ordinary — even invisible — than the fearful scenarios that resistant officials conjured.

The local impact is hard to discern. The city is still paying for the hotel rooms, food and other expenses for the migrants in its care, so local taxpayers haven't been saddled with costs. No serious crimes or problems have been reported, at least not at the seven Hudson Valley hotels where asylum-seeking individuals, couples and families are living.

They have become long-term guests in scattered hotels, largely out of view except to advocacy groups and networks of supporters. Even after six months, volunteers continue to cook meals, deliver donated clothes and do what they can to help their new neighbors cope.

"They are invisible to most people," said Ardsley Mayor Nancy Kaboolian, whose Westchester County village has one of the migrant housing sites. "But not to those who are actively involved with making their lives better."

The number of asylum seekers housed in hotels reaching from Yonkers to Rochester has dipped to around 2,000, or around 3% of the nearly 66,000 asylum seekers currently in the city's care, according to the most recent counts. The city pays $170 per room for each night they stay.

Here's a snapshot of where things stand at four of the Hudson Valley hotels:

"Remarkable" volunteer response in Ardsley

Only couples and parents with children are placed at the Ardsley Acres Hotel Court, a single-story, 60-room motel off the Saw Mill River Parkway. A total of 57 adults and 15 children were living in 30 rooms there as of Oct. 23, according to a headcount then by Westchester County Executive George Latimer.

Kaboolian, who said she visits the motel a few times a week to talk to the guests and staff and see what they need, said she has heard little from Ardsley residents about the housing arrangement since the largely positive feedback she got after it began in June.

"Even initially, the feeling was much more positive than it was negative," Kaboolian said. "The response has been really remarkable."

Roughly 40 to 50 volunteers help in various ways and hold monthly meetings to discuss strategy, she said. They cook meals and organize outings, including a recent trip to the Bronx Zoo for the kids. They give English classes, twice a week at a nearby church and twice a week at the hotel. About three times a month, nonprofit groups serve dinners to the asylum seekers.

On the Sunday before Thanksgiving, they pulled out all the stops: a dozen organizations and about 100 volunteers threw a Thanksgiving feast at Woodlands Community Temple in the town of Greenburgh, complete with interpreters at each table to translate the speeches. Kaboolian made blankets for each of the children.

"Thanksgiving is a uniquely American event," she said. "And we thought we'd share this event with these folks."

Limited impact: NYC moved about 2.2K asylum seekers to upstate NY. Have those efforts stalled? What we know

"Really quiet" at two Newburgh hotels

Newburgh is one of the places that resisted. Both the town and Orange County sued to stop the placement of asylum seekers and won temporary court orders in May that froze the counts at two Newburgh hotels: 110 asylum seekers who already had moved to The Crossroads, and another 76 at a Ramada by Wyndham. All were men without families accompanying them.

The numbers have since dropped, since the court order prohibits the city from replacing anyone who returns to the city or moves out for other reasons while the case is pending. But how many migrants remain at the two hotels after six months is uncertain.

The "fear of the unknown" that some residents initially voiced when the migrants arrived appears to have faded over time, Town Supervisor Gil Piaquadio said in a recent interview.

"It's really been quiet," he said of the two hotels.

Piaquadio said he still believes the suit was necessary, though, because of what he sees as the town's valid zoning objection. Hotels are supposed to be limited to occupancy for up to 30 days and should not be turned into shelters, he said.

Police calls have more than doubled at both hotels compared to the same time period last year, according to call breakdowns provided by town Police Chief Bruce Campbell. They are generally low-level incidents, similar to those that occurred there before asylum seekers came: disorderly conduct; fire, mental health and medical emergencies; domestic incidents; customer disputes. Both hotels have guests other than asylum seekers who contribute to those calls.

Kevindaryan Lujan, a county legislator from Newburgh who has been helping at the hotels as a volunteer, said the support network for those two sites remains robust. Volunteers bring healthy foods to supplement the men's daily fare, drive them to work and appointments, give English lessons and hold special events.

They recently held a talent show at the Ramada at which some contestants played instruments and sang. Next, Lujan said, they are planning to collect winter coats, hats and gloves.

No info from NYC about Poughkeepsie guests

Court orders also capped the number of men placed at the Red Roof Inn in the town of Poughkeepsie and prohibited replacements for those who leave. The city had placed 86 men there when the orders were issued, and that count has since dropped to an unknown level.

Both the town and Dutchess County had sued, bringing cases similar to those in Orange, Rockland and Onondaga counties. Town Supervisor Jay Baisley said his objections are unchanged, six months later: the city was moving shelter residents to a hotel in his town with no warning, no regard for the town's zoning code and no information about who the men were.

To this day, the city has yet to furnish that information, Baisley said.

The town has incurred no expenses as a result of the placements, but Baisley expects the county eventually will — once the city stops paying the hotel bills.

"It's going to come," he said. "It's only a question of when."

What comes next?

Orange and Westchester county officials say the placement of asylum seekers has so far cost their counties nothing. Dutchess County said it spent a few thousand dollars on medical screenings and is seeking reimbursement by the state.

One potential local cost is schooling for children at a Ramada in Yonkers, where 162 adults and 102 young children reportedly were living as of Oct. 23. Thirteen of those kids are now enrolled in pre-kindergarten classes in the Yonkers Public Schools, according to the school district.

Harrowing tales: Treacherous jungles, bribes: What asylum seekers endured before arriving at NY hotels

In addition, Yonkers is losing revenue because the Ramada is no longer generating sales and occupancy taxes that overnight guests normally would pay, Yonkers officials charged in a lawsuit in August. They estimate that omission is costing the city $22,000 a month.

No deadlines are looming for the asylum seekers at that hotel and the 13 others around the state.

New York City recently declared time limits for migrants staying in its own shelters to conserve its limited space, ordering individuals to reapply for shelter after 30 days and families to reapply after 60 days. But no such restrictions have been given for those staying at hotels outside the city.

Chris McKenna covers government and politics for The Journal News and USA Today Network. Reach him at cmckenna@gannett.com.

This article originally appeared on Rockland/Westchester Journal News: Asylum seekers moved into NY hotels in May. What's happening now?