Yonkers seeks fines against hotel for housing asylum seekers longer than a month

A Yonkers hotel that has housed migrant families since May is being sued by city officials for more than $200,000 in fines for operating what they describe as an unapproved boarding house.

Yonkers brought the case against the former Ramada by Wyndham — now known as Plaza Esperanza — in state Supreme Court in White Plains in August, three months after New York City placed the asylum seekers there. The suit contends the hotel can house only transient guests and violated its certificate of occupancy and Yonkers' codes once the migrants had stayed longer than 30 days.

Neither Yonkers nor Westchester County had issued orders or sued to stop New York City from moving asylum seekers to hotels outside its borders, as other counties and municipalities did. New York City began those transfers in May to open space in its own shelters for the steady arrivals of migrants.

But Yonkers, with the case it filed Aug. 16 without any public announcement, has now raised objections similar to those of communities that resisted the placements.

"We have every right to enforce our laws, and we have done that," Mayor Mike Spano said in an interview.

Spano said he hoped to recoup revenue the city has lost since the hotel stopped paying sales tax and hotel occupancy taxes after it became a contracted shelter. That loss totals about $22,000 a month, city officials estimate.

Richard Portale, a White Plains attorney representing the hotel owner, said Wednesday that he hopes to reach an amicable resolution to the dispute, one that balances the needs of both the migrant families and Yonkers.

"This doesn't need to be litigated," he said.

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The first 15 asylum-seeking families from New York City arrived at the 103-room Ramada on Tuckahoe Road on May 15, mothers carrying young children as they stepped off the buses. That grew to about 100 families within days, according to the lawsuit. Some 217 adults and children were living there as of about a month ago, county officials have said.

Yonkers officials visited the hotel four times through Aug. 8 and noticed guests who had stayed longer than the 30-day limit for transient lodging, the lawsuit claims.

Further evidence of extended stays is that parents listed the hotel as their home address when they enrolled their kids in school, attorneys argue. They object that the migrant housing has shrunk Yonkers' available lodging space by 100 rooms.

Fines for the alleged violations range from $250 to $5,000 per day. The $200,000 fine being sought amounts to the maximum fine for 40 days.

Anthony Merante, a Republican councilman challenging Spano in the Nov. 7 mayor's race, agrees the hotel should be cited for exceeding the 30-day maximum.

"That not the purpose of a hotel," he said. "It's not a migrant hotel. It's a hotel for the neighborhood."

The lawsuit doesn't seek to evict the families. Merante said he wouldn't pursue that remedy either if elected, at least not initially. But he would demand a long-term plan from New York City and then seek eviction if it misses its deadline to comply.

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Around 400 asylum seekers in all, including 125 children, are living at three Westchester hotels, County Executive George Latimer said last week. Spano said 10 of those kids attend Yonkers schools.

Statewide, around 2,200 migrants were staying at 14 hotels in seven counties at New York City's expense as of last month, the USA Today Network found. They were a small share of the roughly 60,000 asylum seekers in the city's care.

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: NYC asylum seekers: Yonkers NY seeks fines from hotel boarding