Governor Kathy Hochul announced Monday that the state has identified more than 18,000 open positions, from nearly 400 employers, who are willing to hire immigrants who have already obtained legal work status in the United States.
For this process, a digital registration portal has been established where only people who have received the Employment Authorization Document (EAD) can request information to receive assistance. Basically, personal data, address and primary language are required.
“Right now, we have a migration crisis and a labor crisis. By connecting work-eligible people with jobs and opportunities in New York, we can solve both and ensure a better future for all New Yorkers,” said the governor from the Hot Bread Kitchen at Chelsea Market.
This initiative has monitored vacant positions in 379 companies in the private sector, which have identified positions that could be filled by people with legal employment status.
The businesses are mostly accommodation and food services, healthcare, social assistance, manufacturing and administrative support.
According to figures shown by the New York governorate, at least 50% of these 18,000 vacant positions are in the Big Apple, 2,800 in the Hudson Valley region, more than 1,200 in Long Island and 1,521 in the western region.
The New York State Department of Labor (NYSDOL) and a team of 70 state officials representing 16 state agencies have led an outreach effort to identify business needs and assess migrants’ skills and experience.
The reassignment and extension of Temporary Protected Status (TPS) to Venezuelans is, based on the governor’s criteria, one of the ways to overcome the immigration crisis, because in the coming months more people would be legally enabled to join jobs and leave the shelters.
“I continue to pressure Washington and Congress to open those work authorizations to more people, because, again, the Venezuelans are a good start, but we must include thousands who come from Mauritania and the Congo, other parts of South America and Central America. We have people from Iraq and Afghanistan, people are coming from Russia, because everyone is finding their way to the southern border,” he indicated.
“There is no more space”
The immigration crisis continues to bring hundreds of immigrants to New York City who have crossed the southern border with the United States, taking advantage of a local law that requires the Mayor’s Office to provide accommodation and services to anyone who declares that they are homeless.
However, faced with the flow of more than 116 thousand people since the spring of 2022, of which more than 60,000 are in emergency shelters and hotels rented especially to address this crisis, the City reinforced some persuasive actions last week such as distributing pamphlets at the border, to prevent people from going to New York, arguing that there is no longer space or hotels to accommodate them.
Among the list of messages it stands out that: “New York has run out of space”, “Hotel is not guaranteed”, and they are invited to go to more “affordable” cities to start their new life because New York is very expensive.
At this time in which a humanitarian emergency has already been declared, the governor this Sunday went further, warning CBS that the “border is too open.”
“We want Congress to put a limit on who can cross the border. You really have to slow down the people coming, because the volume keeps growing and growing. So we also have to send appropriate messages that we are at our limit,” concluded the state leader.
At the same time, Mayor Eric Adams and his group of advisors not only continue to make calls to review immigration policies at the border, but are awaiting judicial decisions that could change the right to refuge in the Big Apple.
In this sense, the Republican representative of Staten Island, Nicole Malliotakis, said on the social network ‘X’ that it catches her attention that precisely two Democrats from New York are agreeing that the only way to put an end to this crisis , is by guaranteeing strict security policies on the border.