MONTICELLO – Days after the City of New York placed dozens of asylum seekers in the Knights Inn hotel in the Village of Liberty, they have moved them out.
County Legislature Chairman Rob Doherty said the hotel owner was told that the contractor for New York City essentially required full use of the entire hotel and that he was unwilling to accept those conditions. That was because of the owner’s of existing obligations to Sullivan County and his desire to support his private paying customers who have already booked rooms in advance of the busy Catskills vacation system.
Doherty said as a result, New York City has apparently decided to relocate the migrants.
“I guess the city found it to be just easier to bring them to another county than to try to fight the fight here in Sullivan County,” he said.
Doherty said the county has not seen or been informed of further transports from New York City. He noted the county’s emergency order still stands prohibiting local lodging establishments from entering into contracts to house social services clients from municipalities outside Sullivan without the express consent of the county.
