Filthy migrant encampment — including illicit open-air market hawking drugs — sprouts up on Randall’s Island: ‘It’s a calamity’
Unruly migrants have taken over Randall’s Island.
An out-of-control encampment has sprouted up at the once-placid Manhattan park in recent weeks — with migrants even setting up an illicit open-air market hawking drugs.
More than 50 tents have now been set up along the East River on Randall’s Island, on the outskirts of the city-run 3,000-bed mega-shelter. Two dozen tents line the island end of the 98th Street walking path alone.
Photos show garbage, clothing and blankets littering the lush parkland, that is home to some of the Big Apple’s top athletic facilities and waterfront pathways.
Scores of electric scooters also clog the pathways, zipping along at dangerous speeds on bicycle paths.
Stands peddling food, loose cigarettes and joints have been set up by some enterprising campers.
The asylum-seeking outlaws have even tapped into city utility poles for electricity and commandeered water fountains for cooking and to bathe.
Meanwhile, New Yorkers trying to enjoy the outside oasis in the city are menacingly shooed away by the unwanted neighbors.
“This is my Zen place. Well, it was my Zen place,” said one Manhattanite who was chased and threatened by a migrant on the island on Wednesday.
“There was never any trash here and it’s filled with trash here,” she continued. “This is not my Zen place anymore. It’s a calamity place now.”
A pair of portable toilets installed by the city in the area are filthy and overflowing, and don’t appear to have been serviced for at least a week.
Meanwhile, a group of private security guards hired by the city to guard the massive city-run shelter were instead spotted at the water’s edge by The Post on Wednesday smoking a joint.
Asked about the mayhem, an NYPD cop stationed at the park to patrol the grounds agreed things were “getting out of hand.”
“Yeah, I know. The parks people are trying to move them out,” the cop said, motioning toward the brazen weed market. “Somebody’s going to have to make a decision here.”
A crew of cops and about 20 city parks workers finally showed up around 3 p.m. on Wednesday — sending some of the illicit peddlers scrambling and others packing up their tents in haste.
One migrant was charged with disorderly conduct and led off in cuffs, as workers packed up much of the gear — with one ranking cop telling The Post police and parks employees would likely conduct daily sweeps.
However, it’s unclear if the filthy tent city will be gone for good. A much smaller Randall’s Island encampment of about a half-dozen tents last year was taken down daily by the parks department only to sprout up the next day.
Many of the migrants now in the unkempt camp were housed inside the mega shelter erected by the city to accommodate the massive influx of migrants that have arrived in the Big Apple since 2022 after illegally crossing the southern border.
More than 212,000 migrants have now come through the city’s intake system, with about 64,000 still in tax-funded city care and shelters at 210 separate sites in the five boroughs.
Last week alone more than 700 migrants entered into city care.
But rules implemented by Mayor Eric Adams to limit shelter stays for migrants to 30 or 60 days have created a dilemma for some asylum seekers — many of whom don’t know the landscape outside of their shelter space and surrounding area.
“Inside Randall’s they don’t want to give shelter,” Venezuelan migrant Jesus Miravetti said Wednesday. “They don’t want to give us anything and then since we don’t have an ID or a partner, they throw us on the street and it’s difficult for us to get food.
“That’s why we live like this,” he said.
One bike-riding New Yorker told The Post this week that he tried to give directions to a migrant woman who asked him for train directions. He told her to get off at Central Park.
“‘What is Central Park?'” he said the woman asked him. “They need some type of orientation.”
Asked about the situation on Randall’s Island this week, Mayor Adams told reporters that “porta potties should never be an indicator that we’re accepting any form of encampments.
“I’m a big hygiene person, and it doesn’t matter if it’s used by someone who’s sleeping on a park bench or someone who’s walking by,” he said. “I don’t want people using our streets as toilet facilities.”
Adams’ chief of staff, Camille Joseph Varlack, said Big Apple police and parks officials will “continue to enforce the existing rules” on Randall’s Island against illicit vending and tent cities.
“Just because we have the two porta potties there does not mean that we are encouraging encampments,” Varlack said.
“Our policy on Randall’s Island is the same as it is across the city. For those individuals who are there, certainly we know with our 30 and 60 day rules that we continue to provide them with intensive case management.”
Pressed on the encampments there, Varlack said the city is “in the process of dealing with the encampments on Randall’s Island.”
But New Yorkers who have frequented the park say it’s hard to ignore what’s happening there.
“It’s definitely on the uptick now,” jogger Chris Kozarich told The Post. “This is starting to look a little out of control for sure. Wow, there’s a lot more tents than there were before. This has exploded.
“I was here maybe like five days ago and it wasn’t like this, at least in the morning,” Kozarich said. “I haven’t seen it like this.”
Additional reporting by Craig McCarthy
