Crown Heights Hotel Switches To Transitional Housing for “Unhoused” New Yorkers Diagnosed with Serious Mental Illness

by CrownHeights.info

NYC Health + Hospitals has announced that it will be expanding its Bridge to Home program to Brooklyn, building on the success of the program’s Manhattan site. The new site will be located at 1464 Atlantic Ave (Mirage Hotel) in Crown Heights.

Bridge to Home aims to break the cycle between street, shelter, and recurring hospital admission for “unhoused New Yorkers diagnosed with serious mental illness” (SMI) by addressing the gap between inpatient psychiatric treatment and permanent housing placement. The program offers unhoused patients with SMI a stable, home-like environment with onsite clinical services, behavioral health care, and housing application assistance to ensure they can continue their recovery while they transition to permanent housing. Earlier this month, the NYC Health + Hospitals Board of Directors approved a five-year lease to expand the program to Brooklyn.

Like its Manhattan counterpart, the Bridge to Home site at 1464 Atlantic Ave (Mirage Hotel) in Crown Heights, Brooklyn will serve up to 50 guests with 24/7 on-site services and stays of up to 12 months, until guests are connected to permanent, supportive housing. Providers from NYC Health + Hospitals/Woodhull will work on-site to ensure guests have access to a full spectrum of health care services, including behavioral health care, medical treatment, social services and housing navigation. The Brooklyn site is expected to welcome its first guests in early fall 2026.

“The core of Bridge to Home is simple: to provide our most vulnerable neighbors with the care and clinical services they need to recover,” said Mayor Mamdani. “For New Yorkers living with serious mental illness, the cycle between shelters, hospitals and the streets has become a revolving door that the City has accepted for too long. This program will help break that cycle with continuous care and a path to permanent housing.”

The news was received with mixed results among Crown Heights residents.

“NY is about to convert a hotel on Atlantic Ave near Kingston Ave to a Homeless shelter for very dangerous criminals,” s Lubavitcher resident who lives on Sterling Place stated. “While this is technically located in north Crown Heights just outside our community, what is stopping these shelter residents and former inmates with “serious mental illness” from roaming on Kingston a few blocks south into the Shchunah?”

New York City Council Member Crystal Hudson who represents Crown Heights lauded the site, noting that; “This program creates a real bridge between inpatient treatment and permanent housing while giving people the support and time they need to recover. I am grateful to NYC Health + Hospitals for bringing this investment to my district in Brooklyn and for continuing to build solutions that recognize the humanity and dignity of our unhoused neighbors.”

The reaction of some Crown Heights residents differed from Hudson’s view, with one noting that “Our ultra-progressive councilwoman Crystal Hudson actually had the audacity to proudly support this project with a “word salad” claiming that this shelter will help the neighborhood. Where is the red line? Will we CV”S wait for a real tragedy to happen before the Askonim notify our elected officials the common-sense reality that these shelters will put all the families, residents and visitors to the neighborhood in danger?”

Another member of anash that lives on Lincoln Place expressed that in the summer months when the weather is warm, Brower Park in north Crown Heights is frequented by many Chabad families, and questioned if it will still be safe to bring their children to that park with a Homeless shelter for patients with “serious mental illnesses” nearby.

NYC Health + Hospitals will present next week to Brooklyn Community Board 8 (CB8) their plan on how they will operate this new facility and why it will be ‘beneficial’ to the neighborhood. It is not known if they will allow any questions to be asked from the public. Unfortunately there currently are no Lubavitcher members on Community Board 8.

In a press release, NYS Assembly candidate Ahron Gluck reminded Crown Heights and East Flatbush residents that to vote for a member of anash in this month’s Democratic primary election, you must be registered to vote as a Democrat: https://e-register.vote.nyc/