A very interesting and I am sure a debatable news story that has just come out here at cruise.co.uk.
It has been brought to our attention that the Excelsior Hotel in New York are taking in homeless people as well as full paying holiday makers.
(Photo by Spencer Platt/Getty Images)
As you can imagine this has caused quite a stir and many people not at all happy about this. Depending on where you have booked (if you have booked this hotel) you can cancel it and get a full refund as this was not mention in erratas on the booking system.
But what about the issue itself? And is it an issue?
Personally I don’t think I would have a problem with it, i think it is all very charitable and we all need to pay our part.
Quite often I hear about the homeless as people that maybe not have chosen this lifestyle but are more likely to have been ‘Drawn a bad hand’ in life. Each homeless person has their own individual story and I can not judge any of them on just appearance or stereotyping.
Below is a extract from a NY news paper that has a little more insight into it and why.
***At least 40 homeless people are currently living at a luxury hotel on the Upper West Side.
The city is paying for the group to stay at the Excelsior Hotel at 45 West 81st Street. It’s unclear how much the city is paying for the accommodations, but rooms at the hotel typically cost $200 to $300 a night. Some other guests said they worried that the arrangement is dangerous, but city officials stood by it.
“It’s part of every neighborhood’s responsibility to help these families get back on their feet,” Helen Rosenthal, a City Council member who represents the Upper West Side, told the New York Post.
Mayor Bill de Blasio said in February that the city was going to start cutting down on the number of hotels doubling as homeless shelters, following fatal stabbings at a Staten Island hotel. A mother and her two daughters had been staying at the Ramada Island for two months when they were stabbed to death.
On average, the cost of renting hotel rooms for homeless people comes to just under $5,000 a month per room, according to city officials. In late 2015, the city was renting approximately 1,100 rooms.
In October, the Coalition for the Homeless said the city had grossly underestimated the homeless population, claiming it’s closer to 6,000 and 12,000, well above the official estimate of 3,000 to 4,000. — Kathryn Brenzel ****
Check out the hotel forum websites, there are some very interesting views from paying customers.
What do you think to this? Is it the right moral decision? Would you mind bumping into homeless people in your hotel lobby?