Migrants struggle to find shelter as encampment grows in Brooklyn neighborhood

BROOKLYN, N.Y. (PIX11) – A resourceful migrant washed his feet with water from a city fire hydrant, using a hose borrowed from a community garden in Bed-Stuy Brooklyn.

On this block, Venezuelan migrants straddle one side of the corner. West Africans are on the other side.

They have joined an encampment of street homeless migrants, which has only grown in size since the nearby Stockton Street shelter right down the block shut down last week.

We met Moustapha on Friday. He’s a Senegalese migrant who did not want to be identified and says he’s now spending his tenth night on the street.  

“We’re trying to look for apartments, and we just don’t know where to find them,” Moustapha told PIX11 News through a translator.

A spokesperson for Mayor Eric Adams tells PIX11 News that before it closed, some 270 migrants lived at the Stockton Street shelter.

They say the combination of frequent shelter closings and 30- and 60-day shelter limits makes it impossible to accurately count the number of migrants currently fending for themselves, including the men here at the community garden.  

Decades ago, this was an abandoned lot filled with crack vials and needle...