Ten people die in NYC’s frigid cold, raising questions about the city’s preparedness

NEW YORK (AP) — One man was discovered under a layer of snow on a park bench in Queens. Another was found just steps from a Manhattan hospital. Yet another was pronounced dead on the ground beneath an elevated train line in the Bronx.

Each is among a growing number of people — at least 10, as of Tuesday — who died after being exposed to the bitter cold that has persisted in New York City since late last Friday.

Their causes of death are still under investigation, but some showed signs of having succumbed to hypothermia. Officials said several victims were believed to have been living on the streets. The temperature in the city fell to 9 degrees (minus 13 degrees Celsius) on Saturday.

With the frigid temperatures expected to continue through the week, Mayor Zohran Mamdani said the city was adding additional homeless outreach workers, opening new warming centers and instructing hospitals to limit discharges “to ensure that people who have nowhere to go are kept indoors.”

But the rising death toll has also prompted questions about whether Mamdani’s nascent administration could have done more to protect the city’s most vulnerable residents ahead of the Arctic blast and the snowstorm that hit early Sunday.

One of the victims, a 52-year-old man living in Queens, was found Sunday morning with discharge papers in his pocket showing he had been released from Elmhurst Hospital, a city-run facility, on Friday, according to State Senator Jessica Ramos.

By the time of his release, the city had already activated its Code Blue protocols, a set of extreme weather policies that include precautions meant to ensure homeless patients are not released back onto the street.

It was not immediately clear if the man, who is originally from Ecuador, had been living outside at the time of his death. Inquiries to City Hall, the Department of Homeless Services and the city’s public hospital system were not returned.

The city has yet to release the names of any of those who died during the storm.

Studies have shown that around 15 people suffer from cold-related deaths in New York City each year. But homeless advocates said they could not remember another storm in recent memory that resulted in so many deaths outside in such a brief period.

“The fact that this many people have passed away shows the city needs to do a much better job of making people feel safe when they come inside,” said David Giffen, the executive director of the Coalition for the Homeless. “It’s not that most of the people on the streets are unaware of the shelter system, but that they’ve had experiences there that make them not want to return.”

In the lead-up to the storm, city-contracted outreach teams fanned out across the five boroughs, attempting to coax residents to accept placements in shelters, transitional housing or even heated buses. Mamdani and his deputies have repeatedly urged New Yorkers to look out for those in need of help.

“Extreme weather is not a personal failure, but it is a public responsibility,” Mamdani said on Tuesday. “We are mobilizing every resource at our disposal to ensure that New Yorkers are brought indoors during this potentially lethal weather event.”

The city’s social services commissioner, Molly Wasow Park, said at least 200 people have voluntarily accepted shelter since the storm began. She said the city has also moved to involuntarily hospitalize a handful of people, including those who were wet, inappropriately dressed or “unable to acknowledge that there are real dangers.”

Ramos said the man discovered on the park bench was wearing only a thin jacket. His body appeared to be frozen when it was found by police under a layer of snow on Sunday morning.

“It’s devastating to know the government could have done more and didn’t,” she said. “There are real questions here that demand answers.”