This week, the Adams administration initiated its initiative to distribute prepaid debit cards to migrants in New York City, following a contentious $53 million contract awarded without a bid two months prior.
Employees from Mobility Capital Finance, a New Jersey-based firm, began issuing eight Mastercards preloaded with funds at the Roosevelt Hotel on Monday, marking the start of a pilot program set to expand to 115 cards by the following week, as confirmed by a spokesperson from City Hall.
The year-long agreement attracted scrutiny when it was disclosed that the contract had been finalized without undergoing the standard bidding process.
The tech startup stands to gain approximately $1.8 million from the deal by receiving a portion of the funds loaded onto each card, as stipulated in the contract.
Adjustments were made to the initial proposal, which would have provided cards loaded with a month’s worth of funds for food and baby necessities. Now, the cash will be replenished weekly.
A spokesperson mentioned that a family with two adults and children under five would get roughly $350 weekly.
Attempts to locate any migrant families who had received the cards on Monday were unsuccessful. Even employees at the Roosevelt Hotel were unaware of the distribution.
The pilot program aims to assist about 460 of the 64,500 migrants under the city’s care as City Hall monitors its effectiveness.
“This initiative, which aims to replace the city’s current method of delivering non-perishable food boxes to migrant families in hotels—a lot of which ends up being discarded—will be a cost-saving measure,” stated Kayla Mamalek, a spokesperson for Adams.
City Hall estimates that the new method of feeding asylum seekers could lead to savings of up to $600,000 monthly.
The Adams administration has defended the emergency contract as a necessary step to expedite the launch of this cost-saving program.
Nevertheless, it was two months before any prepaid cards were distributed.
City Hall has avoided answering questions regarding the delay, merely stating that the rollout proceeded as planned.