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A chic hotel in the heart of Broadway has been quietly operating as a migrant shelter for over a year, The Post has learned, as the Big Apple continues to grapple with the ongoing crisis.
The 141-room Square Hotel at 226 West 50th Street between Eighth Avenue and Broadway is just across from Gershwin Theatre, where the musical âWickedâ is playing.
âTo our valued guests: it is with great sadness that we announce the Square Hotel will be closed for the foreseeable future. We appreciate your patronage and hope to welcome you back someday soon,â the Square Hotel says on its Facebook page.
The hotelâs website says, âPlease pardon our appearance as we slip into something new! We look forward to welcoming you in the future.â
The hotel site still boasts a Japanese restaurant and bar in its lobby and âArt Nouveau styled hotel roomsâ with âsophisticated furniture, plush beds with down comforters and deluxe linens, flat-screen televisions with cable and C.O. Bigelow toiletries.â
But recent visits to the Square Hotel found a much different scene.
A National Guard soldier is seen stationed at the entrance of the lobby.
A couple with carry on luggage walked into the hotel on Sunday, but were escorted out by National Guardsmen.
A sign placed at the lobby entrance last week warned that motor bikes chained to scaffolding and poles in front of the hotel would be cut and removed.
One critic said âlazyâ hotel operators even in the Great White Way have concluded that itâs more profitable to take the easy money from the city to fully occupy their rooms with migrants rather than book tourists.
âThese hotels could be doing a fine tourist business right now, but they are being lazy, and a sure-thing 100-percent occupancy on the city dime, and without having to provide traditional hotel services, is just too good a deal to pass up,â said Nicole Gelinas, a senior fellow at the Manhattan Institute.
Other pro-business advocates said itâs sad that the city and the hotel industry are turning the Broadway District into a migrant district.
âWe consider the Broadway District a key to the cityâs economy. There is only one Broadway âin the entire world!â said state Conservative Party Chairman Gerard Kassar…
READ FULL ARTICLE HERE… (nypost.com)
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