A state judge has agreed to hear arguments in late July, protecting the Midtown East site at least temporarily beyond the city’s planned June 30 contract termination.

Mainchance, a drop-in homeless center in Midtown East, will maintain its funding at least a few weeks beyond June 30—when the city planned to terminate it—while a state court judge considers a lawsuit arguing that ending the facility’s contract would be “premature and baseless.”

At a brief court appearance held virtually Tuesday morning, Judge Lynn Kotler said she would issue a restraining order temporarily continuing the contract and associated funding, criticizing lawyers for Mayor Eric Adams’ administration for not seeming “interested in working out anything.”

She also set a hearing date for July 23. Brady Crain, the center’s director, expressed relief in a subsequent phone call. “I’m delighted. We won a temporary stay but there’s still a fight,” he told City Limits. 

Mainchance and its operator, Grand Central Neighborhood Social Services Corporation (GCNSSC), filed suit on June 5, after receiving a letter from the Department of Homeless Services (DHS) in May confirming the city’s plans to end Mainchance’s funding two years before its current contract is set to expire. 

“The city has made a decision to go a different way, which it’s entitled to do,” Blake Alhberg, assistant corporation counsel, told Judge Kotler Tuesday. 

Mainchance and GCNSSC are simultaneously appealing the city’s decision administratively, and filed the suit in an attempt to preserve funding while that potentially months-long process plays out. Today’s order signals the court may support that effort, according to Mainchance board member and attorney Marc Gross, who is representing the site and GCNSSC pro-bono. 

“This judge made it very clear that she could very well keep the center open by our having to exhaust administrative remedies through the comptroller’s office,” he said. 

“We were very pleased with the court’s understanding of the wider context of this case and the homeless crisis that the city is facing and the need to address it with dignity for the clients,” he added. 

New York City’s homeless population has been at record highs this year, with an estimated 147,000 people staying in city shelters in April. 

Founded in 1989, Mainchance has operated for over 20 years in a four-story building on East 32nd Street, an upscale office district off of Park Avenue. 

Drop-in centers don’t have beds. At Mainchance, overnight guests can sleep in large plastic adirondack-style chairs on the second floor, in a high-ceilinged room with a balcony. 

In addition to relief from the elements, Mainchance provides housing-related counseling and medical care, plus meals, showers and a monthly food pantry. Its lawsuit touts over 45,000 visits and 70,000 meals served during the year ending in June 2023. 

Clients deserve continuous support rather than being “pushed off” to other homeless shelters, Gross said while making his case to the judge Tuesday. 

Preliminary city budget documents describe Mainchance as “underperforming” and state that it will be replaced with new sites. The closure would save $3.7 million in Fiscal Year 2025, and an additional $10.2 million in the out-years, documents show. 

Yet DHS’ May 8 letter to Mainchance says the contract is being terminated “without cause.” Mainchance received “excellent” or “good” ratings on all performance audit metrics from 2021 to 2023, according to court records. And the city has confirmed that no other drop-in center closures are planned this budget cycle. 

“Why is this site different from all other sites?” Gross asked the court Tuesday.

According to Mainchance’s lawsuit, the closure is all the more puzzling because the organization has sought to convert to a hybrid Safe Haven facility. 

Unlike drop-in centers, Safe Havens have beds. These sites are distinct from traditional shelters, in that they have a low barrier to entry and aim to appeal to street homeless New Yorkers. Mainchance’s proposal calls for over 25 beds and 30 lounge chairs. 

Gross pointed to a March email from Ellery Gillette, assistant commissioner of capacity planning and development at DHS, stating that “DHS does not want to operate a drop-in at this site” but would review a “viable” proposal to convert the facility into a Safe Haven. 

Construction could be completed in three months for less than $500,000, within the organization’s current budget, Gross added. Yet messaging around the hybrid proposal has been confusing. Even if approved, renovations would only be possible with a continued contract, which the city seems determined to end. 

If funding is cut off, Gross said, Mainchance will lose its lease and have to fire its staff and “most importantly the homeless are going to be sent back on the street.” 

In a statement last week, after Mainchance filed suit but before the parties appeared in court, a Department of Social Services (DSS) spokesperson said that the Adams administration is working “aggressively” to expand low-barrier shelters, including both Safe Havens and drop-in centers. 

A new drop-in center is opening in Manhattan this summer, according to DSS, which will bring the borough’s total to three. 

Neither Mayor Adams’ press team, nor the City Law Department, immediately replied to a request for comment on Tuesday’s court outcome. 

Crain, Mainchance’s executive director, said afterwards that he did not go into the hearing with firm plans to shut down on June 30, instead holding out hope for some sort of intervention. 

“They thought we were a little agency and we were just gonna bow out and we showed them,” he said.

To reach the reporter behind this story, contact Emma@citylimits.org. To reach the editor, contact Jeanmarie@citylimits.org

Want to republish this story? Find City Limits’ reprint policy here.

Ten alleged members of a Minneapolis gang accused of “terrorizing” a city neighborhood have been charged with a range of federal crimes including possession of a machine gun and drug trafficking, law enforcement officials announced Tuesday.

The charges are the latest move in an ongoing federal initiative that began two years ago to crack down on violent crime in Minnesota, U.S. Attorney Andy Luger told reporters.

“Our federal resources are focused on holding accountable those who threaten the safety of our communities,” Luger said. “My message to the community: We are working for you, for your families and your children, to make sure violent crime continues to drop and we can all enjoy our beautiful cities this summer.”

Many of the cases prosecutors have brought under the initiative have involved the prosecution of gang members in north and south Minneapolis. Before Tuesday, federal prosecutors had already charged more than 70 alleged gang members, Luger said.

Last year, authorities set their sights on three Minneapolis-based gangs. The first round of charges was announced in May 2023, when federal authorities said 45 people had been charged for crimes including seven homicides, drug trafficking and firearms violations. Then in August of that year, 14 more alleged members of Minneapolis-based gangs were charged.

Tuesday’s charges involved a fourth gang. Minneapolis Police Chief Brian O’Hara said his department’s gun investigations unit and the FBI caught wind that gang members were seeking to reemerge in a south Minneapolis neighborhood after a period dormancy. Authorities began an investigation last fall.

“Much of the violence they perpetrate on our residents can be directly attributed to actions related to the distribution of fentanyl and other dangerous narcotics, illegally possessing firearms and in general terrorizing our community,” O’Hara said.

Investigators conducted search warrants and recovered cash, crack cocaine, methamphetamine, fentanyl and 13 illegal guns, O’Hara said.

The charges were brought ahead of the summer months, when violent crimes often rises, to ensure the gangs could not resurface, Luger said. Investigators believe the gang is local and not connected to a national criminal enterprise.

Nationwide, violent crime was down 15% in the first three months of 2024 compared to a year earlier, according to FBI data released this month. That reflects a continuing downward trend since a coronavirus pandemic surge. But at least one expert has cautioned that the declines in FBI data are preliminary and likely overstated.

In Minneapolis, O’Hara said there has been a drop in violent crime in some areas but not others. Efforts to curtail violent crime have been hampered by personnel shortages and the proliferation of illegal drugs and guns, he added.

“Today, we are here to say that enough is enough,” O’Hara said.

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Glenn Whipp | Los Angeles Times (TNS)

LOS ANGELES — I’ve written about the Emmy races for limited series and comedy, which brings us to drama. And if you think this is an instance of me saving the best for last, that’s not the case. Far from it. Thanks to production delays caused by last year’s strikes as well as the end of such Emmy nominated perennials as “Succession” and “Better Call Saul,” this year’s lineup of drama series contenders is thin. The eventual nominees might not be the worst slate ever selected … but it’s going to be close.

How bad will it be? That depends on whether you believe that there’s such a thing as guilty pleasures (hey, if you like something, why apologize?) or that pleasure can be found in hate-watching a series just to see how cuckoo it can get. With those stipulations in mind, let’s look at the landscape, which can charitably be described as “wide open,” for this year’s Emmy drama categories.

DRAMA SERIES

Maybe you consider this first season of “Shōgun” to be a limited series, just like the 1980 television adaptation of James Clavell’s book that starred Richard Chamberlain. I won’t argue. I will just tell you to give thanks that it’s coming back for a couple more seasons, and because of that, it will be competing as a drama and classing up the joint. It will be joined by the final season of “The Crown,” the only nominee from last season eligible this year.

Emmy voters have been content to ignore Apple TV+’s flagship series “The Morning Show” in this category, rewarding it mostly for its acting. It had a new showrunner this year, and you can’t say Charlotte Stoudt didn’t lean into the zany plot twists and frenetic energy that fans seem to love. Meanwhile, another Apple TV+ show, the well-regarded misfit spy saga “Slow Horses,” is still looking for its first Emmy nomination of any kind. Good news! It’s a wide-open landscape!

From there, voters can rummage through a perfectly entertaining Marvel series (“Loki”), a couple of stylish crime dramas (“Sugar,” “Tokyo Vice”), a giddy, postapocalyptic video game adaptation (“Fallout”), a challenging take on an unadaptable book from the “Games of Thrones” team (“3 Body Problem”), light period fluff (“The Gilded Age”) and a movie adaptation that, in my circle, no one had the patience to watch to the end (“Mr. & Mrs. Smith”). That could also be said about “The Curse,” a show equally brilliant and alienating.

Anna Sawai as Toda Mariko in “Shōgun.” (Kurt Iswarienko/FX/TNS)

DRAMA ACTRESS

Nobody had a better character arc than Anna Sawai on “Shōgun” — vassal, translator, warrior, lover, avenger. Her final moments on the show stand up to anything on television this year. Emma Stone, now a two-time Oscar winner with her recent triumph for “Poor Things,” is a formidable contender as well for her unsettling turn on “The Curse.”

Several leads could be nominated after being passed over last year — Imelda Staunton for playing Queen Elizabeth II on “The Crown,” Carrie Coon for wholeheartedly embracing the melodrama of “The Gilded Age” and Jennifer Aniston for her star turn on “The Morning Show.” Voters opted for Aniston’s co-star, Reese Witherspoon, in 2023. Maybe they’ll attend the ceremony together in September.

Other possibilities: Maya Erskine (“Mr. & Mrs. Smith”), Carrie Preston for “The Good Wife”-verse spinoff “Elsbeth” and Juliette Binoche for her cold-blooded Coco Chanel on “The New Look” (and because she deserved more love for making us swoon in Tran Anh Hung’s film “The Taste of Things”). Ella Purnell might be the most deserving dark-horse contender for the hell her character went through on “Fallout.”

DRAMA ACTOR

I don’t know what’s going on with television critics’ digestive systems, but I don’t think I’ve read a review of “Slow Horses” that hasn’t expressed a deep appreciation for Gary Oldman ‘s ability to pass gas. Can you win an Emmy for a certain flair for flatulence? We’re about to find out.

“Shōgun” leads Hiroyuki Sanada and Cosmo Jarvis will both be nominated and, as this adaptation belongs to Sanada’s Lord Toranaga, he has the upper hand. (Nobody bests Toranaga.) One thing I just learned: Dominic West has never been nominated for an Emmy. Appreciation for the last two seasons of “The Crown” has ebbed, and perhaps he’s too charming to play Prince Charles, but his grieving monarch was nonetheless affecting.

More often than not, voters like to have an emotional connection with characters. That puts Nathan Fielder (“The Curse”) and Donald Glover (“Mr. & Mrs. Smith”) at a disadvantage but maybe increases the hopes for Walton Goggins, whose Ghoul has a tragic backstory on “Fallout.” Colin Farrell’s private detective also was dealing with a dark past — and a big secret — on “Sugar,” a series that confounded many viewers with its midseason twist but worked (mostly) for me as a stylish, sci-fi noir. Farrell always delivers.

Lesley Manville as Princess Margaret in “The Crown.” (Keith Bernstein/Netflix/TNS)

DRAMA SUPPORTING ACTRESS

Elizabeth Debicki won the Screen Actors Guild award for her sensitive portrayal of a melancholy Diana on “The Crown” earlier this year, and with Jennifer Coolidge out of the race, she might well win the Emmy too. Castmate Lesley Manville should be nominated as well, since the series finally gave her a showcase episode in “Ritz,” the gorgeous, devastating highlight of “The Crown’s” final season. Manville’s Princess Margaret is absolutely breathtaking. Maybe she should take the Emmy.

Another English legend, Kristin Scott Thomas, could earn a nod for her droll perfection in “Slow Horses.” As for the remaining five spots: Emmy favorites Christine Baranski (15 nominations, one win) and Cynthia Nixon (five nods, two Emmys) have a case for elevating “The Gilded Age” above the ordinary. Moeka Hoshi and Fumi Nikaido might be part of a “Shōgun” sweep. (Both had exceptional moments in the season finale.) And four women from “The Morning Show” — Greta Lee, Holland Taylor, Nicole Beharie and Karen Pittman — had memorable scenes that could linger in voters’ minds.

DRAMA SUPPORTING ACTOR

Billy Crudup won this category for the first season of “The Morning Show,” and he remains the best reason to watch the series. His co-star this season, Jon Hamm, playing the suave, space-loving billionaire that Elon Musk can only wish to be, will join him. Perhaps Mark Duplass, nominated for the first season, returns as well.

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They probably won’t be the only castmates nominated here. Look for Khalid Abdalla and Jonathan Pryce from “The Crown,” and as many as three “Shōgun” actors — Tadanobu Asano, Takehiro Hira and Tokuma Nishioka. (Asano’s wildly entertaining portrayal of Yabushige makes him my favorite in the whole category.)

And it feels like after eight nominations — and one win — as a guest actor, it might be time for Nathan Lane to get his due as a regular on “The Gilded Age.” His sweet-potato-pie Savannah, Georgia, accent is absolutely, delightfully ridiculous — just like the show.

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