He said he agreed to go there voluntarily because his counselor at a city-run shelter told him it was nice.

Among researchers and advocates around the country, New York's city-run shelters are notorious for being violent, drug-infested places.

It's the worst of the city-run shelters," he said.

The shelter, one of the few remaining city-run shelters, will use the money toward staff development, he said.

More than half of those brought in could end up in city-run shelters or back on the streets.

The agency's goal is to winnow the number of city-run shelters to six.

Some homeless people, particularly those who live in common-law relationships or continue to use drugs, do not want to follow the rules of city-run shelters.

Early on, he stayed in city-run shelters, but he stopped, he said, after he was robbed.

The homeless they found would be offered food and housing in a city-run shelter.

There was even a contingent of men from a city-run homeless shelter on Wards Island who stopped by to sample the food.