unaccompanied immigrant children
have poured into South Texas,
community leaders from Dallas to Los
Angeles to Syracuse, N.Y., have offered
to set up temporary shelters to relieve
the Army bases, holding cells and
converted warehouses at the border.
The outreach offers stand in sharp
contrast to other places around the
country, where some protested having
immigrants from Central America come
to their towns while the nation's
leaders attempt to find solutions to the
issue.
In Dallas County, Judge Clay Jenkins
has offered three county buildings that
could hold as many as 2,000 migrants
at one time.
"These are just like your and my
children, except that they're scared and
they're dirty and they're tired and
they're terrified," Jenkins said. "We can
take some pressure off those border
troops and let them get out of the
childcare business and back into the
border security business."
More than 57,000 unaccompanied
children have been apprehended since
October, the Border Patrol says. Three-
fourths of them are from Honduras,
Guatemala and El Salvador, and say
they are fleeing pervasive gang violence
and crushing poverty. By the time they
have reached South Texas, they have
survived a treacherous journey through
drug-war-torn Mexico.
President Obama has asked Congress
to authorize $3.7 billion in emergency
spending to increase enforcement at the
border, build more facilities to
temporarily house the unaccompanied
minors, and beef up legal aid. White
House Press Secretary Josh Earnest
has said the government will entitle
due process but will not guarantee a
"welcome to this country with open
arms."
In the meantime, from California to
Massachusetts, communities are
offering to build or rehab facilities to
take in child migrants until they
connect with relatives, plea asylum
cases or enter into foster care. The U.S.
Department of Health and Human
Services is responsible for ensuring one
of those three outcomes before it
deports any minor.
Demonstrators in Murrieta, California,
made national headlines for their
strong opposition to the child migrants.
But while protesters frustrated efforts
to process immigrant families there,
other California communities have
been encouraging agencies to build
shelters and start programs to assist
unaccompanied children caught
crossing the border.
Los Angeles Mayor Eric Garcetti has
been working with federal officials and
local nonprofits to try to provide
shelter and legal representation for the
children, noting that many are likely
planning to reunite with their parents.
In San Francisco, county officials are
also looking at ways to help provide
medical, mental health, educational
and legal services once the children are
released from federal custody.
Thousands of miles from where the
children are entering the country,
Massachusetts Gov. Deval Patrick said
Friday that HHS officials will review
Camp Edwards military base on Cape
Cod and Westover Air Reserve Base in
Chicopee to see if either is suitable for
holding as many as 1,000 children.
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