Immigrant center hits record number of immigrants staying overnight
Recent influx cause’s Sacred Heart to add new tent
by KRISTIAN HERNANDEZ
Posted: Tuesday, August 11, 2015 8:00 am
KRISTIAN HERNANDEZ | STAFF WRITER
McALLEN — A recent immigrant influx and changes in immigration policy could be to blame for the unprecedented influx of overnight stays last month at a local relief center.
The immigrant relief center, which Catholic Charities of the Rio Grande Valley opened 14 months ago at Sacred Heart Church downtown, saw nearly three times the average number of immigrants staying overnight over the last 30 days.
This recent increase has changed the way the center processes migrants and prompted Sister Norma Pimentel, executive director of CCRGV, to request an additional tent, which was installed last week by city workers.
“It’s definitely put a strain on our resources,” Pimentel said. “This is a respite center and what we want is to take care for their immediate needs and they move on. So if they stay overnight, we need to work additional hours and we need additional help to take care of them.”
A total of 762 migrants spent the night at the center in July, 29 percent more than at the peak of last year’s surge, according to the latest data from CCRGV.
Pimentel said they began noticing families arriving at the center without bus tickets starting in late June. She said there was also an increase in men coming through the center, which prompted her to expedite the installment of the new 25-by-35-foot tent which can accommodate about 35 people.
“The extra tent is just to be prepared,” Pimentel said. “We’ve always needed the extra space, but the main factor recently was the increase in fathers. I wanted to make sure we made that separation between them and the women and children.”
Immigrations and Customs Enforcement routinely coordinates release plans and travel arrangements with family members of people being released from custody in the Rio GrandeValley, but in recent instances ICE failed to confirm these plans, according to a statement from agency spokeswoman Nina Pruneda.
“While ICE contacted family members, confirmation of ticketed travel were not received,” Pruneda wrote. “ICE is now again ensuring ticketed travel confirmation is received before releasing individuals from custody.”
Pimentel said ICE officials called her before releasing some of these families to the center without travel plans.
“This is something they checked with me first,” Pimentel said. “We accepted that commitment to help them contact the families because we have more time here to do it.”
Preparing for an increase
At the border, agents are also seeing an increase in illegal crossers. Border Patrol agents held a briefing Aug. 3 at their Rio Grande Valley Sector Headquarters to inform local entities and stakeholders of a recent uptick in unaccompanied minors and families from Central America coming across from Mexico illegally.
Recently, 750 people were apprehended in one day, according to Border Patrol spokesman Omar Zamora. He said they are seeing an average of 250 to 300 people more than in the recent months. He attributes this recent uptick to the summer months and said it is nowhere close to the nearly 1,500 daily apprehensions they were seeing at the same time last year.
“It’s not alarming for us. It’s something that we expected to see, but at the same time it is something that we are going to keep a pulse on,” Zamora said. “If we do see an increase, we want to make sure we don’t get caught off guard.”
Since last year’s surge, Border Patrol has increased their capacity to process immigrants in McAllen and focused on keeping law enforcement and other key players informed, Zamora said.
This increase comes months after immigration officials announced policy changes causing immigrants to be released faster after ICE began issuing them ankle-monitoring bracelets instead of sending them to detentions centers, according to recent reports.
In late July, U.S. District Judge Dolly Gee ordered the release of all children from immigrant family detention centers after ruling it violated parts of a 1997 settlement from another case barring immigrant children from being held in secure facilities.
There are two centers in Texas at KarnesCity and Dilley, both south of San Antonio, that combined hold some 1,400 women and children. A third center is located in Berks County, Pennsylvania. All three are overseen by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement but managed by private prison operators.
“I think the ankle bracelets would be an alternative to detention and I think that could bring the numbers to possibly be very similar to last year,” Pimentel said. “Instead of releasing them to a detention center, they allow them to continue to travel with that ankle bracelet so therefore more will be released to the center.”
“I assume that may be the course that we may see in the future and the extra tent is definitely going to help us in case we need it,” she added. “Right now, it’s hard to say what will happen. It’s all just speculation.”
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