U.S. says Dallas County shelter sites aren’t the only possibilities

By MICHAEL A. LINDENBERGER
Washington Bureau
mlindenberger@dallasnews.com
Published: 08 July 2014 10:28 PM
Updated: 08 July 2014 10:28 PM[/COLOR]

WASHINGTON — The U.S. government is evaluating many sites — not just those offered by Dallas County Judge Clay Jenkins — to shelter thousands of Central American children who have been detained along the U.S. border with Mexico, officials said Tuesday.

Dallas County’s proposalto house up to 2,000 children at two unused sites in Dallas and one in Grand Prairie is one of many under consideration, a spokesman for the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services said.

Offers have been made nationwide by community agencies and local and state governments, said Kenneth Wolfe, deputy public affairs director for Administration for Children and Families, which administers the department’s programs for unaccompanied minors stopped at the border.

Wolfe said the government is also evaluating potential temporary shelter sites already proposed by the Pentagon and the Government Accountability Office.

“Organizations, communities and states have offered to help with this humanitarian response,” Wolfe said.

“While only a few facilities will ultimately be selected, a wide range of facilities are being identified and evaluated to determine if they may feasibly provide temporary shelter space for children. Facilities will be announced when they are identified as viable options.”

Jenkins, in an interview, said nothing is certain. “A lot of things could still happen,” he said.

However, he said, his conversations with HHS officials left him confident that children will be sent to Dallas County by the end of July.

“I believe it’s very likely to happen,” he said.

Still, he conceded, “there are a lot of moving parts here. … It’s a very fluid situation.”

The administration is scrambling to find suitable shelter for unaccompanied minors from Central America, tens of thousands of whom have been stopped by border agents since Oct. 1.

A 2002 federal law requires that they must be cared for while officials determine whether they have a legal right to remain in the country.

In most years, that has meant only brief stays in federal custody. But over the past two years, the number of unaccompanied children stopped at the border has surged. Last year, more than 14,000 were put into HHS custody. This year, that number is expected to swell to 60,000.

Jenkins said he wants Dallas County to help. A tour of detention facilities in McAllen left him shaken, he said. “If you have ever been in a drunk tank, that’s what it looks like. Little children with their faces pressed up against the glass doors looking across the way at their older brothers or sisters.”

It’s not clear whether the government has the money to pay for sheltering the children in Dallas. President Barack Obama told Congress in a letter Tuesday that without an emergency infusion of $1.8 billion, the Health and Human Services Department would not have the money to adequately care for the children.

Jenkins said he couldn’t get an answer from the department Tuesday about whether the extra funds from Congress would be required to bring the children to Dallas.

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