The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) aggressively works with its interagency partners to ensure that unaccompanied migrant children (UC) are safe and unified with family members or other suitable sponsors as quickly and safely as possible. To support this effort, HHS has selected with the assistance of Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) the Freeman Expo Center in San Antonio, Texas, as an Emergency Intake Site (EIS) for up to 2,400 children.
The Emergency Intake Site will provide ORR with needed capacity to accept children from Customs and Border Protection (CBP) into its care where they can be safely processed, cared for and either released to a sponsor or transferred to an appropriate ORR shelter for longer-term care. The Emergency Intake Site is intended for use as a temporary measure.
The Emergency Intake Site will provide required standards of care for children such as providing clean and comfortable sleeping quarters, meals, toiletries, laundry, and access to medical services. A COVID-19 health screening protocol for all children will be implemented to follow CDC guidelines for preventing and controlling communicable diseases. Services will be provided by a combination of contractors, and federal staff - including teams from the HHS Office of the Assistant Secretary for Preparedness and Response and the US Public Health Service Commissioned Corps.
The Flores Monitor has been notified. All efforts will be made to safely release children to sponsors or transfer them to other ORR care providers as quickly as possible.
HHS will utilize all available options to safely care for the children. These options include both short-term and long-term solutions. In the short-term, ORR is working to ensure children don't spend more time in border patrol facilities than necessary by: 1) safely increasing capacity in its permanent/licensed network by implementing enhanced CDC COVID-19 mitigation strategies; 2) safely reducing the time it takes to unify UC with sponsor; 3) using Influx Care Facilities with the same standards of care used in its permanent/licensed network; and 4) establishing Emergency Intake Sites to decrease over-crowding in CBP facilities. Simultaneously, ORR is committed to aggressively moving toward the long-term goal of acquiring enough state-licensed beds in our care provider network to reduce the need in the future for Influx Care Facilities or Emergency Intake Sites.
ORR operates a network of over 200 facilities/programs in 22 states, and has a proven track record of accountability and transparency for program operations, as well as being a good neighbor in the communities where facilities are located.
In addition to the Freeman Expo Center in San Antonio EIS, HHS has taken steps to significantly increase in bed capacity, including:
- On February 22, HHS opened the Carrizo Springs Influx Care Facility (ICF), Carrizo Springs, Texas adding an additional 952 beds to our care-provider network.
- With the assistance of FEMA, on March 19, HHS opened an Emergency Intake Site for Unaccompanied Children in Midland, Texas with the potential capacity of 700 beds.
- With the assistance of FEMA, on March 19, HHS opened an Emergency Intake Site in Dallas, TX, with the potential capacity of 2300 beds.
- On March 20, HHS announced it will open an Influx Care Facility (ICF) at Target Lodge Pecos North, in Pecos, Texas with the potential capacity of 2000 beds.
- On March 23, HHS announced it will open a second site in the Carrizo Springs, Texas area. The Dimmit site will add an additional 500 Influx Care Facility (ICF) beds.
- With the assistance of FEMA, on March 24, HHS announced it will open an Emergency Intake Site for Unaccompanied Children at the San Diego Convention Center, with the initial potential capacity of 1,400 beds.
- With the assistance of the Department of Defense (DOD) on March 25, HHS announced it will open Emergency Intake Sites (EIS) for Unaccompanied Children at Fort Bliss near El Paso, Texas with potential capacity of up to 5000 beds and at Joint Base San Antonio Lackland, near San Antonio, Texas with the potential capacity of up to 350 beds.
HHS will keep Congress, State, and local officials informed of future actions concerning UC matters throughout our care-provider network.
USCCB/MRS Safe Passages Family Reunification program will continue to update you accordingly.
