Workers filing federal complaint against immigrant shelter employer

At least 10 people hired to work at the temporary shelter for unaccompanied immigrant children at Naval Base Ventura County had their positions terminated because of their work authorization through the federal Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program.

The group, led by Clergy and Laity United for Economic Justice — Ventura County, is in the process of filing a complaint with the U.S. Department of Justice seeking a formal apology and compensation for lost wages from nonprofit Southwest Key Programs that operated the now-closed shelter.

The Port Hueneme shelter was hastily opened June 6 as one of three military sites designated as emergency shelters to help cope with the surge of unaccompanied children — primarily from Guatemala, El Salvador or Honduras — illegally crossing the U.S.-Mexico border.

About 1,540 immigrant teenagers temporarily lived at the Port Hueneme shelter during the two months it operated.

The federal Administration for Children and Families closed the emergency shelters in Port Hueneme, Texas and Oklahoma at the beginning of August, but the Defense Department authorized the use of the three facilities through January if they need to be reopened.

Texas-based Southwest Key Programs, which has a cooperative agreement with the Administration for Children and Families, was tasked with staffing the shelter that started housing immigrant teenagers the day after the Defense Department authorized use of the facility, Administration for Children spokesman Kenneth Wolfe said.

Southwest Key runs 14 permanent shelters for unaccompanied minors across Arizona, Texas and California, but the Port Hueneme facility was the first time the nonprofit had operated a temporary shelter on a military site.

In the process of hiring hundreds to staff the shelter, Southwest Key hired several people who are legally authorized to work in the United States, but are neither legal permanent residents nor U.S. citizens.

Southwest Key's requirements to work at the shelter included being at least 21 years old, legally permitted to work in the U.S., having a valid driver's license or ID, speaking and understanding Spanish, and having at least a high school diploma or GED.

Under most circumstances, however, an individual needs to have at least legal permanent resident status to access a military site.

Naval Base Ventura County spokeswoman Kimberly Gearhart said people who aren't legal permanent residents or citizens can be granted base access if they have a relative living on base or are visiting under a working environment.

But the process is "fairly lengthy and Southwest Key wouldn't have been able to authorize it because they're contractors and not military," Gearhart said.

Less than two weeks after the shelter opened, two women went to Naval Base Ventura County for their first day as youth care workers at the shelter and gained access to the base with their forms of California identification.

But after getting to the shelter facility, they were promptly escorted off the base by a Southwest Key administrator because they were not legal residents, according to CLUE-VC Executive Director Juana Tapia.

Southwest Key was "just hiring left and right and trying to fill the positions as quickly as possible," Tapia said. "They seem to be playing this Ping-Pong game with these Dreamers. Nobody was telling them what had happened and why they had been hired."

Southwest Key did not immediately respond to requests for comment.

The next day, Southwest Key told employees without legal resident status they were being let go because they could not gain access to the base.

"If it's so commonly known that with it being a Navy Base there's extra rules and special precautions that they take, I don't understand how that mistake could have been made," Tapia said. "We continue to think of them (Southwest Key) as very negligent."

Oxnard residents Gabriela Macias, 22, and Cinthia Montero, 24, were hired to work as youth care workers earning $16 per hour at the shelter, but their positions were terminated during their training session June 18 because they are not legal permanent residents.

The women are authorized to work in the country after being approved for the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program, or DACA, which allows certain minors who were brought into the United States illegally to apply for renewable work authorization and temporary protection from deportation. DACA recipients can also get a Social Security number and a driver's license.

Macias and Montero are among the 10 local residents filing a complaint against Southwest Key with the Department of Justice.

The day after Macias, 22, graduated with bachelor's degrees in Spanish and Latin American studies from UC Santa Barbara, she left two part-time jobs and moved back to Oxnard to start her training with Southwest Key.

"It was a cause that I really cared about and I wanted to see these kids and I wanted to make sure they were in good conditions," she said. "I literally dropped everything for that. It was very stressful for me. For it to just fall apart like that, it was very stressful being unemployed and not working."

Montero said after she accepted the Southwest Key position, she gave up her job at Macy's where she was working 24 hours per week, another job at the bookstore at Oxnard College and canceled her summer college courses.

The shelter positions required they work 12-hour shifts six days per week.

"I felt that this chance was a once in a lifetime opportunity," she said. "Being a child whose father was deported was something that was near to my heart because I could relate and I was really excited about it."

Montero said being unexpectedly fired after leaving her other commitments was a financial shock.

"I want to put my foot down and say, ‘No, it's not OK. You can't be playing with people's lives like this. You can't come here and promise things and not go through with it,'" she said. "It hurt me quite a lot."

Link to Ventura County Star article

Shelter for immigrant children closes

The temporary shelter for unaccompanied immigrant children at Naval Base Ventura County closed last week just three days after federal officials announced it would "phase down" and close within two months.

The last group of about 110 13- to 17-year-olds living at the Navy facility was released Aug. 7, more than three weeks before the scheduled Aug. 31 closure date that was reported to Ventura County health officials.

About 1,540 immigrant teenagers lived at the Port Hueneme shelter during the two months it operated.

Children at the two other temporary shelters in the U.S. were discharged, as well. They left the Fort Sill Army installation in Oklahoma on Aug. 6 and Joint Base San Antonio-Lackland in Texas on Saturday, according to federal officials.

The Defense Department authorized the Department of Health and Human Services to use the three military sites as emergency shelters through January to help cope with a surge of unaccompanied children — primarily from Guatemala, El Salvador or Honduras — illegally crossing the U.S.-Mexico border.

The Administration for Children and Families, a branch of Health and Human Services, suspended use of the temporary shelters after it "expanded capacity to care for children in standard shelters, which are significantly less costly facilities," spokesman Kenneth Wolfe said in an email. "At the same time, we have seen a decrease in the number of children crossing the southwest border."

Nearly 7,800 minors were temporarily housed and discharged from the three military shelters after they opened in May and early June, Wolfe said.

Most children were released to a family member or sponsor living in the United States while they await immigration proceedings.

Custody of unaccompanied minors detained at the border is transferred within 72 hours to Health and Human Services, which has about 100 permanent shelters near the southwest border.

But the shelters became overwhelmed as 57,000 children were detained illegally crossing the border without a parent during a nine-month time period ending in June.

That number is expected to reach 90,000 by the end of September — a nearly fourfold increase from the 24,000 unaccompanied minors detained by Customs and Border Protection during the 2013 fiscal year, according to the Department of Homeland Security.

There have been fewer unaccompanied children apprehended at the border since the start of July, Wolfe said, but the temporary shelters could be reopened if there is another significant increase.

After the Port Hueneme shelter opened, donations of hygiene products, clothes, toys, books and school supplies poured in from community members with the hope that they would help the children.

The donations eventually filled a classroom at the Center for Employment Training in Oxnard, said Jessica Flanagan, a Ventura resident who organized the effort.

But because the shelter was supported by federal agencies, getting donations to the Navy base was difficult.

Most of the donated clothing went to local low-income families at an event hosted by the center. The rest of the items will go to the Los Angeles-based consulates of Honduras, Guatemala and El Salvador or permanent foster homes that serve unaccompanied immigrants in California, Flanagan said.

Link to Ventura County Star article

Port Hueneme and other temporary shelters for unaccompanied children to close

The three temporary shelters opened at military sites to help cope with the surge of unaccompanied children crossing the border — including Naval Base Ventura County — will close within two months, federal officials said Monday.

The Administration for Children and Families, a branch of Health and Human Services, "proactively expanded capacity to care for children in standard shelters, which are significantly less costly facilities," spokesman Kenneth Wolfe said in an email. "At the same time, we have seen a decrease in the number of children crossing the southwest border."

The temporary shelters at Naval Base Ventura County in Port Hueneme, Joint Base San Antonio-Lackland in Texas and Fort Sill Army Base in Oklahoma cared for more than 7,700 children since opening in May and early June, Wolfe said.

The Oklahoma shelter is expected to close by Friday, while the Texas and Port Hueneme shelters will "continue to phase down" and "end operations over the next two to eight weeks," he added.

The shelter at Naval Base Ventura County is slated to close by Aug. 31, according to county health officials.

Southwest Key Programs, the Texas-based nonprofit contracted to operate the shelter, informed West Ventura Medical Clinic Director Dr. Ramsey Ulrich Thursday the facility would stop operating at the end of the month, clinic manager Kristina Navarro said.

About 110 immigrant teenagers were living at the local shelter Monday morning, which has a maximum capacity of 575 people.

Since the shelter opened June 6, nearly 1,430 13- to 17-year-olds have been temporarily housed and discharged to a family member or sponsor living in the United States.

Custody of an unaccompanied minor detained at the border is transferred within 72 hours to Health and Human Services, which has about 100 permanent shelters near the southwest border.

But the shelters became overwhelmed as 57,000 unaccompanied minors — primarily from Guatemala, El Salvador or Honduras — were detained after illegally crossing the border during a nine-month time period ending in June.

That number is expected to hit 90,000 by the end of September — a nearly fourfold increase from the 24,000 unaccompanied minors detained by Customs and Border Patrol during the 2013 fiscal year, according to the Department of Homeland Security.

Since the beginning of July, however, the number of unaccompanied children apprehended at the border has decreased, Wolfe said.

The Defense Department had recently extended the use of the three military facilities as shelters through January, along with agreeing to provide space for another 5,000 beds.

"The three temporary shelters on military bases could be reopened for a limited time if the number of children increases significantly," Wolfe said.

Link to Ventura County Star article

Navy base shelter for immigrant children to close Aug. 31

The temporary shelter for unaccompanied immigrant children at Naval Base Ventura County will close Aug. 31, according to county health officials.

Southwest Key Programs, the Texas-based nonprofit group contracted to operate the shelter, indicated Thursday that the facility would stop operating at the end of the month, West Ventura Medical Clinic Manager Kristina Navarro said Friday.

Dr. Ramsey Ulrich, director of the county-affiliated clinic that was contracted by Southwest Key to staff the shelter with medical personnel, sent an email Thursday to his staff saying Southwest Key “conveyed that the amount of children coming to the U.S. slowed significantly such that there is no need for emergency shelters on all the (Department of Defense) facilities.”

The news of the shelter closing comes less than a week after the Defense Department authorized Naval Base Ventura County and two other military sites to continue housing unaccompanied immigrant minors through at least January — four months longer than originally approved.

Naval Base Ventura County spokeswoman Kimberly Gearhart said the Port Hueneme facility would continue being offered to the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, but “whether HHS needs it or how they’re going to use it, I really can’t say.”

The Administration for Children and Families — the Health and Human Services agency that oversees the shelter — did not have an announcement yet on the temporary facilities, spokesman Kenneth Wolfe said in an email.

But according to Ulrich’s email, which was obtained by The Star, fewer than 200 children are currently living at the Port Hueneme shelter, and it is no longer receiving new children.

As of Tuesday, the shelter was housing about 250 immigrant teenagers — primarily from Guatemala, El Salvador or Honduras — who were caught illegally crossing the border without a guardian.

Since the shelter opened June 6, more than 1,300 13- to 17-year-olds have been temporarily housed and discharged to a sponsor living in the United States.

Along with the Port Hueneme shelter, housing facilities were opened at Joint Base San Antonio-Lackland in Texas and Fort Sill Army Base in Oklahoma to help Health and Human Services cope with the surge of Central American children crossing the border without a parent.

“Several factors will determine the continued need for these temporary shelters,” Wolfe said in the email, including “the number of unaccompanied children crossing the border, HHS’s capacity to care for the children in permanent, more cost-effective shelters, and the time it takes to place the children with sponsors.”

Custody of an unaccompanied minor detained at the border is transferred within 72 hours to Health and Human Services, which has about 100 permanent shelters near the southwest border.

Those shelters were overwhelmed with 57,000 unaccompanied children apprehended at the border during a nine-month span between October and June, according to the Department of Homeland Security.

That number was expected to hit 90,000 by the end of September — a nearly fourfold increase from the 24,000 unaccompanied minors detained by Customs and Border Patrol during the 2013 fiscal year.

Since the beginning of July, however, the number has decreased while HHS is placing more children with relatives or sponsors in the United States, Wolfe said.

“For the first time since this urgent humanitarian situation began, there are more children leaving custody than entering it on a weekly basis,” he said.

Southwest Key spokeswoman Cindy Casares would not confirm the closure of the Port Hueneme shelter because she could not get in touch with employees running the facility, she said.

“I don’t have updated information, things are always in flux until it’s final,” Casares said. “They’re in California. They are very busy running the shelter. I am in Austin (Texas).”

Southwest Key has been contracted by the Office of Refugee Resettlement — a division of the Administration for Children and Families — to run 14 permanent shelters for unaccompanied minors across Arizona, Texas and three California locations: El Cajon, Lemon Grove and Pleasant Hill.

The Port Hueneme shelter was the first temporary facility operated by Southwest Key, Casares said.

Casares said she could not provide other information about the local shelter because the Office of Refugee Resettlement directed Southwest Key to not communicate with the media regarding unaccompanied minors.

A Southwest Key recruitment manager did confirm Friday that the Port Hueneme shelter is no longer hiring.

Maria Duarte was overseeing a six-day job fair at the Ventura Beach Marriott to fill more than 330 temporary positions at the shelter, but the event unexpectedly ended early.

As hopeful job applicants arrived at the fair Thursday afternoon, they were turned away with little information by a handful of Southwest Key employees still at the hotel.

Cecila Tores, of Anaheim, and Elena Burguete, of Corona, said they drove three hours to attend the job fair. They were turned away and told to apply for available jobs online, even though all Ventura County-based positions had been removed from the website.

“It’s like a joke,” Tores said. “They say one thing and they do something else.”

Multiple people hired during the job fair reported being called days later and told all jobs at the Port Hueneme shelter were canceled, but there would be an opportunity to apply for similar positions at a future shelter for unaccompanied minors in Van Nuys within the next couple of months.

Casares said she had not been notified of a Southwest Key shelter opening in Van Nuys and the Administration for Children and Families does not identify the locations of its permanent shelters.

Link to Ventura County Star article

Navy shelter for immigrant kids extended through January

The temporary shelter for unaccompanied immigrant children at Naval Base Ventura County will continue providing services through at least January 2015 — four months longer than the Defense Department originally authorized.

And the nonprofit contracted to run the Port Hueneme shelter, Texas-based Southwest Key Programs, is hiring an additional 330 positions to staff the facility.

The shelter is currently home to nearly 250 immigrant teenagers — primarily from Guatemala, El Salvador or Honduras — that were apprehended illegally crossing the border without a guardian.

Since the shelter opened June 6, about 1,300 13- to 17-year-olds have been temporarily housed and discharged, according to Administration for Children and Families spokesman Kenneth Wolfe.

Naval Base Ventura County was one of three military sites designated as temporary shelters by the Defense Department to help the Health and Human Services Department cope with the surge of Central American children crossing the border without a parent.

Custody of an unaccompanied minor detained at the border is transferred within 72 hours to Health and Human Services, which has about 100 permanent shelters near the southwest border that have been recently overwhelmed.

The Department of Homeland Security reported 57,000 unaccompanied children were apprehended at the border during the nine-month span between October and June. That number is expected to hit 90,000 by the end of the fiscal year — a nearly fourfold increase from the 24,000 unaccompanied minors detained by Customs and Border Patrol during the 2013 fiscal year.

The Administration for Children and Families’ Office of Refugee Resettlement — under the Health and Human Services Department — temporarily houses the children until they can be released to a relative or sponsor in the United States while their immigration case is processed.

More than 30,300 children have been discharged throughout the country since the beginning of the year, including 3,150 that have been released in California, according to the Office of Refugee Resettlement.

Along with extending operations at the shelters in Ventura County, Texas and Oklahoma that have a total capacity of about 3,000 children, the Defense Department announced it will provide another 5,000 beds.

The Defense Department has not identified additional locations for temporary shelters, but Naval Base Ventura County Commanding Officer Capt. Lawrence Vasquez said the base does not expect to increase its shelter capacity beyond the current 575 beds, according to a statement published on Facebook. 

Southwest Key Programs is in the midst of a six-day job fair at the Ventura Beach Marriott to fill more than 330 temporary positions at the Port Hueneme shelter.

Published open positions included 275 youth care workers, 25 case managers, 20 teachers, and a handful of medical coordinators, housekeeping and laundry workers, a shift leader and accounts payable clerk, according to the nonprofit’s website Tuesday.

Youth care workers — who can earn $22 per hour — supervise the children and are required to “develop positive rapport with youth while serving as a role model,” according to the website.

The job fair will continue Wednesday and Thursday at the Ventura Beach Marriott at 2055 E. Harbor Blvd. from 8 a.m. to 5 p.m.

Requirements to work at the shelter include being at least 21 years old, legally permitted to work in the U.S., having a valid driver’s license or ID, speaking and understanding Spanish, and having at least a high school diploma or GED.

Shelter staff cannot have had a misdemeanor or felony in the last 10 years; have a history of crimes including probation, deferred adjudication or legal matters related to minors; and cannot have been refused auto liability insurance during the last seven years.

Maritza Rodriguez, 23, was among dozens of hopeful applicants filling up four banquet rooms at the Ventura hotel for the job fair Tuesday morning.

The Oxnard resident said she found out about the job openings from one of her friends who currently does clerical work at the shelter.

“I just want to work with something new,” she said. Rodriguez added Southwest Key Programs recruiters said she would best fit the medical coordinator position because of her experience working as an office manager.

Maria Duarte, a recruitment manager for Southwest Key Programs overseeing the job fair, would not answer any questions about the Port Hueneme shelter. Duarte, who said she started with the nonprofit mid-June, referred all media inquiries to the nonprofit’s Austin-based spokeswoman Cindy Casares.

Casares did not respond to repeated phone calls Tuesday.

Link to Ventura County Star article

Clogged L.A. Immigration Court could face more challenges from children crossing border

The walls of the Los Angeles Immigration Court's 15th floor information center are covered with a week's worth of hearing schedules for about 30 courtrooms in the downtown building near Pershing Square.

Daily schedules for the immigration judges vary — some hear nearly 40 cases a morning to briefly move them along in the system, while others have two afternoon hearings where it could take hours to make final rulings.

The Los Angeles Immigration Court — where Ventura County residents typically report for deportation proceedings — is one of 59 throughout the nation for the Executive Office for Immigration Review, an agency under the U.S. Department of Justice.

The office "is currently managing the largest caseload the immigration court system has ever seen," the agency reported in the Federal Register.

At the end of the 2013 fiscal year, more than 350,300 cases were pending. Nearly 49,500 of them were stalled in the Los Angeles Immigration Court — the most of any court in the country.

The average time to complete an immigration case was 589 days as of June, according to the Transactional Records Access Clearinghouse, a nonpartisan research center at Syracuse University. But the wait time in Los Angeles averaged 823 days — more than two years.

Gabriella Navarro-Busch, a Ventura-based immigration lawyer who has been representing clients in the Los Angeles court for 13 years, said cases often take up to five years.

"There's always been a backlog," Navarro-Busch said. "The backlog has increased because of detention and enforcement. A lot of people who are in detention are trying to seek asylum, and everyone has to be given an interview."

The overwhelmed system recently gained national attention as a surge of unaccompanied children crossing the southwest border became highly politicized.

The Department of Homeland Security reported 57,000 unaccompanied children — primarily from Central America — were apprehended at the border between October and June.

Officials expect the total number of immigrant children caught crossing the U.S.-Mexico border illegally without a parent could reach 90,000 by the Sept. 30 end of the fiscal year — a nearly fourfold increase from the 24,000 detained by border agents last fiscal year.

"We haven't really faced the brunt of the number of children cases that have been dropped before the court," Navarro-Busch said.

A temporary shelter for unaccompanied immigrant children was opened at Naval Base Ventura County in Port Hueneme to provide relief for the 100 crowded permanent shelters near the southwest border.

Since opening June 6, the Navy shelter has housed nearly 1,550 children ages 13 to 17.

"There are probably some kids from the base who will be placed in L.A. County," said Navarro-Busch, who recently started providing legal aid to the children. But she said only about 100 children discharged from the shelter have been placed with a relative or sponsor in California, and none have been placed in Ventura County.

COURT RELIEF

The White House on July 8 asked Congress to approve $3.7 billion in emergency funding to address the increase in Central American immigrants entering the country. The proposal included $64 million for the Department of Justice to hire additional immigration judges and increase court capacity to speed up cases.

To deal with the increased caseload, an interim rule took effect July 11 to allow the Executive Office for Immigration Review to designate temporary judges for renewable six-month terms. Currently, there are 250 immigration judges working throughout the nation.

The agency is "currently in the midst of the application and appointment process," with the "hope that temporary immigration judges will be appointed by early fall," spokeswoman Kathryn Mattingly said in an email. The border crisis led the agency to postpone an August legal training conference for immigration judges, Mattingly said.

The court system also has started several programs to remove certain cases from the docket. U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement attorneys were directed in 2011 to exercise prosecutorial discretion "to dismiss, suspend or close a particular case" if a defendant facing deportation possesses certain qualities, according to a memo from then-ICE director John Morton.

That includes people who do not have a criminal record, have been living in the United States for an extended period, have children or immediate family members who are U.S. citizens or permanent residents, and received a U.S. education.

As of June 30, nearly 25 percent of the 43,300 cases closed in Los Angeles Immigration Court since October 2012 involved prosecutorial discretion.

Nationally, 8.5 percent of closed cases involved prosecutorial discretion in fiscal year 2013 — up from 4.7 percent the previous year.

"Every single one of my cases, I look at it for potential prosecutorial discretion," Navarro-Busch said. "If we really don't want to deport the breadwinner of a family with U.S. citizen children, I think the program has worked really, really well."

Administratively closing a case using prosecutorial discretion is not a deportation cancellation and does not grant permanent residence, but it will temporarily remove the case from the court docket and keep the person in the United States, Navarro-Busch said.

"The moment they are put in deportation proceedings, they become eligible for a work permit while their case is pending," she said. "With administrative closure, the client can continue to renew their work permit."

That was the result of one of Judge Jan D. Latimore's 18 scheduled removal hearings Monday morning in a packed courtroom on the 17th floor of the Los Angeles court.

Latimore and the ICE attorney agreed to grant one young woman prosecutorial discretion because she has lived in the country for more than 20 years, has a child who is a U.S. citizen, does not have a criminal record and is completing her GED.

Latimore agreed to close the case and told the crying woman to finish her GED "for yourself, for your son, for your future."

"Don't disappoint me," the judge said.

But prosecutorial discretion is not granted consistently, Navarro-Busch said.

SEEKING ASYLUM

Ingrid, a 28-year-old woman from El Salvador, testified before Judge Gita Vahid-Tehrani during a 2.5-hour hearing Monday afternoon on her asylum application filed with the court more than two years ago.

Despite her lack of a criminal record, and a 2-year-old daughter born in the United States, Ingrid was not offered prosecutorial discretion because she had not consistently lived here since her first entry in 2007.

Ingrid tried to claim asylum based on her fear of returning with her child to her hometown of Sensuntepeque, where her mother abused her physically and emotionally.

"She would use any excuse to harm me," Ingrid said in Spanish, adding her mother threatened her life many times.

Vahid-Tehrani said she was sympathetic but she ultimately denied the request because the persecutor was her mother and Ingrid could live elsewhere in her native country as a "college-educated woman."

To qualify for asylum, applicants must prove they face persecution in their home country based on race, religion, nationality, political opinion or membership of a particular group.

The minors coming to the United States are typically applying for asylum or special immigrant juvenile status, said Vanessa Frank, another Ventura-based immigration lawyer.

"Every immigration court is allotted a certain number of visas every year, and that's why the relief is difficult to retain," Navarro-Busch said. "These visas are closely guarded."

After an application for asylum or cancellation of removal is denied, the defendant can appeal to the Bureau of Immigration Appeals within 30 days. Cases can linger there for one or two years, then move on to the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals and take up to four years, Navarro-Busch said.

And if "the defendant becomes eligible for a different form of relief to gain some type of legal status, they can always reopen the case," she said.

Link to Ventura County Star article

Immigrant children at Navy shelter to receive additional vaccines

Nearly 500 immigrant children living at a temporary shelter at Naval Base Ventura County in Port Hueneme will receive pneumonia and flu vaccinations Friday in response to a handful of infectious disease cases.

Three teenagers living at the shelter were diagnosed with pneumonia last week and taken to a local hospital where they were treated with antibiotics and are "improving tremendously," Ventura County Public Health Officer Dr. Robert Levin said Tuesday.

"I don't see any likelihood that we're going to be seeing an outbreak of any kind there," Levin said. The kind of pneumonia that was diagnosed typically displays symptoms within a couple of days after being exposed, he added.

Levin has responded to the shelter four times to consult on communicable disease concerns since it opened five weeks ago in response to the influx of unaccompanied children crossing the southwest border.

There have been some cases of fevers and colds, but Levin said it was "not a tremendous number" of "fairly routine pediatric problems" considering the shelter's maximum capacity of 575 children ages 13 to 17.

Despite rumors of swine flu spreading among children at the shelter, Administration for Children and Families spokesman Kenneth Wolfe said there have been no cases.

Since opening June 6, the Port Hueneme shelter has been a temporary home for 1,400 immigrant teenagers — primarily from Guatemala, El Salvador or Honduras — apprehended illegally crossing the U.S.-Mexico border without a parent.

"It's not surprising when you bring a bunch of children together from different places that there's going to be some kids that get ill," Levin said. "We have pediatric clinics in our county that are filled all the time with our own county residents because kids get sick."

New immigrant children arriving at the shelter would most likely not receive the additional pneumonia and flu vaccinations, Levin said.

The 42,000-square-foot Navy facility was one of three temporary shelters opened at military sites to relieve the 100 permanent federal shelters near the U.S.-Mexico border.

When unaccompanied children are detained at the border, Levin said they receive vaccines for chickenpox; tetanus, diphtheria and pertussis; meningococcal disease; and measles, mumps and rubella.

The children are also checked for scabies and lice, screened for tuberculosis and undergo a mental health assessment, according to the Department of Health and Human Services, which takes unaccompanied immigrants under age 18 into custody within 72 hours of being detained.

The Administration for Children and Families provides short-term housing until the children can be placed with a family member or sponsor in the United States leading up to their immigration court hearing.

To date, 920 immigrant children have been temporarily housed and discharged from the Port Hueneme shelter, according to Wolfe.

"There's been absolutely no evidence of any kind that there's been any disease transmission outside of this compound to the general population in our county," Levin said.

Levin said Health and Human Services and Southwest Key Programs — the nonprofit contracted to handle day-to-day operations of the shelter — is "doing a terrific job of providing a very clean and healthy environment for these kids in the short time that they have them."

"They are sparing no effort to make sure that they (the children) are receiving preventive services and acute care services that this population would need," he said.

The shelter has an on-site medical team of nearly 50 people, including three nurse practitioners or physician assistants, five registered nurses, five licensed vocational nurses, five certified nursing assistants and 30 master's-level behavioral clinicians, according to Robert Garcia, the regional administrator for the Administration for Children and Families.

Dr. Ramsey Ulrich, medical director for West Ventura Medical Clinic, was contracted by Southwest Key to staff the shelter with a physician or midlevel practitioner for eight hours a day.

The Port Hueneme shelter has a 20-bed infirmary where contagious children could be kept for a couple of days if they could potentially spread an infectious disease to others, Levin said.

Link to Ventura County Star article

Immigrant rights advocates rally for children housed at Port Hueneme Navy base

About 250 immigrant rights supporters rallied outside Naval Base Ventura County in Port Hueneme Tuesday afternoon to advocate for the 575 immigrant children living at a temporary shelter at the base.

The singing of peaceful hymns and chants of “No papers, no fear, our kids are staying here,” were a stark contrast to last week’s protest in Murrieta that forced buses transporting migrant children and families to be rerouted to San Diego after demonstrators blocked the roadway to the suburban processing center.

Instead, only a group of about five minimally vocal people were at the rally protesting against the children being housed at the base.

The Navy facility was one of three temporary shelters opened at military sites by the Department of Health and Human Services to help cope with the influx of unaccompanied children crossing the southwest border.

In its first month of operation, the Port Hueneme shelter has been a temporary home for 1,330 immigrant teenagers — primarily from Guatemala, El Salvador or Honduras — apprehended illegally crossing the U.S.-Mexico border without a parent.

The shelter was at its maximum capacity of 575 children ages 13 to 17 while small groups of California state legislators, Ventura County elected officials, and Southern California religious, social justice and philanthropic leaders toured the 42,000-square-foot facility Tuesday.

The Health and Human Services department intends to use the converted warehouse at Naval Base Ventura County as a temporary shelter for a total of 120 days since it opened June 6, according to Assemblyman Jeff Gorell, R-Camarillo, whose district director toured the shelter with members of the California Latino Legislative Caucus.

State senators Kevin de León, D-Los Angeles; Ricardo Lara, D-Bell Gardens; and Norma Torres, D-Pomona; told reporters in a press call they were “satisfied” with the conditions of the shelter, but plan to make a formal request for President Barack Obama to grant the children refugee-status when the caucus reconvenes in August.

The children’s “No. 1 goal is to survive and to be reunited with their family members,” said Sen. Lara, caucus chairman. “Murrieta was appalling and that’s not what America stands for. Our country is better than that.”

The tours and rally occurred on the same day the White House announced a request for Congress to approve a $3.7 billion supplemental appropriation to address the increase in Central American immigrants crossing the southwest border.

Customs and Border Patrol detained 24,000 unaccompanied minors crossing the border in 2013. By May, that number had already reached 47,000, according to the Department of Homeland Security.

Nearly half of the emergency funding — $1.8 billion — would be appropriated to the Department of Health and Human Services to provide care for unaccompanied children crossing the border.

The Department of Homeland Security transfers custody of unaccompanied immigrants under age 18 to the Department of Health and Human Services within 72 hours of being detained at the border.

The Administration for Children and Families provides short-term housing until the children can be placed with a family member or sponsor in the U.S. leading up to their immigration court hearing.

Nearly 760 immigrant children have already been temporarily housed and discharged from the Port Hueneme shelter, according to Administration for Children and Families spokesman Kenneth Wolfe.

About 85 percent of the children discharged from the Port Hueneme shelter are sent to live with a family member in the United States, said Minerva Carcaño, Bishop of the Los Angeles Episcopal Area, who also toured the shelter Tuesday.

The other 15 percent of the children will either go to a foster home, be transferred to a more permanent shelter or have decided that they want to return to their native country, Carcaño said.

Vanessa Frank, board chairwoman of Ventura County Clergy and Laity United for Economic Justice, toured the shelter before the afternoon rally along with Oxnard Councilwoman Carmen Ramirez and Central Coast Alliance United for a Sustainable Economy executive director Marcos Vargas, among others from Los Angeles-based organizations.

“It’s been amazing to me, over the past month, to see how our county has come forward with remarkable support for these children,” said Frank, a Ventura-based immigration lawyer. “To see folks from Ventura County — doctors, lawyers, nurses, parents, therapists, art teachers, veterans — come forward in great numbers … It’s been remarkable and so moving.”

Martha Arevalo, executive director of the Central American Resource Center in Los Angeles, choked back tears as she addressed the crowd after touring the shelter.

“When I saw these kids I saw myself. When I saw these kids and they were smiling, I knew that they were scared and alone,” said Arevalo, whose parents are from El Salvador. “They’re having to make life and death decisions. It’s not about amnesty … it’s about survival.”

Link to Ventura County Star article

Immigrant rights advocates to rally outside Navy Base while state legislators visit shelter

As many as 100 people are expected to caravan from Los Angeles to Port Hueneme Tuesday afternoon to rally in support of the immigrant children temporarily housed at a Naval Base Ventura County shelter.

The National Day Laborer Organizing Network, Central American Resource Center, United Methodist Church and other immigrant rights advocates will gather at the corner of Ventura and Pleasant Valley roads around noon to call for transparency of the shelter's conditions.

One hour into the rally, Assemblyman Luis Alejo, D-Watsonville, and other members of the California Latino Legislative Caucus will be escorted through the 42,000 square-foot converted warehouse on a 40-minute tour to inspect living conditions.

Since the housing facility opened at the beginning of June, the shelter has been home to more than 1,200 immigrant teenagers — primarily from Guatemala, El Salvador or Honduras — apprehended illegally crossing the U.S.-Mexico border without a parent.

There were 470 13- to 17-year-olds living Monday at the shelter that was one of three temporary shelters opened throughout the country to help cope with the influx of unaccompanied children crossing the southwest border.

Customs and Border Patrol detained 24,000 unaccompanied minors crossing the border in 2013. By May, that number had reached 47,000, according to the Department of Homeland Security.

"The recent surge of unaccompanied minors is an issue that goes beyond the debate of our nation's flawed immigration system," Alejo said in an email. "This is a question of whether or not we ought to take proper care of helpless children with no one to turn to."

Unaccompanied minors detained at the border are placed in deportation proceedings, but the Department of Homeland Security transfers custody of immigrants under age 18 to the Department of Health and Human Services.

The department's Administration for Children and Families provides short-term housing until the children can be placed with a family member or sponsor in the U.S. leading up to their immigration court hearing — a process that Ventura-based immigration lawyer Vanessa Frank said can take more than two years.

Over 740 immigrant children have already been temporarily housed and discharged at the Port Hueneme shelter, according to Administration for Children and Families spokesman Kenneth Wolfe.

Tuesday's local rally comes one week after buses transporting migrant children and families had to be rerouted to San Diego for processing after protesters bearing American flags blocked the path to the Murrieta U.S. Border Patrol Station.

"We want to be there and be a counterpoint to Murrieta to show that there are people that support the children," National Day Laborer Organizing Network spokesman B. Loewe said. "These are people escaping violence and are in need of help."

Loewe said the rally will seek to "welcome the children and ensure they are taken care of instead of dehumanized" by being referred to as a "flood" of people crossing the border and greeted by protesters holding signs reading "return to sender."

"It's clear that California and our country is one that benefits and is built by immigrants," he said. "We're in a place were immigration reform is long overdue."

Link to Ventura County Star article

Navy shelter serves more than 1,100 immigrant children in first month

Nearly 620 immigrant children have come and gone at the shelter at Naval Base Ventura County in Port Hueneme that is temporarily housing teenagers apprehended illegally crossing the U.S.-Mexico border without a parent.

As of Thursday, there were about 520 13- to 17-year-olds living at the shelter that opened its doors June 6 to help cope with the surge of unaccompanied children crossing the southwest border.

Customs and Border Patrol detained 24,000 unaccompanied minors — primarily from Guatemala, El Salvador or Honduras — crossing the border in 2013. By May, that number had already reached 47,000, according to the Department of Homeland Security.

Unaccompanied minors detained at the border are placed into deportation proceedings, but they are turned over to the Department of Health and Human Services. The department’s Administration for Children and Families provides short-term housing until the children can be placed with a family member or sponsor in the U.S. leading up to their immigration court hearing.

As the 100 permanent shelters became overwhelmed, military housing facilities were opened in Port Hueneme, Lackland Air Force Base in San Antonio and Fort Sill in Oklahoma.

Since news broke that Ventura County would become a part of this story garnering national attention, the local response has been prominent and swift.

A county-affiliated medical clinic signed a yearlong contract to provide on-site physicians every day of the week; congresswoman Julia Brownley, D-Westlake Village, is seeking transparency of the shelter’s operations; community organizations have gathered to jointly address political and humanitarian concerns; and private citizens continue to use social media to rally donations.

“I’m really proud of Ventura County for coming together in a welcoming and humane way,” said Lucas Zucker, a community organizer for the Central Coast Alliance United for a Sustainable Economy, or CAUSE. “It’s especially inspiring because there are some other places in the country where people are protesting at these facilities.”

Buses transporting migrant children and families had to be rerouted to San Diego for processing Tuesday after protesters blocked the path to the Murrieta U.S. Border Patrol Station, according to The Associated Press.

CAUSE and Ventura County Clergy and Laity United for Economic Justice, or CLUE-VC, along with other nonprofits and members of the private Facebook group, “Kids Housed at the Base,” have formed a coalition specifically dedicated to providing assistance to the shelter.

“These are children in a certainly vulnerable position,” Zucker said. “We obviously want to make sure there’s safeguards against misconduct.”

Barry Zimmerman, Human Services Agency director, said the agency will respond to referrals and allegations of abuse at the shelter, but will have to work with the federal government and law enforcement officials to determine jurisdiction of any potential cases.

Vanessa Frank, board chair for CLUE-VC and a Ventura-based immigration attorney, is helping lead the coalition.

“The children are fleeing violence in their home countries. Those countries are increasingly unable to protect anybody,” Frank said. Guatemala, El Salvador and Honduras, “in the past few years, suffered. They’re not really making the gains that we’re hoping in educating kids and assuring their rights.”

Honduras has the highest homicide rate of any country with 90 intentional homicides per 100,000 people in 2012, according to the World Bank. El Salvador and Guatemala round out the top five with rates of 41 and 40 homicides, respectively.

In 2011, Honduras had a poverty rate of nearly 62 percent — surpassed only by Zimbabwe. During that year, 54 percent of Guatemala’s residents were living in poverty while 41 percent of El Salvadorans were impoverished.

Frank said “the increase in violence and lack of security is the primary push” driving children to leave their native countries in Central America, “even more than reuniting with family” in the United States.

But since identifying this “humanitarian crisis,” the Obama administration is also working to make it clear that U.S. immigration policy does not grant deportation relief to children illegally entering the country.

Department of Homeland Security Secretary Jeh Johnson wrote an open letter at the end of June to the parents of the unaccompanied children detailing that the federal Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program is for children that entered the U.S. illegally before June 2007.

Johnson’s letter adds the immigration reform bill being considered by Congress provides an earned path to citizenship, but only for certain people who came to the U.S. before 2012.

Frank, however, said misunderstanding immigration policy is not the reason for the flood of children deciding to “jump on top of a train for three days and walk through the desert.”

“People are fleeing with fear of their lives and well-being,” she said. “It’s pretty far-fetched that you’re an 11-year-old in Guatemala saying, ‘If I go there, I heard about this California Dream Act. I would probably get a full-ride to Cal.’ That’s not what’s happening.”

Part of the local coalition’s goal is to ensure the immigrant children housed at the Base receive some sort of introduction to the deportation process because Frank said the proceedings will last several years.

The Los Angeles immigration court is the third-most backlogged in the country, with cases taking an average of 800 days — more than two years, Frank said.

“It’s really important that the kids get … at least a fundamental orientation of what’s going to happen to them,” she said.

Texas-based Southwest Key Programs was contracted to staff the Port Hueneme facility and held a career fair in Oxnard the weekend before the shelter opened looking to fill hundreds of jobs, according to its website.

There are 45 Spanish-speaking case managers working at the shelter, but Frank said it is a concern that many of the children coming from Guatemala speak an indigenous language instead of Spanish.

“There hasn’t been a lot of transparency,” Frank said of Southwest Key. “I’m not sure if they were really prepared for the broad and committed response from the community.”

Brownley said in an email that she has “been working closely with the Department of Health and Human Services, the Naval Base, and local elected officials and nonprofits to make sure the children are receiving appropriate care and legal counsel, and I will continue to monitor the situation very closely.”

Joan Araujo, Health Care Agency deputy director, said a one-year contract to provide medical staff at the shelter was signed between Southwest Key and the West Ventura Medical Clinic.

Dr. Ramsey Ulrich, medical director for West Ventura Medical Clinic, signed the contract through his corporation to provide two four-hour shifts each day of a physician or midlevel practitioner.

Araujo said the county has never dealt with a shelter of this magnitude.

Link to Ventura County Star article 

Community looks to provide aid as number of immigrant children at Navy shelter grows

The number of unaccompanied immigrant children housed at a temporary shelter at Naval Base Ventura County, Port Hueneme has grown to about 210 teenagers mostly from Guatemala, El Salvador and Honduras, officials said.

Since the shelter opened June 6, nearly 70 13- to 17-year-olds have been discharged to either a family member or sponsor living in the United States until their immigration court hearing.

The base is home to one of three temporary shelters recently opened nationwide in response to an overwhelming increase of unaccompanied minors illegally crossing the southwest border. The number is expected to reach 60,000 this year.

As more children are brought to the shelter, where they can stay for up to four months, community members and local nonprofits have started to pool donations of basic needs goods and look for ways to volunteer their time.

It is unclear, however, whether the boxes of clothing and hygiene products will ever be permitted on the base.

“The federal agencies supporting these facilities are unable to accept donations or volunteers to assist the unaccompanied children program,” according to a statement on the Administration for Children and Families website.

The Administration for Children and Families, a division of the Department of Health and Human Services, oversees operations of the 42,000-square-foot shelter.

Texas-based Southwest Key Programs was contracted to staff and run the facility and is looking to fill hundreds of jobs at the Port Hueneme shelter, according to its website.

Officials expected the Port Hueneme shelter to reach its maximum capacity of 575 children as early as this week, but ACF spokesman Kenneth Wolfe said in an email it’s “a day-by-day situation as far as reporting numbers.

The Center for Employment Training in Oxnard has become a staging site for donations to be dropped off with the hope that they will eventually go to the children housed at the shelter.

Teresa Telles, director of the nonprofit’s Oxnard branch, said it has already collected more than 20 boxes and an even greater number of bags of hygiene products, clothing and school supplies.

Telles reached out to a private Facebook group with 235 members that has been trying to find a way to provide donations to the shelter and needed a central location to keep the items.

Jessica Flanagan, who lives in Ventura with her husband and 9-month-old daughter, started the Facebook group before the shelter opened.

“I’m just a regular person with a job and a kid at home that wanted to show some compassion for some kids that have traveled a really, really long way and have been through some stuff that I don’t think any of us could imagine,” she said.

Flanagan said she contacted Southwest Key and was initially told that donations were needed and more than welcome, so she rallied community members through social media to collect clothing, 250 individual hygiene kits and brand new sets of twin bed sheets, among other items.

“They asked for these things,” Flanagan said. “We’re just standing by and waiting to be called upon for action.”

Flanagan said she is hopeful the back-and-forth will soon end and the donations will be accepted.

“If they can’t accept donations, maybe they can identify a charity that is affiliated with Southwest Key that can accept them and funnel it through to the kids that way,” she said. “These kids are in our backyard; they’re in our community. We need to make sure they’re being treated well.”

Southwest Key is now directing media calls to the Administration for Children and Families.

The Center for Employment Training in Oxnard will continue accepting donations weekdays between 8 a.m. and 5 p.m. at the front desk of the office at 761 S. C Street.

Link to Ventura County Star article 

Naval base expects to house 575 immigrant children by Tuesday

About 180 immigrant children caught illegally crossing the U.S.-Mexico border unaccompanied are being housed at a new temporary care center at Naval Base Ventura County in Port Hueneme.

Since the housing facility opened at the base Friday, the number of immigrants — ages 13 to 17 — has more than doubled from 75 and is expected to grow to the building’s maximum capacity of 575 children as early as Tuesday.

The children are expected to be housed in the 42,000-square-foot converted warehouse for up to 120 days until they are placed with a vetted sponsor or family member in the United States while their immigration case is pending.

Twelve children already have been placed with a sponsor or family member since the opening of the shelter, which is operated by the Administration for Children and Families, a division of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services.

Naval Base Ventura County is one of three military sites nationwide designated to temporarily house the immigrant children in response to an overwhelming increase in unaccompanied minors crossing the border — particularly from Central America — a number expected to reach 60,000 this year.

The other facilities are at Lackland Air Force Base in San Antonio and Fort Sill in Oklahoma.

“The surge of unaccompanied children” crossing the southwest border “correlates with an overall rise in illegal migration into the Rio Grande Valley,” Secretary of Homeland Security Jeh Johnson said Thursday at a news conference in Washington, D.C.

Customs and Border Protection detained 24,000 unaccompanied minors — the majority from Guatemala, El Salvador and Honduras — illegally crossing the border in 2013. By May, the number for this year already had reached 47,000, Johnson said.

“This is a problem of humanitarian proportions,” Johnson said.

Robert Garcia, the regional administrator for the Administration for Children and Families, led about 10 members of the media through the Port Hueneme shelter Thursday morning.

During the hourlong tour, reporters were not allowed to interact with children or staff members at the shelter, could not take photographs or record audio, were discouraged from asking questions and were frequently referred to the ACF spokesman based in Washington, D.C., for more information.

“The health and safety and well-being of the kids are paramount to us,” Garcia said. “They’re far from home and it’s difficult for them.”

While most of children are from Central America, a few are from Mexico, ACF spokesman Kenneth Wolfe said in an email.

When children are detained at the border, they are medically cleared by U.S. Customs and Border Protection after being checked for scabies and lice, undergoing a mental health assessment and receiving vaccines.

Within 72 hours of being detained, the minors are turned over to Health and Human Services and taken to one of the agency’s 100 permanent shelters. Now they can also be taken to one of the three temporary shelters, including at Port Hueneme.

There are 45 Spanish-speaking case managers working at the local shelter, along with an on-site medical team of nearly 50 people.

Texas-based Southwest Key Programs was contracted to staff the facility and held a career fair in Oxnard the weekend before the shelter opened. It was looking to fill hundreds of jobs, according to its website.

“The adults are with the kids all the time,” Garcia said. “They’re always being supervised.”

While the Navy housing facility once acted as temporary living quarters for men and women preparing to deploy to Iraq or Afghanistan, it is now filled with teenagers waiting to be reunited with a familiar face in a country far from home.

Led by a staff member, the children walk in small groups in single-file lines through the halls adorned with their own artwork depicting flags of their native countries and posters of American superheroes. The air conditioning is kept off to more closely resemble conditions in Central America.

Most of the girls wear light pink hooded sweatshirts, bluejeans or sweatpants, and tennis shoes. The boys are in light gray.

Their day starts early at 5:45 a.m. and continues with a carefully planned schedule that includes three meals, physical education, learning basic English and math, time for art and playing outside, vocational classes, specific shower times and a nightly movie. Lights out by 9:30 p.m.

The children are separated by gender — about two-thirds of them are male — and grouped with others of similar age into one of the shelter’s 10 dormitories that hold 40 to 70 beds each.

The rows of closely aligned bunk beds are spotless — the beds are neatly made, belongings are kept in hidden storage spaces and stuffed animals sit on top of colorful blankets.

Ping-pong and foosball tables are waiting to be played with in a recreation room equipped with large couches, beanbag chairs and a variety of board games. Two small soccer fields are nearing completion.

Children sit in groups of six to eat their meals at tables covered in bright orange table cloths under a large tented area that has been decorated with strings of colorful papier-mâché squares and stocked with a variety of hot sauces.

“We’re trying to make kids as comfortable as possible,” Garcia said.

Link to Ventura County Star article