Texas Grants Child Care License to Migrant Detention Center
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Version 0 of 1. The authorities in Texas have granted a child care license to a federal immigration detention center where thousands of mothers with their children have been confined, often for weeks and sometimes months. The decision to recognize the center, in Karnes City, as a care provider for children drew outrage from immigrant advocates, who said it was little more than a prison. It was a victory for the Department of Homeland Security, which considers the center a holding station where families pass initial health and security checks and the first phases of their asylum screenings. The Texas license strengthens the hand of the Obama administration as it tries to maneuver around a ruling from a federal judge in California, who ordered the rapid release of all migrant children and their parents and ruled that minors could not be held in secure facilities not licensed specifically for child care. Officials at the Texas Department of Family and Protective Services did not make a statement about the license, which was issued on Friday and posted on the agency’s website early on Monday. The initial license is temporary, lasting six months. “If ever there was lipstick on a pig, this is it,” said Jonathan Ryan, the executive director of Raices, a legal services group in San Antonio that works with immigrants. “If you want a child care facility, you don’t contract with a for-profit prison company.” Known as the Karnes County Residential Center, the facility is a series of barracks behind brick walls. It holds a maximum of 580 migrants and is run by the GEO Group, a private correctional detention company. The center includes a well-equipped daily school, a gym and a medical clinic, and offers many activities for mothers and children. But immigrant groups have reported that even short periods in detention took a psychological toll on the children, many of whom arrive with families fleeing violence and forced recruitment by gangs in Central America. In her order last August, Judge Dolly M. Gee of Federal District Court for the Central District of California gave the Obama administration two months to release migrant children held in unlicensed facilities. The administration appealed. Texas officials revised the state’s licensing rules, adding exceptions that allowed the Karnes center and another family detention center in Texas to qualify for child care permits. A challenge by advocates to the rule revisions failed in state court. According to records from the Texas agency, an inspection of the Karnes center on March 29 showed that children’s health records did not record allergies clearly and that cleaning carts were left unattended, posing dangers to children. But the agency approved the license and gave center officials a chance to correct the problems. Patrick Crimmins, a spokesman for the Texas agency, said officials would conduct three unannounced inspections over the next six months. If the center meets the required standards, it will receive a permanent license. The Department of Homeland Security did not immediately offer a comment on the license. |