El Paso, Texas –
The rate of border crossings has slowed slightly at El Paso’s southern border, as the city tries to cope with having large numbers of migrants in the area for longer than expected.
On Friday, March 1, the city of El Paso’s online immigration dashboard showed 1,135 encounters from the previous day. On December 19, for example, the number was even higher, with 1,489 arrests and surrenders per day.
John Martin, deputy director of the Homeless Opportunity Center, said the shelter is doing everything it can to help.
“Each of the shelters that we support in this particular area, what we call the downtown shelter network, are all operating at or above capacity at this time,” Martin said.
Biden says he won’t take executive action to secure the border, wants Congress to find a solution
The city of El Paso, Texas, is looking for ways to deal with an influx of migrants into its shelters after delays in state transportation out of the area caused backlogs. (Joy Addison/Fox News)
Deputy City Manager Mario D’Agostino said the city will continue to update its state of emergency to allow buildings such as hotels and schools to be converted into emergency shelters.
“In fact, I’ve had to stay in a hotel twice in the last five days,” D’Agostino said.
He said the question is not how many migrants will arrive, but who will arrive.
“We’re meeting a lot of Venezuelans,” D’Agostino said. “They don’t have the means to get to their destination, so they don’t have the financial assistance to move to the destination city of their choice already. They rely on the state’s transportation system.” ”
El Paso city officials had to renew the city’s state of emergency several times to secure temporary shelter to house migrants. (Joy Addison/Fox News)
Pentagon commander warns of ‘alarming’ number of drone intrusions at US-Mexico border
But state transportation delays are causing long stays.
“The reason we were using hotels was because the state was only providing transportation once a week,” D’Agostino said.
This week marks the first time the state’s transit system has resumed service five days a week. Shelter directors and local officials hope this will help with some of the outstanding issues and ultimately bring some relief to the city.
Two hotels are being used as emergency shelters as more immigrants come to El Paso for long-term stays. (FOX News/Joy Addison)
“Less than 1% of those passing through want to remain in El Paso if we can allow them to continue moving, so once transportation is available, we maintain them in local shelters.” ,” D’Agostino said.
CLICK HERE TO GET THE FOX NEWS APP
Thanks to the re-imposition of the city’s state of emergency, evacuation center managers reported that no local residents in need of shelter have been denied evacuation at this time.
