500 migrant girls transported from Houston holding facility after reported incident

HOUSTON, Texas (KTRK) — Immigrant led organizations are searching for answers as to why officials abruptly closed a Houston-area shelter which was housing hundreds of young migrant girls on Saturday.

A flurry of activity was seen at the shelter just before the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services announced the teens would be transferred or reunited with family or sponsors, more than two weeks after the facility opened.

Buses were seen leaving and arriving at the shelter, and boxes and computers were being moved by workers Saturday.

“Today, HHS announced that all of the children in HHS Office of Refugee Resettlement (ORR) care at the Emergency Intake Site (EIS) for Unaccompanied Children at the National Association of Christian Churches site in Houston, Texas (NACC Houston) will be immediately unified with sponsors or transferred to an appropriate ORR facility,” agency officials said in a statement released Saturday.

Nearly 130 of the reported 450 girls at the site already have plans to be united with a sponsor, HHS officials said.

Representatives from local non-profit, FIEL Houston, held a press conference Saturday afternoon and exposed the conditions of the facility.

Executive director of FIEL, Ceaser Espinosa, said the conditions inside the warehouse were ‘inappropriate for anyone, especially young girls’, who range in age from 13-17 years old. He added that employees of the facility would only let the teens get out of their cots a few times a day to shower and use the restroom.

Fiel member Alan Cisnero said while he was out with his family on Friday night, he noticed a large amount of first responders arriving to the facility. He said he then proceeded to see what the issue was, however officials told him they couldn’t share much information regarding who was involved in the incident.

Espinosa added that the facility actually had 500 girls on roster at the time of Friday night’s incident, meaning they were right at capacity. Due to the amount of girls, he said they were unable to properly social distance inside the warehouse.

“The NACC Houston EIS and other Emergency Intake Sites are intended for use as a temporary measure,” DHS officials said.

The reason for the transfers Saturday weren’t immediately clear, though the agency cited “continuity of care under conditions that meet our strict standards of care in ORR state licensed shelters, the Carrizo Springs Influx Care Facility or Emergency Intake Sites where beds have become available.”

The unaccompanied migrant children began arriving at the Houston location, which is not being disclosed for security reasons, on April 2, a day after it opened.

Federal authorities, community and faith leaders worked together to prepare the 500-bed shelter that was operated by the National Association of Christian Churches.

“I spoke to a child who had been in the desert for 12 days. Every child that I spoke to, these were girls, and they were under 14, had crossed the Rio Grande at night,” U.S. Rep. Sheila Jackson Lee said on April 1. “Every one of them had that frightening experience.”

There are 10 migrant housing facilities total; nine are in Texas and one is in San Diego.
Here are the details for all nine Texas centers:

• Carrizo Springs – 500 beds

• Carrizo Springs – 952 beds

• Fort Bliss – 5,000 beds

• Dallas – 2,300 beds

• Houston- 500 beds

• Midland – 700 beds

• Pecos – 2,000 beds

• San Antonio – 2,400 beds

• San Antonio – 350 beds

All 10 centers combined have about 13,000 beds.