U.S. Air Base In Texas Transformed Into Shelter For Wave Of Immigrant Children

By Jim Forsyth

LACKLAND AIR FORCE BASE Texas (Reuters) – A half-century-old section of a U.S. Air Force base in Texas has been transformed into a holding and processing center for thousands of children illegally crossing the border from Central and South America without adults.

Among those children are Jose Maquez Soto, 12, who came from Honduras to the United States and now rests on a bunk at Lackland Air Force Base in San Antonio under a hand-drawn flag of his native country and a message cheering the Honduran squad in the upcoming soccer World Cup.

Jose is one of the 60,000 “unaccompanied minors” – children under 18 – that the Obama administration estimates will enter the United States illegally this year. It projects that number to grow to nearly 130,000 next year, creating what the White House describes as an “urgent humanitarian situation.”

Nearly 1,000 of the minors at a time are being sheltered at a facility built about 50 years ago to house new recruits for basic training. The boys and girls will pass along corridors with faded Air Force pictures and new signs written in Spanish that point the way to the dining hall and bathrooms. Since the facility opened three weeks ago, 1,820 children have passed through the center.

About 850 have been released to a vetted family member or a sponsor, said U.S. Department of Health and Human Services spokesman Jesus Garcia. The person who takes the child, Garcia says, has to agree to bring the child to an immigration hearing.

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http://www.rawstory.com/rs/2014/06/06/u-s-air-base-in-texas-transformed-into-shelter-for-wave-of-immigrant-children/