Kids in detention need a hurricane plan
As hurricane season begins, activists monitoring the Homestead Temporary Shelter for Unaccompanied Children posed a question: “Do the feds have a hurricane plan?” The recent response was dispiriting: “We’re working on it” and “We can’t tell you what it is” aren’t sufficient answers.
The camp houses about 3,000 underage teens who entered the
United States without permission and in many cases have been separated from their parents. Put aside for a moment the Trump administration’s reprehensible immigration policy. The reality is that the camp exists, and it’s not going anywhere anytime soon. The fight for a more humane immigration policy must not blind people to the immediate needs of vulnerable children in U.S. custody. All should agree that safeguards need to be in place to protect them from a natural disaster.
And in Miami-Dade, the Mean Season is on.
No storm is immediately forecast to head toward South Florida, but there’s a decent chance — as there is every year — that a strong hurricane will hit us, derailing life for a day or weeks or months.
If that happens, even a relatively modest Category 2 hurricane could spell trouble for the camp, which sits on ground vulnerable to storm surge. A more intense storm could demolish the camp, just like Hurricane Andrew did to the Homestead area in 1992.
If a powerful storm moves toward South Florida, how will federal officials make sure that those children in detention remain safe? With only a few days warning, where will they securely relocate so many children, as everyone else is seeking shelter?
Unbelievably, it seems MiamiDade officials are being kept in the dark, too. Frank Rollason, director of emergency management for Miami-Dade, and his team work with governments, nonprofits and businesses to develop strategies for orderly evacuations.
Yet the federal government, the Office of Refugee Resettlement, have not shared its plans for the Homestead camp.
“They are self-contained. Our involvement with the Homestead shelter is next to nothing. They have not reached out to us, or to Miami-Dade County Public Schools, about sheltering these kids come a hurricane,” Rollason told Miami Herald reporter Monique O. Madan.
And neither the feds nor their private contractor are talking. Officials told Madan and other people asking about the hurricane plans that they aren’t yet complete or are secret. Secret?
This isn’t a major national security risk. These children are not terrorists being detained nor dangerous covert assets. Secrecy is not needed. No one will use an evacuation plan to stage a daring breakout during transit as a hurricane barrels down on Florida.
Lack of preparation for the unexpected before or after a hurricane already had devastating circumstances at a Broward nursing home where 12 patients died in 2017 after Hurricane Irma hit and left them without air conditioning.
This is simple human decency and concern for children, who just Wednesday learned that many of their privileges in detention are being taken away. The fact is that Rollason and other experts can help coordinate evacuation, identify safe shelters and plan for the worst.
They have experience dealing with hurricanes and evacuations year after year.
Share the hurricane evacuation plan, if it exists, and let everyone know that the kids will be safe.