Feds Seek Northern VA Space For Unaccompanied Immigrant Kids

VIRGINIA — The federal government is looking at Northern Virginia for space to house hundreds of unaccompanied immigrant children, according to a new notice posted by the General Services Administration. As the Trump administration weathers criticism for its hard-line stance on immigrants seeking entry into the United States and a family separation policy that held kids for weeks in temporary border facilities, the government is moving to find more shelters across the country.

The notice posted on FedBizOpps.gov says the GSA seeks to lease shelter space for 440 unaccompanied children on behalf of the Department of Health and Human Services' Office of Refugee Resettlement. These children are defined as "age 17 and under who are unaccompanied by parents or other legal guardians and who have no lawful immigration status in the United States (unaccompanied alien children) and apprehended by the U.S. Department of Homeland Security."

Under these circumstances, children are transferred to the custody and care of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Service's Office of Refugee Resettlement.

The federal government is considering these areas for the space: Arlington County, Fairfax County, Loudoun County and Prince William County, and the cities and towns of Alexandria, Fairfax, Falls Church, Herndon, Vienna and Manassas. According to the Miami Herald, HHS is looking to locate permanent facilities in places like Virginia, Florida and California.

The facility would be between 95,607 and 109,948 square feet with a lease up to 15 years. About 147 staff will provide 24/7 care. According to the notice, the facility will have children's bedrooms or sleeping areas, children's bathrooms, classrooms, recreation or multipurpose areas, medical service, food service, administrative and support space, and about two acres of outdoor recreation space.

The notice calls the potential facility "Virginia (National Capital Region) Unaccompanied Alien Children (UAC) Shelter." The estimated date for occupancy is July 2020.

The search for space comes as all unaccompanied children have been moved from the Homestead, Florida, facility for unaccompanied children. According to an HHS statement reported by ABC News, children were "reunified with an appropriate sponsor or transferred to a state-licensed facility within the ORR network of care providers as of August 3, 2019."

Critics have described the facility as prison camp.

But federal officials told The Washington Post HHS facilities should be called shelters rather than detention centers, since they are different from the detention centers U.S. Customs and Border Protection runs near the U.S.-Mexico border.

Last month, the U.S. Department of Homeland Security's independent watchdog reported on dangerous overcrowding and prolonged detention of children and adults in Border Patrol facilities in the Rio Grande Valley of Texas, Pro Publica reports. Nearly a third of the children in the facilities had been detained for more than 72 hours — a violation of federal limits. Many had little or no access to showers or clean clothes.

Unlike Border Patrol facilities, which are overseen by the Department of Homeland Security, shelters for immigrant children are run by private agencies under contract with the Office of Refugee Resettlement. Children are supposed to be placed in age-appropriate facilities and have access to social workers, counseling and education while they wait to be placed with sponsors.

The Trump administration said it ended its formal policy of separating families last summer, but the separations have continued. The Houston Chronicle reported in June that the federal government has justified hundreds of separations based on sometimes dubious evidence that parents have serious criminal records or gang affiliations. ProPublica reported that immigration authorities are using secret databases run by foreign police and militaries to identify gang ties.