Printer-friendly version
East County Supervisors, candidate for vacant seat split on views over migrant aid
By Miriam Raftery
Photo, left: Migrants in Jacumba Hot Springs in May 2023
October 12, 2023 (San Diego) – By a 3-0 vote, San Diego County Supervisors on Tuesday approved allocating $3 million in federal American Rescue Act funds to aid nonprofit groups that have become overwhelmed by waves of migrants in our region. Agencies through the region’s Rapid Response Network are handling hundreds of asylum seekers daily in recent weeks. The funding will provide immediate aid with a goal of consolidating resources into a proposed migrant center in the future.
An estimated 98% of these migrants have family in the U.S., according to the proposal. But after being processed and screened by Border Patrol agents, many are being dropped off at transit stations without food, water, translation services, or any means of contacting relatives or traveling to reunite with their families. Recently, many migrants have been held temporarily in scorching desert heat in areas such as Jacumba and Boulevard without shade, water or food; community volunteers have stepped up to provide tarps, water, and sandwiches in what ECM reporter Rebecca Person termed “peanut butter diplomacy.” One immigrant called a volunteer offering food “an angel.”
An award-winning ECM report in May led the Southern Border Communities Coalition to file a federal complaint with Homeland Security over alleged mistreatment of migrants in violation of U.S. and international laws.
The use of the federal funds approved by Supervisors, intended as a three-month stopgap measure while the County pushes for more federal money, will be used to help migrants and asylum seekers with translation help, transportation, food, water, hygiene kits, restrooms, access to Wi-Fi and equipment to reach relatives and move beyond San Diego to their destination, while asylum seekers await hearings in immigration court.
The action comes weeks after Supervisors declared a humanitarian crisis over the desperate plight of the migrants, many of whom fled dangerous and desperate situations in their homelands. The crisis in Jacumba has similary played out along other local border communities, such as San Ysidro.
Chairwoman Nora Vargas, a Democrat, introduced the measure. She noted that while people can differ in their views on immigration, “We have a responsibility once people are here in our communities to make sure they’re treated with dignity and respect.”
She was joined by fellow
Democrat Terra Lawson-Remer and by East County Republican Supervisor Joel Anderson.
Photo, right: Border Patrol Agents with migrants near Jacumba Hot Springs in September, 2023.
In a December interview with East County Magazine aired on KNSJ after migrants were dumped at El Cajon’s transit station in frigid cold, Anderson stated, “We’re a great nation. We can do better.” He added, “These people should not be political pawns and our communities should not have to suffer.” Abandoning asylum-seekers with no resources or advance notice to local officials is “not fair to our community and it’s certainly not fair to the people being dropped off,” said Anderson, who thanked the federal government for providing FEMA funds to help, but said more federal resources were needed.
Anderson (photo, left) noted in the ECM interview that East County has long welcomed immigrants from places such as Iraq and Afghanistan, but noted, “We’ve always had support.”
While Anderson voted for allocating funding to assist nonprofits helping the migrants, he also sought to introduce a measure to end the County’s funding of free legal aid to migrants, but the board chair declined to add the item to the agenda.
Supervisor Jim Desmond, a Republican who also represents portions of East County’s rural, desert and mountain communities, was absent to a family commitment. But he voiced disappointment in the vote to fund migrant aid. In a statement, he said the $3 million “should be used to address pressing issues without our county. Our community faces challenges such as homelessness, deteriorating roads, and mental health crises that demand immediate attention and resources.”
Amy Reichert, the Republican candidate running for the seat vacated by Nathan Fletcher’s resignation, also denounced the vote to aid migrants and slammed the federal government’s “ineptness.”
Reichert's opponent, Democrat Monica Montgomery Steppe, voiced support for the allication at the Politifest candidate forum last Saturday "The county is the public health agency. And so when folks enter into our region, we have a responsibility to keep everyone safe while they are here,” Montgomery Steppe said. “We have a choice to ensure that we are shepherding people to their final destination. So I do support the allocation, because I do feel that it is necessary.”
In testimony to the board, the public and aid groups spoke out, with opinions divided.
Chris Stoddard, a San Diego resident, said, “It is not our responsibility to take care of people that chose to immigrate to our country illegally.” Citing recent massacres of Israeli citizens by Hamas terrorists, Stoddard added, “If the recent events in Israel have not concerned you enough about who exactly is walking across our border, then I don’t know what will.” (Note, migrants are screened by Border Patrol, and those found to pose security risks can be deported, though it’s unclear how in-depth initial screens are of the migrants released for relocation within the U.S. when facilities are overwhelmed.)
But Father Scott Santarosa of Our Lady of Guadalupe Parish in Logan Heights says his parishioners faith “calls us to act with mercy towards our brothers and sisters in need.” His church has been providing a safe sleeping space for 15to 35 migrants nightly, he told Supervisors.
Lindsay Toczylowski, executive director of Immigrant Defenders Law Center, told the San Diego Union-Tribune in an interview that she is “grateful” to Supervisors for their actions to assist nonprofit non-governmental organizations aiding migrants. But she hopes the county will step in to operate a migrant welcome center, instead of leaving nonprofits to run such a facility “because it’s beyond what the NGOs here in San Diego have capacity to do on our own,” she concluded.
Recent comments