 Actually, what I'd really like to do is introduce you to Jonathan Ryan, the executive director of Ryeesis to give us a further situation update. I feel like Ryeesis is the sort of one of the most on the ground folks with the updates about the kids. And then when we have a report in from the various representatives, those of you who are working with families and kids, hopefully we'll streamline that in a way that if you're responding in a way that's different from someone else that you would report in. So I hope that the things that Jonathan will say will then dovetail into the representatives from the agencies, especially the governmental representatives and the larger organizations will respond to some of the especially long term issues. So Jonathan, please help us see the whole picture and help us understand what we can do to help. Great. Thank you. I think I'm already, I'm hot. All right. Great. Hi. Good morning, everybody. And thank you so much for coming out. Can you hear me? Okay. I can hear myself really well. Okay. That's weird. So my name is Jonathan Ryan, and I'm an attorney. But as we say in the Wizard of Oz, I'm a good attorney. And I really appreciate that graph that you were just showing because that kind of shows, I've also got another guest from Riasis here, Helena Ryan, who is the new interfaith outreach coordinator for Riasis. And she's also seated in the mother's section because I've got my mom here helping me as well. And so I was glad to see that chart because I kind of told my mom, I was like, now you see why I've been so busy. So Riasis is the refugee and immigrant center for education and legal services. We are a non-governmental, non-for-profit agency that has been here in San Antonio since 1986. Our work predates that incorporation. Some of the founding members of Riasis are here with us today. It began essentially during the Central American Wars by a group of people who were assisting those who were coming directly across the border, still bearing the wounds, still hungry, still tired from the journey, and they provided them that basic assistance. Some of those members went to federal prison because of the work that they did on behalf of those people. As laws changed and the focus of Riasis became legal services, we've developed into essentially a law firm. We are a law office that assists underserved refugees, children, and families in Central and South Texas. We have an office here in San Antonio that's at Flores in Poplar. If you know MK Davis or the Michoacana there on Flores, we're right across the street. We also have a location up at 410 and 35 next to the immigration offices, and we have new offices in Corpus Christi and Austin. Most of this is due to the rise in the number of unaccompanied children here in our region. When I came to Riasis in 2008, we were an agency of four people. Today we are an agency of 40. We'll probably be an agency of 50 or 60 by the end of the year. And the growth has been due to the rise in the number of unaccompanied children here. In 2008, I answered the phone and it was a request from a non-for-profit in New York that administers funding for legal services for unaccompanied children, asking if I could provide know-your-rights presentations and basic legal screenings to just 28 children who are in San Antonio. That's what they told me. Just 28 children. It won't be hard. That was in 2008. In 2009, there were 60 kids. In 2010, there were 120. In 2011, there were 250. In 2012, there were 500. Last year, in 2013, it got up to 1,000 children and we thought, ah, that's where it's going to stop. And this year, we were providing at our max in mid-July. We were providing services to over 2,300 children here in the San Antonio and Corpus Christi area. So the agency that I work with, Riasis, that I run, provides classes, know-your-rights presentations to these children very soon after they arrive at the health and human service facilities. During these presentations, we explain to them what their rights are and what their responsibilities are to the immigration court because it looks many ways like a child protective services environment except differently from that context where the parents are maybe the subject of a criminal prosecution. In this case, it's the children who have to respond to a court. And there is no appointed counsel in the immigration system because it's considered civil in manner, not criminal. There is no appointed counsel despite the fact that we have changed the immigration courts by law over the recent years to more resemble a court, a criminal court. And the consequences of deportation, as we know, can be as severe as death. So we try to fill that gap left by the absence of a public defender model. And we provide the children information and for many reasons we provide them free representation or we attempt to match them with a pro bono in the area where they're going to reunify too. So that's the work that we do and the work has grown significantly over the past several years, obviously. Now when the crisis hit or the influx came this summer, we were not provided as usual additional funding to serve Lackland. And we saw a lot of parts of the country where no services were provided to these large Department of Defense facilities. We made a decision, I say we on behalf of my staff, they love it when I say that. We made a decision that we were going to go to Lackland even though we didn't have funding. And so starting on June 9th, we requested access to health and human services to provide services at Lackland and we began to provide know your rights and individual screenings. We completed providing initial legal screenings to all of the children at Lackland last Wednesday. So in just less than 60 days we provided individual consultations to over 1,650 children. We found after those screenings, we have a multi-page intake screening that we've developed over the past six years to collect information that can help us identify children who may be refugees. They may be in fear of persecution or may have indeed been persecuted in their home country. They may be victims of extreme forms of abuse, abandonment, neglect or other crimes under our state laws, but in their home countries. They may be victims of human trafficking. They may also be victims of a crime that occurred in or has some nexus to the United States. So we're screening the children for factual information that we can then use to determine if they're eligible for this form of relief from deportation. They can successfully defend their deportation and remain here permanently in the United States with a humanitarian protection. We have found that 63% of the children with whom we have worked are eligible, are likely to succeed in their cases before an immigration court. This finding flies in the face of the statements by the administration, by immigration, by others who claim that these children are not refugees, are not eligible for any form of relief and will ultimately be deported home. It's just factually not true. Unfortunately, many immigrants and many children do not have representation. And as a child, a six-year-old child trying to prepare an asylum application, I know many lawyers, we have to handhold them through the pro bono process a few times before they understand how to put together an asylum application. The children have literally no hope, no hope of preparing this request and that lack of wherewithal often leads to them being ultimately ordered removed. It has nothing to do with their eligibility or what's happened to them. It's that they have no voice. These children have no lobbyists. They've got no voice in this process. They've got no voice in our politics except for potentially us. And thanks to our access, we're able to meet with these children and we hope to be able to provide them with some sort of voice in this process. So what I think that we can do today, and I'd like to quickly get this into a question and answer kind of a format because I think that'll drive the discussion a bit better. What I can provide, I think, to this group is that we've been inside this system, so to speak. The statute, the laws that protect these children that are currently being discussed as being changed require that the shelters that Health and Human Service provide access to counsel. So through this statute, agencies like RAISIS can enter into the Health and Human Service facilities. We can gain access to these children to learn their stories, who they are and really, most importantly, where are they going? Because of all the children in this system. So we have this pre-existing system, right? Lackland got us into the news and it made us all aware of it. We have a system that's been here for years and it's managed by organizations like BCFS, Baptist Child and Family Service, like the Archdiocese, Southwest Key, International Educational Solutions. These are non-for-profits that have contracts with Health and Human Services to provide shelter space. Normally it is a home-like or group-home-like setting where these children reside. Due to the influx, Lackland popped up in order to be a clearinghouse for children because there was no room in the existing system. At this point now, they've increased capacity around the country, so they created these three air force or military bases that had approximately 1,000 children in each facility for a total of 3,000 children. Well, what they've done over the summer is they've opened up approximately more or less 10 facilities around the country with about 300 beds in each. That replaces that 3,000 military bases with 3,000 beds of smaller, more appropriate for child-setting shelter beds. So these children are moving through now out of Lackland. No new kids are coming to Lackland. They're moving out to the classic shelters, as we call them, more appropriate long-term settings. And they're being reunified with family members. So of all of these children who are in these shelters, we talk about 1,200 kids at Lackland. It's important to keep in mind not just the number but the pace, the movement. Movement is key to this whole system and I think as we respond, we have to understand that these are moving populations. The migration continues even after they've crossed the border. So these children are spending between 14 and 30 days in these facilities. So the 1,200 kids at Lackland today are not the same 1,200 kids that were there two weeks ago. They're moving. Approximately 90 to 96 I've heard percent of the children who are in these HHS facilities reunify to a family member or a sponsor. Now when we talk about family reunification, it is not always the case that these children are moving to my favorite Uncle Tony. They're often going to the step-cousin of my second aunt. People that they've never met before, in fact. They're family members but they're very distant family members. So it is not true that all of these children are simply coming to reunify with mom and dad. I wish it was the case, but it's not. So most of these children will reunify with family members. Of those 96 percent of the kids who will reunify, so taking 90,000, let's say 100,000 children come this year to make the math a little easier, we can say 96,000 children are going to reunify with family members. Of those 96,086 percent of them are going to leave the state of Texas. Here in Texas we get 14 percent of the reunified unaccompanied children. We're the number one state for reunification. No other state gets 14 percent. But it's true that the majority of children are going to leave the state. And so a big consideration that we have is matching children with pro bono attorneys out in the four corners of the nation. They're going to Florida, California, New York, Virginia, and oh boy Georgia, get ready. They're about to hit Georgia. We're finding children are going to states that had previously passed these SB 1070-like laws that forced the existing undocumented but long term integrated into the community undocumented individuals were forced out. And now we're seeing children going into these agricultural areas potentially to replace that workforce. So many of these children have been trafficked. Many of these children will be trafficked. And a big part of what we do when we get into the facilities is we try to inoculate them. We try to inform them about trafficking. We try to enable them with phone numbers, hotlines, 911, how to make a cry, how to ask for help. That it's okay to ask for help. We have to tell girls that they don't need to provide sex to the people that they're living with in exchange for being residents. Very, very vulnerable these children once they get out. So there's a big part of this, big focus is at the border, I know. And that's definitely, there's a lot of need. We've seen it at Greyhound stations. There's a great need for that as people have been released. Now they're going to be detaining the families so the need is going to shift as the families are not being dumped off at Greyhound but are going to be detained. So there's going to be a great need for legal services and reception services as those who are released on bond are dropped off at our Greyhound station here. That's a very, very weak point. Every night, about 11 o'clock, the private detention buses come by and just drop people off at the cargo, drop off over at the Greyhound station at Pecan and St. Mary's. I was there at 2, 3 o'clock in the morning once picking up a lady. And there was at least four Central American women with seven or eight children just huddled in the corner. I was there at 2, 30 in the morning. I was there wearing my suit and they looked deathly afraid of me as if I was some kind of immigration guy there to mess with them. So there's a great need for those who are released. A big focus has been on these shelters and the detention systems but people are very vulnerable when they're released. The kids who are reunified are released. There are kids who are reunified into our area. So I think since October approximately 400 children have been reunified into the San Antonio district. Now the San Antonio district is huge. This is Waco, Corpus, Laredo, Eagle Pastel, Rio, San Angelo. It's a huge district. That immigration court district for San Antonio. So the children are spread along a wide geographic area. But they're clearly going to be hitting our schools very soon. I think that that's another thing that we need to be prepared for. They're going to need special services. They're going to need access to information about how they can guide their cases. The children who age out, at the age of 18 children are normally ice shows up to the kids' shelter and brings them to the detention center. Over our years of work we've worked very closely in a stakeholder way with ICE. We've managed to successfully get children released on their 18th birthday instead of getting sent to adult detention which is a wonderful thing except for the fact that we now have a person on our hands. We've just created a homeless person at the very worst. Phil Le is not here but Posada Guadalupe is a home on the west side where he receives a lot of these young adults now as we're waiting for their immigration paperwork to get complete. So there's a really community response around the children who are leaving the foster care system much like in the domestic context. But these kids are less culturally aware less equipped to be able to be self-reliant when they get here. So that's a huge community response that's very needed. We also have here seven to four beds of long-term foster care through the Baptist Child and Family Service Center. These are children who have been through the shelter system tried to reunify and there's been nobody. These are children who are alone in this country and they're represented and pursuing a case, some kind of a refugee benefit and they're therefore placed into foster homes and also a group home that's on the campus. These children are in our communities, they're going to John Jay High School only. They're on the soccer team. You should see the trophies at the group home for killing it. We've definitely raised the sport, the beautiful game here in San Antonio over the last few years. And so this is a process. There are organizations and individuals who have been involved in this for years. So this is not completely new to us. The numbers are great, the numbers are new and we're seeing within those numbers there are changes. We're starting to begin to parse through our data in more refined ways to discover for example that although Honduras has been the number one country Guatemala is the number one country that we've seen in Lackland. We've seen an increase in Indigenous people who are fleeing. We've seen increases in more younger children and we've seen increases in girls. Now one thing that we talk about in our business is filter rates. And that is the, you compare the number of people who are reported to be leaving the countries compared to those who are arriving. And though we're seeing larger numbers of girls the filter rates show that more girls are leaving Honduras and El Salvador than are getting here, much more. Many, many of them are not making it. Relative to those two countries Guatemalan girls are getting here more in greater numbers compared to those who leave. Some of the information, we're just fresh information we're starting to get from our qualitative and quantitative intakes from Lackland. And as we look at the reasons just to speak a little bit about these people and some of the trends that we're seeing is that the flight of girls from Honduras and El Salvador is much more solitary and that the Guatemalans, it's tied to the fact that we're seeing more Indigenous people we're seeing more non-Spanish speakers Mam, Che, Quiche, Agua Cateca, Cachquel, Ichquel all these new words that we're learning of children who are coming as Indigenous groups. You see images of the children riding on the trains and literally with the Guatemalans they're traveling in groups. They're family tied. Because they're Indigenous they're more closely related by culture and language and family bonds than the more urban Hondurans and El Salvadorans who are fleeing alone and they gather together in groups en route out of necessity. But the Guatemalans are leaving in groups and what you see in the images is literally you see the boys surrounding the girls protecting them as they go forward. And this helps the girls to arrive more intact and more safe. But we're hearing just atrocious things and I could unfortunately speak on and on and on about the stories that we hear of the children things that they fled, things that they've suffered en route and unfortunately many children these days are expressing that the worst thing that happened to them in the entire trip was being arrested by Border Patrol and being put in what we call the Xuelera or the Icebox. And these are Border Patrol stations boxes that are spread out around the border area where people are put as they're being processed into HHS. The law requires that the Border Patrol has 48 hours to determine if a child is an unaccompanied minor. After that they have 72 hours to get the child out of their custody and into the custody of Health and Human Services. The children do not need to be in the custody of their prosecutor. Duh. Took litigation to figure that out. Well so they have five days to get them out. During this time they're often kept in cells or boxes where they eat, they sleep, they use the restroom. They're kept there often times with adults because they haven't yet determined that they're children. They got 48 hours and they use them. The mandated time is five days. That's what the law allows. In fact we're seeing that the average length of stay from the children we've met with is seven days. This is seven days in a box including two bologna sandwiches a day in about 55 to 60 degree temperatures. It's extremely cold in these areas. The average stay is seven days. We've heard children reporting up to 12. We've heard children talking about their concern for other children who had lost consciousness due to the cold. It's devastating to hear a child expressing concern about another child. That's a devastating situation to be in. We really need a community response. I must say that organizations like RISIS have felt kind of out there on our own for many years. You can read my grant requests. I've got so many foundations that are coming asking me now how they can help and I've been saying go read the grant requests I've been putting in for the last few years. We've been the minors canary on this issue for years. We've seen it doubling in our own context. I think we've had a realization those of us who are involved in this work of the world has taken a look at this and reeled in shock. We're standing back and looking and realizing what we've been through. I'm having to get counselors from my staff at this point after what they've been through this summer. The associated trauma that prepare yourselves for will be an issue if you really get involved with this. I just want to close and get to question and answer important questions. Why are you here little kid? If you ask these children why are they here? Why did they come to the United States? I will guarantee you the answer you will hear from every child. I came here to study and to get a job and to support my family. That's what they'll tell you to a T. Why? Because you're asking this child why are you on my doorstep little kid? What do you want from me? You're stoking their shame, you're stoking their guilt they're going to tell you what they think that they want you to hear. I'm here to be a good person I'm here to contribute and I'm here to take that's what they'll tell you and it's true. Ask that same child why did you have to leave your house? Why could you not live in your hometown anymore? And you will hear a different story. You will hear the truth. Because all these children that we see it's like the trunk of a tree they've all kind of arrived here at our border and they're kind of this monolithic group they all look the same, they've got the same story they're all here. You follow those stories up like a tree and you'll see that they branch out to these tiny little branches and that's when you get to the kid that's when you get to the beginning of these stories there's a child who's alone who somebody is hurting that child somebody is not protecting that child and it has to do with this overwhelming lid of crime and organized violence normalized violence that sits like a lid on top of these three countries the northern triangle. These children see the world through the lens of their families that's how children see the world they see somebody in their house maybe an uncle, maybe a parent, maybe a step parent who's harming them, who's maybe exploiting them that person, that adult is usually bearing the pressure of the gangs that the child may see or may not see they're involved with the gangs they're being recruited, they're resisting and that's what really causes a lot of these children to flee it has to do with this criminal violence and we have a lot to do with this criminal violence I've talked to more people who I'm realizing now think that there's so many drug cartels in Central America because they're all doing so much drugs nooooo it's us white lines, it's the white stuff we're putting up our nose we talk more about our national drug problem when a movie star dies than we do when tens of thousands of refugees from the war against children the war on drugs arrive at our shores these are refugees this is the calling of our time in terms of who we are as a nation and I hope that we all can really really fundamentally understand that the laws that we're looking at changing due to this crisis and I think it's unfortunate in some respect that we're calling a crisis some people might be able to go down there and see there's a bit of order to what's happening certainly now, I think when we use that term crisis it opens a space for dramatic action and it's paved the way now for us to take action that I think fundamentally affects who we are as a nation, our character we have a lot of pride built into the fact that we're the beacon of hope and democracy in this world we're very proud of the greatest generation who went to war as we're told not to defend our borders not to defend our interests but to preserve our principle principle that you do not return vulnerable people to a place where they're going to be tortured and killed and persecuted that's who we are and that's what we're looking at losing thank you thank you so I'm going to ask the first question and then as I'm asking and we're hearing a response those of you who have a specific question to start working your way up to the microphone as you can tell we have the iceberg you know, you see a little bit but there is so much information right here that maybe you have heard for the first time so my question John is if I'm a volunteer in this group, in this audience what can I do to help make a difference right now and maybe in the next week or months so we know who the kids are who are coming here in our community so there is a group of kids and they're coming to live here in San Antonio we have to welcome them so we are going to be working to try to engage with groups as you form in groups I think the most that you can form groups and decide what you have to offer the easier it's going to be to work with agencies like us who know where the kids are where they're going I think you need to build relationships with schools and I think we need to get information out there we need to make sure that school counselors know who they can call if they encounter a child who's got this problem I think that that's our first line of contact right now as a community maybe some members of the school system who are here I'm so glad to have your voice could speak to that anybody from San Antonio would like to speak yes and I invite you to come up to the mic so we can all hear you we can pass the mic can we pass the mic oh like Donahue Caller thank you so much John for the presentation my name is Marisa Perez again I represent I'm here representing San Antonio Independent School District in the governmental and community relations department but in addition to that I serve on the state board of education and I represent the majority of San Antonio and my area covers the Rio Grande Valley so I split the Rio Grande Valley with another board member and I guess my question for you John is what can we do as a state board of education to help support our districts with the influx of students I know that these students these children are staying from anywhere from two weeks to several months and so what can I do as a state board member to best prepare my districts for that so they've got school systems when they're in shelter care they have to just like any child in Texas they have to go to school and so Baptist and archdiocese they have school districts that are affiliated with the district inside the shelters and they have a rotating curriculum that's not the full curriculum it's understand that the children are there for a short period of time the children who get out who are going to the local high schools or middle schools they're going to be there for your full year they're not going to just be there for a matter of weeks they're absolutely going to be there the average length of a case that we might take is 15 to 16 months from the point of apprehension to when we can get a kid they're permanent residents so obviously the ESL classes and also understanding that a lot of children who are labeled as Spanish speakers are not Spanish speakers particularly when if you see that they're from the nation of Guatemala do you capture country of origin is that something that's part of the intake process country of origin does keep track of that however the issue with that is are the children going to be in our system long enough for the Texas Education Agency to acquire all that information they will be long enough and the aggregate children from these countries with these needs are going to be increasingly increasingly present so the numbers they were originally expecting 40 to 60,000 children this year they had to revise that number up by this year we're talking about the fiscal year that starts in October so when we say this year on these numbers we're talking about since October of 2013 in fact they estimated 40 to 60,000 they had to revise that to 90,000 and the numbers for next year are 140,000 I was just in DC and they're really talking like 200,000 next year so this is the small summer I think speaking from San Antonio ISD also I think that these children are coming with a lot of issues not only educational issues but social and emotional issues that need to be looked at and given last year we experienced about in the vicinity of less than 100 that we know of there could have been more we're planning to identify these children to see exactly where they're coming from and who they are so that we can understand the population themselves because before we can say we're going to do this, we're going to do that we're going to do this other kind of stuff we need to know who they are this way we can address their individualized needs educational needs from the onset obviously the social and emotional side they're going to have a lot of needs clothing and all that kind of sub school supplies whatever that's going to be a need how many are actually coming to San Antonio is another issue here in Bear County we've got over 17 different school districts where are they going to get housed where are they going to go to school how many is going where so there's a lot of issues there so I think you know from the to get started for the fall we just want to know who these kids are we want to be able to identify them and work with them and kind of have a self-assessment within ourselves as to where we go as to how to best address their academic needs okay so and you're going to have children such as these who come from the shelters you're going to have children who are who are recent arrivals who get apprehended who never went through the system so they won't have that label or tag or they won't be going to court so to speak and then you've got also many children who are here in San Antonio who we call dreamers who are also undocumented but you just wouldn't know it they've grown up here so they're all populations of undocumented students that we've got in our schools they all have particular needs we have a question here yes actually my question is more for the audience than anybody else I didn't realize there were going to be so many priests and ministers here today but when we're collecting for donations and so forth I've had a number of people come up to me and say you know the other side of the fence those who are against accepting the children here will come up and start giving them a hard time and since I'm running for public office they will say what should I say to them and my response has been this has absolutely nothing to do with politics it has to do with children it has to do with human caring no no and my response has been when people came to me and said the same thing and said ask me about it my response has been read your Bible and that work I had one fellow said well I'm an atheist and my response was you really need to read your Bible but I would like to know other than and essentially trying to cut them off because there's no talking with them what is a better response to say to someone like that I mean the US Conference of Catholic Bishops is clear faith leaders and church leaders around the country are clear the position of every faith is clearly on the side of the immigrants and welcoming the stranger our Bible is full of stories of migration every great character from Jesus to Moses is a migrant and clearly what we're seeing here is on the level of things we've read about in the Bible and we can only hope that our response meets that challenge as well I think once people hear individual stories like you have told and are circulating we we become connected with the human story and I think that's the answer I wanted to comment real quick on something you said about collecting things because I think we some of us got and many of you probably got this too some important information that there is not a need for items to be collected for the valley at this point they are at capacity and the need is going to be as we're hearing long term issues school issues legal support some foster homes mentoring trauma care those kinds of things so when at this point it doesn't seem like and the kids who are in the shelters are provided for physically very well so that desire that impulse to give clothes and shoes and so forth at this point we need to to hold back on well I don't have anything to add to it just that we have a relatively short time before we've agreed that we're going to adjourn and I think we need to focus on where we go from here yeah where we go from here picking up on mentoring it seems to me that one possibility would be for if people wanted to volunteer to be mentors that you might be the contact person with whom we could get in touch with individual children so there's an email address that we have set up at Riasis we have somebody manning it and I could give that to you if you're interested it's help kids help kids one word at RiasisTexas.org I'll spell that R-A-I C like Charlie E like Echo S like Sierra Texas all spelled out T-E-X-A-S dot O-R-G are we on the list oh great great so help kids we're on the agenda is that the agenda is that email address on there but the Riasis Texas is there help kids at RiasisTexas send an email state what you want to provide and we'll get in touch with you this is a long term issue folks this is going to be a long term issue and so we hope that you can have the patience to stay with us as we stick with this issue over the long term it's going to be a while as we get to recognize these children who have been released and we get to meet with them and we will put them in touch but it's critical that they get mentors to help them so once again if you have not signed up yet on the sign up sheet invite you to do that and get your email address and then we will email after this we've been taking notes and so there'll be a brief set of minutes of what's transpired with everyone who has been here and on the email address so we're going to share the full email list of everyone who attended with everyone who is here and then we have an email address and so you will capture his email address and be able to do it. I think we've got questions in the back. Yes I just have one question specifically for the San Antonio ISD I don't know if you're aware of this but San Francisco and a lot of schools in the country are adopting a way for children to respond to trauma and also children who haven't experienced trauma to focus and it's called mindfulness and I don't know if you've heard of this but there are schools who are adopting policies in their schools and it's called mindful kind of time or quiet time and that's something that we might want to consider for the immediate response for children who are in classrooms that have dealt with trauma it's just something I wanted to raise to your attention I'd love to speak with someone who's part of the ISD so thank you. So then I'm going to invite you to pass the mic to our guest from HSH there she she's jotting down a note. We'd love, thank you for being here and I'm sure you have something to say or comment. I'm just very touched by this one of the things that I've been trying to convey to people is that the people who are negative and against the children and don't want to help them are the ones who dominate the news coverage and we know from the calls that we get every day at HHS that you are the majority and so many Americans have just been so welcoming to these children and want to help them so I just thank you so much for everything that you're doing I've been with the kids for the last few days here their stories you know with the one woman said about sharing personal stories that's the most moving thing and it's just incredible what these children have been through to get here and their incredible vulnerabilities and we are able to match them mostly with families and those who have family in the United States are actually more vulnerable to violence and to kidnapping and being taken hostage because they think they can get the money from the states so we do end up I think 55% of our kids end up with a parent and that's not an accident those things are connected so these children are targets for violence and we need to do everything we can to protect them and thank you for everything you're doing thank you once again for being here the other guest that I'd like to really hear from is BCFS I think you were down here maybe did you have anything to add I know that the sheltering mission a lot of folks wanted to hear a little bit about it and I know I'm putting you on the spot the sheltering mission has been done since the rise in the number of immigrant children have happened late this spring and through this summer those numbers of children presenting to the border have dropped considerably and we're looking at the shelters being closed over the next few weeks but we're all concerned about the long term care for these children what happens to them legally what happens to them in school and I think Mr. Ryan did a great job of helping understand that these children didn't just need that care during that first month or so that they're here in the US but they have long-term needs that are going to need to be met and there needs to be some continuity of care I was happy to hear that there will be services since continued through the legal system for these kids because the majority of them although a lot stay in Texas are going to Minnesota and Maine and California and Oregon and Florida they're going to need care for years to come in a lot of places I was surprised that only 63% are going to get refugee status I thought it was higher than that from the personal stories and the experiences that I've had they're very sad but most of them are relieved to be here after they go through the situation at the border that he mentioned we're hopeful and excited about getting with a close family member or distant family member or another sponsor so thank you for watching if there's enough already on the border what do we need to be doing now question what do we need to be doing now I think for those children who are here in this community immediately groups of people who can provide mentorship I think also we've got other issues as well and I think that there are other immigrants there are other people in this community we work with the Lutherans Lutheran immigrant refugee services funds us to work with detained survivors of torture we're working with a shelter on the west side that houses African women who are pregnant who the border patrol when they get pregnant African ladies they call us on our cell phone and we bring them up here there are people to be worked with in that community there are adults there are family units who maybe do a reception teams at the Greyhound stations we need people who want to mentor young people you need to come forward let us know your language abilities let us know your interests and we'll find a way to get you helping I've got Andrew Solano who's come visiting us he represents our congressman Lloyd Doggett yes good afternoon I just briefly wanted to just mention the congressman couldn't be here today but I wanted to make sure I attended the meeting I'm absolutely thrilled that so many of you came out I wish it was under different circumstances but our office works closely with Jonathan and his group many of you in the audience know our office and the congressman we want to continue to ask you to call our office we're happy to point you in the right direction if we can we've continued to monitor the situation into the forefront of what our office is doing I did have the opportunity to tour the Lackman facility a few months ago and report back to the congressman he's not aware is from Austin down to San Antonio and so we don't have any part to the border but absolutely again this is the forefront of our legislative issues some of the politics out of it we had the Humane Act recently congressman Doggett did not feel that that was the right piece of legislation moving forward we don't think that we should be rolling back any of the opportunities that we have and protections for these kids we're moving over because at the end of the day it is an immigration issue but it's also humanitarian and we want to make sure that what we're not seeing is the first thing that they see across the border is some militia with a gun pointed at them we want to make sure that it's someone who's there to care for the children like Jonathan and his agency his organization we're just asking for little humanity and decency for the kids and so we want to continue to monitor the situation I have my card there my e-mail up so if you ever need to get a hold of us our office is here on 217 West Travis we do represent the downtown area so this is in our district so I want to come by and say hello and if anybody has any questions you can feel free to contact me and you're going to stick around a little bit longer and so some of the folks after we break up will be able to visit me and you might be able to correct me but I think it's an important number to know 202-224-3121 is that correct for the congressional switchboard 202-224-3121 that's the congressional switchboard the numbers, the reports we hear is that the phones are ringing off the hook against the kids 10-1 and that's the currency of Washington is those phone calls a phone call every 24 hours is a new unique phone call if you don't want to talk to anybody you can leave a message at night and it still gets counted letting them know that you support these refugee children a new call every 24 hours is a new unique call and 10-1 right now anti-immigrant calls so I'm looking at the clock, I do have one question here and then I think it would be appropriate before we dismiss in prayer and we will do that in just a minute to talk about when this group would like to get back together again if we're going to do that and so a question? I just want to answer the question of what can we do now my name is Christina McLean I'm the education minister at Laurel Heights I'm also the United Methodist Children's Advocacy Person these kids have been with us and those of us who've been beating drums for kids for years are thrilled that everyone cares one of the things I say to people is first of all socks and underwear never go to waste okay so people just want to give you something tell them to give you socks and underwear they just they never go to waste but the second you know it's true the reason you're laughing and one sock really never goes to waste right but most of what I want to say to you is there are many many organizations who are set up they are on the front lines they are doing this work daily that's the reason why these children have been cared for before the media hit it in June if you have people in your congregations and your organizations who are moved tell them to do something go register at CASA and become a CASA go become a foster parent in Bear County currently we have and I wish Yolanda was still here to back me up but two weeks ago we had not one foster home left in Bear County that could accept a family of more than three kids most of these kids come in three to five family systems so what I would say to tell you is to use all of this passion and all of this emotion to continue to work for children all you have to do is go online and put I want to volunteer for kids and just watch the list show up and then figure out if you want to read contact essay reads and read to a kid for an hour a week if you want to be a foster parent and you want to feed them dinner be a foster parent if you want to go work in the court system go to CASA go through the training and go fight I mean all of these organizations have been here and friends they're going to be here for a long time because this type of movement allows us to motivate more people to the needs that all kids have and these are not organizations that say oh are you legal well then I'll help you so just to encourage people to do something and if they want to do something other than give money and all the organizations that you've talked they're looking for ten more dollars especially racists who bless your hearts I don't even want to know what your balance sheet looks like right now okay but the money helps but if they have to give something just collect socks and underwear and we'll see that some child gets new socks and underwear great thank you okay so hands for those of you who are interested in having another gathering progress report an update progress report we also have to maintain I think situational readiness and awareness because we are experiencing a low and it's going to leave the headlines and people are going to forget about this a little bit for a while and it's going to rear its head again and so we have to maintain the momentum as I said we kind of have to maintain that August 1st readiness that we arrived at over the summer it was a long hard summer to get to where we got in August 1st where we felt like we had resources and ability we can't let that deteriorate over the next four or five months because come February and March we're going to be right back here in high numbers again if not sooner