Officials with the nonprofit overseeing San Antonio’s Migrant Resource Center (MRC) say they’re already at capacity, yet expect a massive increase of asylum seekers after Title 42 ends on May 11.
More than 12,000 migrants passed through the MRC in April, according to data provided by Antonio Fernandez, CEO of Catholic Charities, which operates the center in partnership with the City of San Antonio. In one week alone in late November, 6,373 asylum seekers arrived at the center.
Fernandez expects as many as 2,000 asylum seekers a day could arrive in San Antonio after Title 42 ends. The shelter holds 707 beds.
The public health rule, which was put in place at the beginning of the pandemic, allowed border officials to turn away asylum-seeking migrants from certain countries.
In preparation for the expected surge of border crossings when it ends, the Biden Administration is sending active-duty troops to the southern border. The administration is also working with countries including Colombia and Guatemala to set up regional processing centers, and has made a deal with Mexico to continue to accept certain migrants the U.S. turns away.
It’s unclear how these efforts will affect the number of migrants arriving to the U.S. in the coming weeks and months. Fernandez said he’d like to see the federal government send asylum seekers directly to their intended destination rather than busing them to cities in Texas.
Several families congregated outside the center on Monday evening. Some sat on the curb outside the center, and others walked around in groups, while others video chatted on their cell phones.
Yet even as it braces for the expected increase, Catholic Charities hasn’t been able to plan for it, Fernandez said, because it has been in limbo for months, waiting to hear whether the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) will continue funding the center.
Last Friday, the nonprofit finally heard back that FEMA would continue financing operations, he said — welcome news, given that the center only has enough funding to last until Sunday.
Uncertainty continues
But Catholic Charities is still unaware of how much money it can count on, Fernandez said.
“That means today, as of this moment, we have no government funding coming to cover these costs,” he said Tuesday. “[FEMA] called us to let us know that yes, there will be funding to help us pay for everything we do, but we’re still waiting for that.”
The inability to plan has ratcheted up his and his staff’s anxiety as the end of Title 42 looms, Fernandez said, on top of the pressure of having the center at full capacity. With more financial certainty, for example, the CEO said he would likely be looking for a second location, to serve the overflow.
After peaking in December, the number of migrants began to subside, according to Catholic Charities, and by early February, the center counted just over a thousand people a week seeking services. A small but steady increase began just days later, however, and by the week of April 23, the center served 4,500 migrants.
Between the rising numbers and the uncertainty of government funding, Catholic Charities has had to reduce the amount of money it is able to spend to help asylum seekers travel to their final destinations around the U.S.
Migrants at the center are mostly from Venezuela, Nicaragua, Colombia and Haiti, and are heading mainly to New York, Miami and Chicago, staff said.
Fewer plane tickets have led to longer average stays. Fernandez said he doesn’t know exactly how they’ll be able to handle the additional need.
“It’s gonna get ugly,” Fernandez said, eyebrows raised, glancing at his team sitting at the conference table at Catholic Charities’ Tobin Hill office.
“Not having clarity from the government is making things a lot worse for us,” he said. “If people keep coming and coming and coming, where are we putting them? Six thousand people in one week is a lot of people.”
He noted that the partnership between the cities of Austin and San Antonio, in which Austin would take some migrants coming up from the border, resulted in a single bus trip.
A request for comment from the City of San Antonio on Wednesday was not immediately returned. Yasmeen Hassan, a spokesperson with the City of Austin, confirmed that San Antonio has only used the partnership once, but said assistance will resume Thursday.
“We are expecting one bus tomorrow and will be prepared to receive up to three buses per day from the San Antonio migrant center moving forward,” said Hassan.
Strong partnership
Fernandez said the city has been an excellent partner. The nonprofit recently sought a greater police presence at the center to help manage the crowds, a request that was quickly granted.
Migrants are free to leave and return as they please, so with more migrants and fewer resources inside the center, pedestrian traffic outside has risen. They walk to the H-E-B down the street, to CiCi’s Pizza and McDonald’s. At times, some wait outside seeking day work.
In the parking lot, 19-year-old Laura Rendón held her 5-month-old daughter in her arms, sniffling from a minor cold, looking for a place to sit while her husband cut another man’s hair for $20, enough to purchase diapers for the baby.
Rendón, who is Colombian, and her husband, Julio Cesar Gonzales, left Venezuela for the U.S. while she was pregnant after selling their failing family business.
“We made the decision together for a better future for the baby,” Rendon said in Spanish. “There wasn’t much food where we were, each day [prices] went up on things. We didn’t have a stable life.”
Rendón gave birth to their daughter Adriana in Nicaragua. The three arrived from El Paso at 5 a.m. Monday and had plane tickets to Chicago on Tuesday.
“I want her to have a good mindset, a good education,” said Cesar Gonzales. “A better future for the baby girl, so she doesn’t experience the same [hardships] we experienced.”
