As migrants overwhelm state shelter system, Auchincloss asks Biden to send team to ‘assess’
As the influx of migrants in Massachusetts continues to push the state’s shelter system and other resources to the brink, Representative Jake Auchincloss is calling for the Biden administration to send an assessment team of federal Homeland Security officials to Boston to “see with their own eyes that this is not a sustainable scenario.”
“Given the scale of the crisis that Massachusetts is facing, we have to try all the things,” the Newton Democrat said in an interview. “This is one dimension of the multidimensional work.”
The type of assessment Auchincloss is requesting recently played out in New York City, where a Department of Homeland Security assessment team spent four days visiting city shelters and meeting with local officials last month.
But instead of money and resources, Homeland Security officials sent letters to New York city and state officials, which were first reported by Politico, identifying “structural” and “operational” in the city’s response to the crisis and making about two dozen recommendations.
Auchincloss’s call for a similar assessment in Boston came during a recent meeting with a legislative liaison to the White House, which the congressman recalled as a “very positive” conversation.
He detailed the meeting in a letter sent to state Senator Marc Pacheco and state Representative Adam Scanlon on Friday morning, who separately wrote to the congressman about the challenges posed by the migrant arrivals in their districts.
“Our state will completely financially collapse if common sense reform is not executed soon,” Scanlon, a North Attleborough Democrat, warned Auchincloss.
Pacheco and Scanlon aren’t the only state officials asking for the federal government to act.
For months, as thousands of migrants have arrived in the state, local officials have pleaded for Washington to intervene.
Healey has twice written to the Biden administration, imploring officials to quickly grant work permits to the thousands of migrants who have overwhelmed the state’s shelter system and to send money to help the state provide necessary resources such as housing and transportation.
“States are holding the bag and bearing tremendous burden,” the governor said on WBUR’s “Radio Boston” last month.
Massachusetts’ 1983 “right-to-shelter” law obligates officials to immediately house eligible families, pressing them to find shelter options on short notice.
The arrival of families needing shelter and support has pushed the emergency shelter system to the brink, and state officials are increasingly turning to hotels and motels, where more than 3,000 families are now being housed.
In total, more than 6,800 families are currently housed in the state’s shelter system.
“The significant influx of new arrivals . . . shows no sign of abating,” Healey wrote in a letter to Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas on Sept. 7. “We have no choice but to meet this moment.”
The firmly worded letter followed a meeting between Healey and Mayorkas about the state’s escalating migration crisis, which has led the governor to declare a state of emergency and deploy the National Guard to shelters around the state.
State officials and immigration advocates argue that the federal government’s long backlog of work permit applications has become a key obstacle in helping migrants exit the shelters and live independently. Local and state officials across the country have cited the backlog of work permit applications, which would allow migrants to earn money and thus find their own housing, as a top complaint.
Auchincloss, who participated in a call with the Massachusetts congressional delegation and state leaders Thursday, said he feels that Healey is “doing her utmost in concert and consultation with other state officials,” but there are limits to what the state government can do without federal action.
“The immigration problem rolls downhill,” he said. “Congress has failed to solve it; it hits the state and it hits localities.”
Among attendees on the Thursday call was state Senate President Karen E. Spilka, who said Thursday that state leaders are “doing all we can to help the desperate families who are arriving here in ever-increasing numbers.”
“We absolutely need help from our federal partners to marshal the resources required to house these parents and children and help them get on their feet,” she said.
The frustration with the federal government has been building on Beacon Hill in recent days.
“The guy’s running for president. He better start paying attention to this,” House Speaker Ronald J. Mariano said of President Biden at a bill signing Wednesday.
At a separate event on Thursday, he said, “Unless we get help, we are going to have some difficult decisions.”
By: Samantha J. Gross
Source: The Boston Globe