So we do have migrant camps in America.
Although not all of the 60-plus evicted from under an Indiana bridge are immigrants, I’ve been wondering for some time if the overload of unemployable (for one reason or another) immigrants in the US would eventually lead to encampments like those we see in Israel and Europe. And, then I wonder if those stories (like this one) ever reached the mainstream media would the average American get-it about the perils of open borders and unlimited immigration.
From the AP (hat tip: ‘pungentpeppers’):
INDIANAPOLIS — Indianapolis police arrested several homeless people Monday who ignored the city’s order to vacate a makeshift camp near the city’s downtown area where dozens of tents had been set up beneath a railroad bridge.
The bridge on downtown Indianapolis’ south side was home to about 24 tents, and about half the residents folded up their shelters and left in response to the city’s 9 a.m. removal order.
But city police arrested at least five people who refused to the leave and disposed of the remaining tents.
Maurice Young, the camp’s self-appointed caretaker, was taken into custody along with a handful of camp supporters. Young told The Indianapolis Star (http://indy.st/19TvijU ) all the city has done is disperse the homeless residents.
Mixed group of residents, many with mental illnesses, drug addictions:
Young said he and his supporters want individualized solutions but he said that since Indianapolis doesn’t offer that he and the others have chosen to live outside the city’s homeless shelter system and on their own terms.
He said the homeless camp’s population fluctuates, but until a few weeks ago 67 people lived in the camp.
After the city’s Department of Public Works posted signs Aug. 19 ordering the land to be vacated by Monday, he said that about 10 people moved out.
Those that stayed until Monday ranged in age from about 30 to 74 and included about 15 women, two of them pregnant, and 10 veterans. The others are immigrants or refugees from Sierra Leone, Ethiopia, Liberia, Haiti, Jamaica and Mexico.
Young estimated about 80 percent have mental health issues, while others have addictions.
Indiana Overload!
For new readers, Indiana has had quite a problem with an overload of refugees especially in the Ft. Wayne area, although Indianapolis is also a “preferred” resettlement site. Catholic Charities of Indianapolis is a primary refugee contractor there and I hope they have been contacted to see if any of their ‘clients’ have been living under the bridge. Maybe the good Catholic parishioners of the Archdiocese of Indianapolis will take some of these destitute people into their homes?
Back in 2010, then Indiana Senator Richard Lugar requested a GAO study of the refugee program as a result of the lack of communication between the federal government/contractors on one side and local governments/citizens on the other who felt they were being swamped with refugees they couldn’t possibly afford to care for. The GAO report is here and it is well worth your time to read it. Whether it mattered one bit to the State Department and the ORR is not evident.
For more information type ‘Indiana’ or ‘Fort Wayne’ into our search function.