Group offers refuge in South Georgia for the families of deportees

Stewart Detention Center, Lumpkin, Ga.: 1,513

Eloy Detention Center, Eloy, Arizona: 1,486

Northwest Detention Center, Tacoma, Wash.: 1,400

Adelanto Detention Facility, Adelanto, Calif.: 1,224

Source: U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement

In a leafy neighborhood more than 100 miles south of Atlanta sits a little yellow house with a unique view of the nation’s immigration detention system.

Called El Refugio — or the refuge — the nonprofit-run home supports families with loved ones at the sprawling immigration detention center just down the road. Volunteers manage the home using private donations.

El Refugio takes in the spouses, children and parents of the men held at the Stewart Detention Center. The federal complex is the second-busiest detention center in the nation for people facing deportation, holding on average 1,513 detainees per day, federal figures show. Only the South Texas Detention Complex in Pearsall, Texas, is busier.

Like Stewart, some federal immigration detention centers are located in remote areas, making it difficult for families to visit their loved ones. El Refugio fills the gap by giving these families free meals and lodging.

Among those who sometimes stay at El Refugio are Melissa Santiago and her six young children from Boone, N.C. A U.S. citizen, Santiago said her husband, Miguel, was the family’s breadwinner and is the father of two of her children, who were both born in the U.S. Miguel – a painter — pleaded guilty to possession of cocaine with intent to distribute this year, Santiago said, and is now facing deportation to his native Mexico.

Santiago said she is having trouble paying her bills and her family is now facing eviction from its rental home. On Father’s Day weekend this month, she made the more than seven-hour drive here in a beat-up 1998 Toyota Sienna she borrowed from a friend. She said she “prayed all the way” the van would survive the trip.

“They are real nice — good people,” Santiago said of the volunteers at El Refugio after returning there from visiting her husband at the detention center. “I’m glad they got it because I mean I wouldn’t be able to afford to come down and pay for a hotel for two or three days.”

But benefits can come from keeping detention centers away from urban areas, said Jan Ting, who served as an assistant commissioner with the former U.S. Immigration and Naturalization Service.

“Locating detention facilities in low-cost areas as opposed to expensive, urban areas is one way the government can try and hold down costs,” said Ting, who teaches immigration law at Temple University and is a board member with the Center for Immigration Studies, which advocates for admitting fewer immigrants. “I don’t know how many taxpayers would volunteer to pay additional taxes so we could build detention facilities in high-costs parts of the country where people want to live.”

Founded in 2010, El Refugio is keeping busy as immigration legislation remains stalled in Washington. Last year, the Democratic-led Senate passed legislation that would allow more nonviolent immigrants to remain in their communities while the government attempts to deport them. Additionally, the bipartisan measure would provide a pathway to citizenship for millions of immigrants living illegally in the U.S.

Republican House leaders have refused to take up the bill, dismissing it as “amnesty” legislation that would reward lawbreakers. Critics also worry immigrants facing deportation could flee without detention.

El Refugio volunteers routinely visit Stewart to check on detainees’ welfare, boost their morale and pass along information from their families. On the weekend the Santiago family visited, the volunteers visited 23 detainees from around the world, including Africa, Asia, Central America and South America.

Since 2011, El Refugio volunteers have made more than 1,000 trips to visit detainees at Stewart. Most come from Georgia, South Carolina and North Carolina. But the volunteers are encountering more who are being brought there from the southwest border, said Marie Marquardt, a co-chairwoman of El Refugio. Among them are immigrants who were apprehended illegally crossing the border while fleeing poverty and violence in Central America, she said.

U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement confirmed Stewart has been holding more recent border crossers this year, though the agency said they represent only a slight increase compared with the number held there last year.

“The detainee population at Stewart is fluid and the number of recent border crossers detained at the facility fluctuates with the seasonal flows of illegal immigration,” ICE said in a prepared statement.

While Santiago’s children ate snacks and played Monopoly at El Refugio, another family stopped in for lunch following a visit to Stewart. Marquardt and the other volunteers served the visitors sandwiches and homemade cookies. That evening, they fired up a grill and cooked hamburgers and hot dogs for Santiago’s family, a pair of families from the Atlanta area and a couple from Miami.

“We think that offering a comfortable and welcoming space for people to build networks of support is one of the most important things that we do,” Marquardt said.

“These families, for the most part, are mothers and children who have been separated from their fathers. Not only are they experiencing financial crisis, but they also are often in emotional distress.”

El Refugio attracts volunteers from all over, including people with Lutheran Services of Georgia. Kathy Rosa of Paulding County recently volunteered there with her husband and teenage daughter. An English language teacher working in the Cobb County public schools system, Rosa ties her volunteerism to her teaching job, saying: “It helps me understand the families I work with.”