McALLEN — The Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) is requesting a two-foot barrier on top of the levee system where the rest of the current border fence was scheduled to be in Hidalgo County, according to Mayor Jim Darling.
McALLEN — The Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) is requesting a two-foot barrier on top of the levee system where the rest of the current border fence was scheduled to be in Hidalgo County, according to Mayor Jim Darling.
As the border wall funding is in the middle of President Donald Trump’s sights this week with a possible government shutdown looming on Friday, Darling addressed the potential wall, or “fence” as Darling called it at Monday’s city commission meeting. Darling has called it a wall in the past, but called it a fence on Monday.
Though Darling did not cite the shutdown as the reason for his wall update, he said he heard from FEMA on Monday about its request to the federal government about putting two feet of some sort of barrier, Darling said, on top of the levee barrier that was planned more than 10 years ago.
In 2006, President George W. Bush signed the Secure Fence Act, which mandated the construction of 670 miles of fence along the U.S.-Mexico border. In Hidalgo County, the drainage district built 20.26 miles of fence combined with a concrete levee barrier, paid for by the county and U.S. Homeland Security. Darling said there was originally 28 miles as part of the plan.
FEMA’s request was for those remaining miles of levee that do not have anything built on top of it, Darling said.
While one purpose of the wall would be to deter illegal immigration crossings, apprehensions are historically low right now. Fewer than 12,500 people were apprehended at the southern border in March. Most months see tens of thousands of apprehensions.
The Respite Center at Sacred Heart Catholic Church, which temporarily houses legal immigrants, had its lowest number of people come through in March since it opened in 2014. Only 258 people arrived the entire month, with just 65 staying overnight. That is wildly different from November, when more than 7,500 immigrants passed through the center. This was the highest monthly totally since 2014. December saw a than 7,400 people that came through the center.
