Staff members at the Camino Health Center in northeast Charlotte are preparing for a surge of migrant families seeking help.
Title 42 is set to expire next week. The COVID-era policy required many asylum seekers to wait in Mexico.
More could be headed to the Carolinas once that is lifted.
“It’s just going to bring a wave here,” said Sharise Johnson, the executive director at Camino. “We are already seeing it.”
Johnson said last fall they were helping one or two migrant families a week.
They are currently assisting six or seven families and they are not all Latinos.
“We see people from Turkey, Ukraine,” Johnson said. “Turkey has been the biggest one we have seen right now at the border coming over.”
She said asylum seekers once came to Camino because they had ties to the Carolinas.
That’s no longer the case with other cities tapped out on resources.
“Right now, people are coming with absolutely nothing and so when they come here, they literally have nothing,” Johnson said.
Data that Camino collected shows a 300% increase in the last four months of asylum seekers coming to North Carolina.
In February, the Camino team traveled to the southern border to understand the needs.
“They have turned themselves in at the border,” Johnson said. “These are not people jumping over a wall or coming here illegally. They are self-reporting at the border and then allowed to come in awaiting immigration hearings.”
Because Charlotte has the only immigration court in the Carolinas, it could be a year or more before their cases are heard. That leaves many asylum seekers in need of resources, turning to the Camino Center. The Camino Health Center provides healthcare, mental health resources, a food pantry, and assistance finding housing and a job.
Their thrift store called The Warehouse helps support the mission, donations, and purchases from the public all go to help families looking to start a better life in the U.S.
“They’re getting their kids into school so they get that childcare piece and then they want a job,” Johnson said. “All Latinos want a job. They want to work.”
Click here for information on The Camino Health Center and how to help.
Title 42 is a U.S. public health code that’s been around for decades, but not often used.
It allows the government to block people from entering the country during a public health emergency.
In March 2020, former President Donald Trump enacted Title 42 to block more than 2.4 million migrants from crossing the southern border.
He said it would curb the spread of COVID-19.
With the lifting of Title 42, President Joe Biden will send 1,500 troops to the border.
They’ll do things like data entry so the Border Patrol can continue law enforcement.
VIDEO: Mecklenburg County commissioners preparing for influx of migrants if Title 42 is lifted
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