Jonathan Starkey

The News Journal

The Obama administration has asked if Delaware can help temporarily house a flood of Central American children illegally crossing the U.S. border, but Gov. Jack Markell said Monday the state doesn’t have any place to house them.

Markell, who is among a number of the nation’s governors who fielded federal requests for help, said there are no state facilities available that could properly accommodate the children while they await immigration hearings. But he said some Delaware faith-based organizations might be in a position to offer assistance.

“I don’t really see the possibility of any state facilities housing these kids,” Markell said Monday. “I don’t think that exists. If private organizations choose to do so, that’ll be up to them.”

Markell said he would “expect to be notified” if the federal government sends any children to Delaware.

The Obama administration is seeking states’ help in finding shelter for thousands of undocumented children who crossed the southwestern border unaccompanied by parents. Since October, more than 57,000 children from Honduras, El Salvador and Guatemala, among other countries, have crossed the border unaccompanied by an adult, according to the Associated Press.

A regional director of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services wrote to Markell on July 2 asking the governor to identify facilities in the state that could potentially provide shelter for child migrants.

“As you are aware, there has been an increase in the number of very young children making this journey,” Joanne Grossi, the HHS official, wrote to Markell. “This is an unprecedented event that requires unique approaches to temporarily house children until they can be discharged to a sponsor while awaiting judicial proceedings.”

Grossi said she hoped Markell would support the “humanitarian effort to assist the unaccompanied children crossing into the United States on the Southwest border.”

In an interview on MSNBC on Monday, Markell criticized Congress for “dithering” on President Barack Obama’s request for $3.7 billion to help manage the surge of Central American immigrants.

“This is a huge issue,” Markell said. “We need to make sure we’re treating these kids humanely.”

Health and Human Services Secretary Sylvia Matthews Burwell met with governors gathered in Nashville on Sunday during a National Governors Association meeting.

Markell did not attend that meeting. Some governors have expressed concerned about the cost of sheltering the migrants while they await possible deportation. Nebraska Gov. Dave Heineman, a Republican, complained that no one in the federal government told him that 200 Central American children who entered the country illegally, and alone, had been sent to his state, according to the Omaha World-Herald.

“They don’t have the courtesy to tell me who they are, who their sponsor is and how they’re going to be returned,” Heineman said in a radio interview, the paper reported Friday.

Delaware Senate Minority Whip Greg Lavelle, R-Sharpley, said the state should be wary of accepting children who crossed the border illegally, saying that taxpayers could ultimately be forced to support nonprofits that shelter them. Their presence in Delaware could prove costlier in other ways, including by pressuring the public school system, Lavelle said.

“Obviously, the draw to the United States from malfunctioning countries continues to be strong,” Lavelle said. “But one thing we can count on is whatever the federal government says they’re going to do, they won’t do it. We will be stuck caring for these individuals and families. They will leave us dealing with the aftermath.”

Contact Jonathan Starkey at 983-6756,

on Twitter @jwstarkey or at jstarkey@delawareonline.com.

57,000

Number of Central American children that have crossed the US border unaccompanied by an adult since October

$3.7 billion

President Obama’s request to Congress to help manage surge of immigrants