The Administration for Children and Families, a division of the federal Department of Health and Human Services, said the plan to utilize St. Paul’s University has been delayed until a public meeting is held on the proposal Thursday.
“This site is on hold pending community input,” administration spokesman Kenneth Wolfe wrote in an email to The Associated Press.
The unaccompanied immigrant children were to be sheltered on the historically Black university’s campus in Lawrenceville, which closed one year ago amid a mountain of debt and questions about its governance. The private campus is up for sale.
The children and teenagers were caught entering the country illegally following a surge in border crossings. They are being held on an interim basis at military bases and other shelters in the Southwest and West.
Officials in Brunswick County, home to St. Paul’s and located in Virginia’s tobacco-growing belt, complained they only recently learned the children and teenagers were to be housed on the campus. They met Monday with federal officials.
Sheriff Brian Roberts said the community is concerned the rolling St. Paul’s campus is in an inadequate and insecure location to house the young immigrants. Residents are fearful some of the teenagers might have gang ties or bring communicable diseases into the farming community, he said.
