Quincy Wollaston T Station: Many migrants sleep there

The Boston Immigrant Justice Accompaniment Network has been helping Haitian families find shelter since August 6.
The group has kept individuals off the street more than 1,000 times since then, according to an internal email.
But by Tuesday evening the money had dried up, leaving network organizers with the unenviable task of telling families, some with children, that they had no better option than to sleep outside.

QUINCY ‒ With nowhere to return, about 50 Haitians, half of them children, slept outside the Wollaston MBTA station on the ground floor Monday night, where volunteers from an immigrant advocacy group provided them with blankets, tarps and other items of first necessity.

This marked the first time this group had to sleep on the street, according to members of the Boston Immigrant Justice Accompaniment Network.

As Gov. Maura Healey increased restrictions on immigrant families seeking shelter through the state’s overburdened facilities, the Boston Immigrant Justice Accompaniment Network stepped in to fill the gap, using grant money from the United Way and the Boston Foundation to house people at hotel. rooms and churches. The group has taken individuals off the street more than 1,000 times since Aug. 6, according to an internal email.

But by Monday evening the money had dried up, leaving organizers with the unenviable task of telling families, some with children, that they had no better option than to sleep outside.

“Because there are no hotels, our best option tonight is out here,” organizer Ashley Smith told the group as recent immigrant Nahomie Brutus, of Dorchester, translated her words into Haitian Creole. “We don’t know what’s going to happen tonight. I’ll be honest. We can’t promise to keep you safe. What we can do is give you blankets and help keep you comfortable.”

Brutus arrived less than a year ago with nowhere to live.

With the help of Milton Welcoming Haitian Newcomers, she has since been able to find housing and a job working in the cafeteria at Beth Israel Deaconess Hospital in Milton.

She spent most of the month preparing a meal of home-cooked chicken, rice and soup for the nearly 50 people gathered at Wollaston. She was accompanied by Cynthia Guise, an organizer who said the Milton group raised $25,000 to help relocate three women and their children to the area.

– Crazy, inhuman politics. A volunteer criticizes the state government’s response to migrants

“It’s the governor’s decision,” Judy Wolberg said of the situation.

Wolberg, a lead organizer with the Boston Immigrant Justice Accompaniment Network, told the Patriot Ledger that families preparing to sleep outside the Wollaston station would be at Logan Airport if Healey hadn’t eliminated that option on July 9.

The state sent most of Logan’s refugees to the Family Welcome Center at Eastern Nazarene College in Quincy, Wolberg said. A second welcome center at the Brazilian Worker Center in Brighton is smaller, with less space to store needed supplies, she said.

With the state’s shelter system limited, newly arrived families have to wait about six months for semi-permanent housing, Wolberg said.

If he opts to enter one of four “temporary respite centers” for up to five days, he must wait six months just to get on the waiting list, Wolberg said, meaning it could be a year before to open a place in the emergency shelter system. Above.

“It’s a crazy, inhumane policy,” Wolberg said.

Wolberg pointed out that the families sleeping at Wollaston Station are here legally.

Using a Customs and Border Protection application, they scheduled their asylum applications to be reviewed, then waited in Mexico for up to seven months for an appointment, Wolberg said.

They then received an I-94 card, which allows Haitians (and other “temporary protected status” nationalities) to enter the country. In short, they are here legally, Wolberg said. “They followed the damn rules.”

A woman from Haiti makes a 5,000 mile journey through 9 countries and 2 continents

A Haitian immigrant named Rosala told The Patriot Ledger, through a translator, how she, her husband and four children ended up at the T station.

She fled Haiti due to an extreme breakdown in security in the country and first ended up in Chile, where her husband worked as long as she was available for work.

From there, she traveled north on foot through Central America to the Mexican border, where she spent seven months awaiting her asylum appointment.

During that long journey, Rosala slept in empty buses, on riverbanks, and anywhere else that offered at least a modicum of safety.

As Rosala spoke, her 2-year-old son slept on the sidewalk, sick with diarrhea he developed in Mexico from a vitamin deficiency, Rosala said.

Asked what she was hoping for, “I just want a place to stay, nothing fancy,” she said through translator Nellie Sanon. “I want my children to go to school in September and a proper place to stay. That way we don’t have to sleep on the street.”

Quincy also took an option off the table to close the church shelter

In early August, Wolberg partnered with Faith Lutheran Church on Granite Street in Quincy to set up seven tents in a secluded garden on the church grounds. After about a week, Quincy’s inspection services department ordered the camp closed, citing building code regulations.

“(The city’s actions were) stupid and unnecessary,” Wolberg said. “It was so private – a locked garden. Nobody could see anything.”

Wolberg said he worries that the city’s closing of the outdoor shelter sets a negative precedent for other churches or charities that consider it.

More: Why did Quincy close a church camp for refugee families? Here’s what we know

“At least they’ll know someone cares.” The grim volunteers do what they can

The first volunteer to arrive at the Wollaston Station Monday night was Sam Kohler, a Weymouth resident who works days at Trader Joe’s in Hingham.

“I bought a hundred bananas,” he said, greeting the Haitian men, women and children he had met over the past two weeks. With his rudimentary Spanish, he could communicate well with immigrants who had spent a lot of time in South and Central America.

Kohler is a magnet for kids of all ages running around the station. Between work, he played football with the older boys and hide and seek with the younger ones.

Although Kohler maintained a cheerful demeanor, he and the other volunteers showed signs of stress and disappointment, knowing their new friends would be sleeping on the streets tonight.

“We’re doing what we can,” he said. “At least they’ll know someone cares.”

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Contact Peter Blandino at [email protected].

Quincy Wollaston T Station: Many migrants sleep there

– Crazy, inhuman politics. A volunteer criticizes the state government’s response to migrants

A woman from Haiti makes a 5,000 mile journey through 9 countries and 2 continents

Quincy also took an option off the table to close the church shelter

“At least they’ll know someone cares.” The grim volunteers do what they can

By Matthew. Jr

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Quincy Wollaston T Station: Many migrants sleep there

– Crazy, inhuman politics. A volunteer criticizes the state government’s response to migrants

A woman from Haiti makes a 5,000 mile journey through 9 countries and 2 continents

Quincy also took an option off the table to close the church shelter

“At least they’ll know someone cares.” The grim volunteers do what they can

By Matthew. Jr

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