Thursday, January 10, 2019

A report from the border

 

We live in a border town.  We walk along the border, sometimes on this side of the fence, sometimes on the other.  (For practical reasons the fence is not built exactly on the border, and it’s always on our side, so being on the other side of it is not really a problem.) We live in a county that is 92% Hispanic; We non-hispanic are definitely the minority.  Not all the people in our county and in our schools are documented.  Not all the people in our county speak English.  That’s our situation.

 There is a border fence.  It is not continuous; it’s built in sections.  I send pictures of it occasionally.  Law enforcement we chat with as we’re out and about say the fence is working just fine.  The fence funnels border crossers to openings our officers patrol.  There are people who cross the border illegally, but the number is down from prior years.  There are drugs that cross the border, but mostly through the ports of entry.  There is crime here in the Rio Grande Valley, but at a rate lower than the national average.

 So here we sit, in the midst of the presidents’ wave of terror.  There are caravans headed our way to storm the borders.  We have criminals, gang members, rapists, and terrorists flooding across.  It’s a national emergency.  But it’s an invisible emergency to us.  We have been here for years, and all we experience is a happy, safe, comfortable, caring community. 

 

No comments:

Post a Comment