The city of Pomona announced it would be receiving unaccompanied migrant children and sheltering them on a temporary basis at the Pomona Fairplex.

L.A. County Supervisor Hilda Solis and Pomona Mayor Tim Sandoval said, Friday, the sheltering would be short-term and part of a plan to reunite the children with family.

Mayor Sandoval said representatives from President Joe Biden’s administration reached out to him about using the Fairplex as a shelter and Sandoval agreed with “assurance” that the children would be “taken care of to the highest degree.”

“I wanted to know that the Pomona Fairplex site was intended to be used as a part of a plan to reunify the children with their families,” Sandoval said. “I was assured of this and that health and human services gauge local nonprofits that we recommend to help the children with their health and well-being.”

https://twitter.com/HildaSolis/status/1380378190879715328/photo/2

Supervisor Solis added that L.A. County healthcare agencies, child welfare agencies and the department of mental health will all be involved in providing services for the children at the Fairplex.

“The ultimate goal is to ensure that these young people are transitioned out of the Fairplex and either reunited with their families here in the United States, or with a loving sponsor who can care for them,” Solis said. “This is not a border crisis, it’s everyone’s crisis.”

The city of Long Beach announced earlier this week that it, too, would be using its convention center as a shelter for migrant children. The center will hold up to 1,000 children, with Mayor Robert Garcia saying, “Long Beach has a long history welcoming and supporting immigrants and refugees.”

The Long Beach contract to hold the children will expire August 2 and while Pomona did not specify an end date for its shelter, the expectation is that it will not be long term.

Throughout the pandemic, the Pomona Fairplex has also been used as a COVID-19 vaccination site and testing site.

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