Oracle residents joined in protest against unaccompanied children placement

Fernie Rosales and
Mike Dirks and Fernie Rosales

About two hundred people gathered in anticipation of the arrival of Unaccompanied Alien Children to the Sycamore Boys’ Academy in Oracle, Arizona on Tuesday. They came from across Arizona and the political spectrum.

The buses expected to carry 40 Unaccompanied Alien Children (UAC) to the Academy never arrived. Those who had wanted to greet the UACs with signs reading “bienvenidos” (welcome in Spanish) and those who had hoped to stop the buses were played by the federal government all day long with conflicting messages spread through the crowd about when the buses would arrive.

Fernie Rosales, a lifelong resident of the area, came out of concern for his community and neighbors. “I have a neighbor right now, with a tumor on her chest. She cannot get healthcare because she works part-time, and she makes too much at $7 an hour to qualify for help. Our people are struggling here. We aren’t taking care of our own kids. Pack them up and drop them off on the lawn of the White House,” said Rosales, a towering Hispanic miner.

Rosales and his friend and partner Mike Dirks work in the mining industry, which has been nearly devastated they say, by the federal government. The mining industry in neighboring San Manuel has been wiped out. According to Rosales, families who had once prospered in the mining industry, are now sending their kids out of the area to find opportunity.

The irony of the situation is not lost on residents. While Guatemalan parents are shipping their kids up north to the U.S. border, the people living on the American side of the border are telling their kids to go to areas of the U.S. where some prosperity still might be found.

“We live and work with a lot of people here who are in the country illegally. They are part of our community,” said Rosales. “We are not anti-immigrant, but we need to take care of people here.”

Rosales, who travels around the world as a professional in the mining industry said, “We have kids in this community who don’t have enough money to buy gas to drive to Tucson to find work. Let them pay taxes, let them suffer like our kids are.”

Pinal County Sheriff Paul Babeu showed up on site briefly, asked protestors on both sides to show each other respect and keep the protests peaceful. His deputies kept a very low profile throughout the day.

With the exception of a few protesters on both sides, no one appeared to want to provoke confrontation, the day was peaceful. The 75 plus people, who came to welcome the UACs and promote open borders were swarmed by media, while the residents were largely ignored.

One group, arrived with mariachis and set about “getting in the face” of the protesters. One area resident said she had to stand between her father and a female activist who was pointing her finger into her father’s chest. “He was just sitting there. He couldn’t do anything to her being a man and all, so I finally got in there and scared her off.”

protestHer father, whose family settled much of southern Arizona, and whose father gave the largest thoroughfare in Tucson its name; Speedway, has been a life-long resident of Oracle. Her property butts up against the Sycamore Boy’s Academy and her mother and father live in the town proper.

Residents eventually asked the Pinal County deputies to stand between them and the activists, who were trying to provoke confrontations. Deputies then placed their bodies between the residents and the visiting activists as they made their way down the street back with media in tow.

One of the more aggressive protestors admitted later that she was from San Manuel and a good friend worked at the Sycamore Academy. During the protests she raced in front of cars and waved her poster board sign, while exchanging epithets with drivers. She said that she was there “for the kids, but the folks in Oracle just don’t want other people to have good things. They are rich people and they don’t even buy their kids a pool,” she said bitterly. The operators of the Sycamore Boys’ Academy will receive between $4000 and $6000 a week per child.

Arizona State Representative Adam Kwasman, known for his histrionics, made a fool of himself when he and a small group mistook a bus carrying kids to YMCA day camp as the expected migrant children. Later he claimed he saw the “fear in their eyes.” They no doubt had the same fear that many would have when confronted by a raging lunatic.

Nearly all of the residents of Oracle know each other and look out for each other. Nearly all of them were there on Tuesday to express their dismay that the federal government had given them no warning and no opportunity to share their concerns about the certain drain on natural resources.

One Oracle resident came to welcome the UACs and quietly held a handmade “WWJD” sign.

A group calling themselves the Arizona Citizens Militia, tried to create an ominous presence, as they provided “security” for what they called VIPs. Looking like a poor man’s Secret Service detail, they did little other than guard an area which held the audio equipment for elected and unelected leaders who addressed the protestors.

Sheriff Paul Babeu was only on site briefly in the early morning. His deputies kept a very low profile throughout the day.

In Arizona, cities and towns now try to grow carefully because water is hard to come by. Residents, especially rural residents are particularly sensitive to the resources available to them. As a result, residents were pleased to get the heads up from area activist Robert Skiba that the UACs would be arriving this week.

Aside from the concerns about the stresses an addition of 40 more people might add to the strapped town with 3000 plus residents, concerns for the UACs themselves were the most common subject of conversation as the residents awaited the buses.

Cyrus Miller, a well-known public school advocate who lives with his sister on the property next to the Boy’s ranch, told James T. Harris of 104.1KQTH, that no one could understand why the feds would send the UACs to the troubled Sycamore Boys’ Ranch. Listen to the interview here.

Miller told Harris that the Academy is a facility for teenagers who are struggling in home or school. Cyrus Miller said that the facility “has no fence, it is an old facility that has been retrofitted.”

Miller also told Harris, “They have a big history of kids escaping. I know about a month and a half ago a friend of mine was working there and she was beat severely and her co-worker a gentlemen had his nose broken and his jaw broken.”

Miller said he has had many issues with the inmates that reside at the Sycamore Canyon Boys Academy. “The program out there is a re-education, re-programming.” Miller added that 70% of the young men in that program have no success. Miller called it a failure of a facility.

“My understanding is they have 46 kids there and they can barely handle them… They are bringing up another 60 and I know for sure that facility is not made for that many kids.”

Miller, who has a young daughter he adopted from China asked, “Can you imagine if they are bringing toddlers up or 10-year-olds and putting them with teenagers?”

Early in the day, the tensions had been high. As word spread out through the crowd about the nature of the ranch, both those who had come to welcome the children and those who had tried to stop the buses began to share concerns for the UACs. The longer they had to wait for the buses, the more opportunity the residents had to share with the outsiders who had come to support the federal government’s settlement decision.

At approximately 1:00 p.m. word was passed by Pinal County deputies that the buses would not be coming after all and the protestors should disperse. Because the word emanated from Congressman Raul Grijalva’s office, few believed it. Grijalva is the congressman who allegedly had operatives place an envelope of powder, intended to look like anthrax, at his Arizona office and then accuse conservatives of trying to kill him.

Despite the doubt, the protesters began packing up their lawn chairs and homemade signs and headed home. They had been played.

Employees from the Sycamore Boys’ Ranch gathered at approximately 7:00 pm. at the Oracle Inn. The group of about 13 employees shot looks of contempt at area residents and refused to answer any questions.

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