Former Middletown School Will Not House Migrant Children: Report

Middletown CT

16 April, 2021

12:05 PM

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MIDDLETOWN, CT — Unaccompanied migrant children will not be housed in Connecticut despite the Biden administration asking Connecticut Gov. Ned Lamont last week if some children from overcrowded Texas shelters could be relocated to the Constitution State, local news sources reported Thursday. According to the Connecticut Mirror, state officials toured Middletown's former Connecticut Juvenile Training School last week. The site was never offered up to the White House because officials were waiting for the president to green light relocating migrant kids to Connecticut, the publication reported. The Mirror reports the White House chose to pursue a convention center in Long Beach, California, instead of the facility in Middletown. Lamont's chief of staff, Paul Mounds, along with the Vanessa Dorantes, commissioner of the Department of Children and Families, told WFSB Eyewitness News several stakeholders across the state joined forces to identify a suitable site for unaccompanied children. "Connecticut's commitment to embrace these children in a standard that reflects compassionate, safe, secure and culturally responsive care until they can be connected to their parents or sponsor is something we can be very proud of," the statement reads, in part. The training school, a secure facility for serious juvenile offenders, has been closed since April 2018.