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Activists to Visit Refugee Detention Facilities Today

Janis Mara (BCN)
Sunday July 01, 2018 - 04:28:00 PM

Activists from various advocacy groups will visit Bay Area youth refugee detention facilities this afternoon to bring stuffed animals, books and blankets and hold a candlelight vigil, organizers said.

A loose coalition of activists were to meet at the Berkeley Fellowship of Unitarian Universalists in Berkeley at noon and a caravan was scheduled to depart at 1 p.m., according to Cynthia Papermaster, a coordinator with the Golden Gate chapter of Code Pink Women for Peace.

Concerned members of the public are welcome to show up as well, Papermaster said.

"We want the kids to know that we care and we are there," Papermaster said. "It's centered on the children. We are bringing stuffed animals, blankets and Spanish language children's' books."

Papermaster said the group had not yet decided which location they will visit. One of the possibilities is Southwest Key, a facility in Pleasant Hill. There are roughly two dozen children being held at Southwest Key, a shelter for immigrant youth in Pleasant Hill, and two of them are adolescent girls who were separated from their parents as a result of the Trump administration's zero-tolerance policy.