ICE offices coming to west Springfield
Katie KullA new U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement office will be coming to Springfield in the near future.
The 12,000-square-foot building at 4715 W. Junction St. will house offices for agents, space for processing undocumented immigrants in deportation proceedings and special agents with Homeland Security Investigations, ICE spokesman Shawn Neudauer confirmed in an email.
"It's just an office building, like most others, though more like a local police station than say a corporation or small business," he said.
The building will contain at least one holding cell for people being interviewed by investigators, but it will not have any overnight holding space.
People in deportation proceedings being held overnight by ICE are currently housed in nearby county jails.
Preliminary building plans provided to the News-Leader also show rooms for video conferencing, a grand jury and storage.
Neudauer said the new office on Junction will eventually replace the current facility in Strafford, though that will take some time as the interior renovations have not yet begun in Springfield.
Building permits show the application for the project was submitted to the city last year.
It's unclear how many agents or investigators will be housed in Springfield. Neudauer said the department does not disclose staffing levels for any of its locations.
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This office is different than facilities near the U.S.-Mexico border that have been the source of recent national news. Some say the centers are necessary to deal with undocumented immigrants at the border, while others decry the conditions of those held in the facilities.
Vice President Mike Pence visited two centers last week.
it has been difficult for members of the public, the media, and even Congress to fully assess conditions, making Pence's visit all the more important as it gave reporters — and therefore Americans — a look at what is going on inside these facilities, which are at the heart of today's immigration debate.
Pence toured two facilities on Friday. One, a Border Patrol detention facility for single adults in McAllen and another, an air-conditioned tent complex for families and children in Donna, Texas.
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