\n\t\t\t\t\t\tVolunteers will walk from Pittsburgh to Clearfield County to advocate for immigrants who were detained by ICE. \u201cThis is a crisis of dignity in this country. People are being, their dignity is being violated, and we want to be sure that we’re calling attention to that,\u201d said Jaime Martinez, the Founder & Executive Director of the nonprofit Frontline Dignity.On Easter Sunday, Martinez will set out on an eight-day walk from the ICE field office on the South Side to the Moshannon Valley Processing Center in Clearfield County. \u201cWe’re taking off into the most rural parts of the state, headed to tiny towns from here to Philipsburg to talk to folks, to understand their perspectives, and most importantly walk with them to a better understanding of each other and about the truth of what\u2019s going on in our state and our country,\u201d Martinez told Pittsburgh\u2019s Action News 4 Reporter Jordan Cioppa. The facility in Philipsburg is a privately owned immigration processing center, contracted to provide services to the Department of Homeland Security on behalf of Clearfield County, according to owner Geo Group\u2019s website. Martinez said he plans to hold a prayer vigil there at the conclusion of the journey. \u201cWe’ll be, hopefully, talking to the commissioners and at least bringing attention to the commissioners in Clearfield County that their vote to renew or not renew the contract with Moshannon Valley Processing Center is extremely important,\u201d Martinez said. While the walk is open to everyone, there are some people in the local immigrant advocacy space who will not participate. \u201cIt\u2019s not helping them in any way, right? We don’t need Moses walking for 40 days. What we need is changes, we need resources for our communities, we need to make sure that people get educated on exactly what\u2019s going in our communities with detentions,\u201d said Monica Ruiz, the executive director of Casa San Jos\u00e9.Ruiz said the Latino community they serve does not support the walk and instead provided a list of other ways they need help. According to Ruiz, Sister Janice Vanderneck, the founder of the nonprofit, has spent more than 12 years assisting people. “And we’re very close to getting her inside of Moshannon now so she can work directly with the people that are affected. That’s the kind of meaningful work that we support,\u201d said Ruiz. \u201cWe provide rides to people so they can visit their loved ones. We provide money so people can call on the phone to their loved ones.\u201dMartinez responded to the pushback from Casa San Jos\u00e9.\u201cI have no real comment on what they choose to support or not support, but I can say that we\u2019ve been working with families on the ground, many Latino families\u2026\u201d Martinez said. \u201cSo, there\u2019s broad support from not just the Latino community, but immigrant communities way beyond, and we\u2019re really grateful to receive that kind of support.\u201dFrontline Dignity is working to raise more than $100,000 over the next two weeks. The organization will hold a news conference on the South Side at 7:15 a.m. on Sunday before starting the walk at 8 a.m.\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/p>\n
\t\t\t\t\t\tPITTSBURGH \u2014 \t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/p>\n
Volunteers will walk from Pittsburgh to Clearfield County to advocate for immigrants who were detained by ICE. <\/p>\n
\u201cThis is a crisis of dignity in this country. People are being, their dignity is being violated, and we want to be sure that we’re calling attention to that,\u201d said Jaime Martinez, the Founder & Executive Director of the nonprofit Frontline Dignity.<\/p>\n
On Easter Sunday, Martinez will set out on an eight-day walk from the ICE field office on the South Side to the Moshannon Valley Processing Center in Clearfield County. <\/p>\n
\u201cWe’re taking off into the most rural parts of the state, headed to tiny towns from here to Philipsburg to talk to folks, to understand their perspectives, and most importantly walk with them to a better understanding of each other and about the truth of what\u2019s going on in our state and our country,\u201d Martinez told Pittsburgh\u2019s Action News 4 Reporter Jordan Cioppa. <\/p>\n
The facility in Philipsburg is a privately owned immigration processing center, contracted to provide services to the Department of Homeland Security on behalf of Clearfield County, according to owner Geo Group\u2019s website. <\/p>\n
Martinez said he plans to hold a prayer vigil there at the conclusion of the journey. <\/p>\n
\u201cWe’ll be, hopefully, talking to the commissioners and at least bringing attention to the commissioners in Clearfield County that their vote to renew or not renew the contract with Moshannon Valley Processing Center is extremely important,\u201d Martinez said. <\/p>\n
While the walk is open to everyone, there are some people in the local immigrant advocacy space who will not participate. <\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s not helping them in any way, right? We don’t need Moses walking for 40 days. What we need is changes, we need resources for our communities, we need to make sure that people get educated on exactly what\u2019s going in our communities with detentions,\u201d said Monica Ruiz, the executive director of Casa San Jos\u00e9.<\/p>\n
Ruiz said the Latino community they serve does not support the walk and instead provided a list of other ways they need help. <\/p>\n
According to Ruiz, Sister Janice Vanderneck, the founder of the nonprofit, has spent more than 12 years assisting people. <\/p>\n
“And we’re very close to getting her inside of Moshannon now so she can work directly with the people that are affected. That’s the kind of meaningful work that we support,\u201d said Ruiz. \u201cWe provide rides to people so they can visit their loved ones. We provide money so people can call on the phone to their loved ones.\u201d<\/p>\n
Martinez responded to the pushback from Casa San Jos\u00e9.<\/p>\n
\u201cI have no real comment on what they choose to support or not support, but I can say that we\u2019ve been working with families on the ground, many Latino families\u2026\u201d Martinez said. \u201cSo, there\u2019s broad support from not just the Latino community, but immigrant communities way beyond, and we\u2019re really grateful to receive that kind of support.\u201d<\/p>\n
Frontline Dignity is working to raise more than $100,000 over the next two weeks. <\/p>\n
The organization will hold a news conference on the South Side at 7:15 a.m. on Sunday before starting the walk at 8 a.m.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Volunteers will walk from Pittsburgh to Clearfield County to advocate for immigrants who were detained by ICE. \u201cThis…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":156178,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[9],"tags":[53994,16863,524,7217,9331,1838,70823,53997,70825,70826,523,70824,73,75,74,85,7143],"class_list":{"0":"post-156177","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-pittsburgh","8":"tag-casa-san-jose","9":"tag-clearfield-county","10":"tag-community","11":"tag-country","12":"tag-executive-director","13":"tag-founder","14":"tag-jaime-martinez","15":"tag-monica-ruiz","16":"tag-moshannon-valley-processing-center","17":"tag-nonprofit-frontline-dignity","18":"tag-people","19":"tag-philipsburg","20":"tag-pittsburgh","21":"tag-pittsburgh-headlines","22":"tag-pittsburgh-news","23":"tag-state","24":"tag-walk"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/156177","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=156177"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/156177\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/156178"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=156177"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=156177"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=156177"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}