Atlanta to receive nearly $11 million to provide services to migrants

ATLANTA — The city of Atlanta is set to receive $10.8 million in federal funding to provide housing and other humanitarian assistance to migrants while they await the outcome of their immigration cases.

The grant comes from FEMA’s Shelter and Services Program (SSP), which distributes money to communities across the country that provide services to migrants amid an unprecedented surge in border arrivals. Because Atlanta does not operate its own migrant shelter or provide direct services to new arrivals, the city will serve more as a conduit for federal funds, which it will funnel to area nonprofits such as the Latino Association.

In total, the SSP program will disburse more than $600 million nationally this fiscal year, which began last October and runs through September.

Atlanta’s $11 million share of the pie is larger than any other recipient outside of border states or New York. It also exceeds the city’s SSP funding last year, which was $4.85 million.

Santiago Marquez, the executive director of the Latin American Association, said most of the federal money will be used for shelters and temporary housing. That includes hotels in the metropolitan area where migrants can stay for weeks while they find work and support themselves.

FEMA funding will help migrants beyond Atlanta’s borders.

On Thursday, Migrant Equity Southeast (MESE), a Savannah-based nonprofit serving immigrants, announced it has partnered with the city of Atlanta to receive FEMA funding to distribute food, shelter and support services to newcomers in the area.

The goal is “to welcome new members of the immigrant community to South Georgia (and) to meet basic needs and uplift individuals who are navigating the challenging process of adjusting to a new country, language and culture,” MESE said in a news release.

In a statement released in the spring, FEMA said supporting communities was part of the government’s “efforts to manage and secure our borders in a safe, orderly and humane manner.” With polls showing immigration is a top issue for voters ahead of this year’s presidential election, the Biden administration last month implemented tough new restrictions on migrants’ ability to seek asylum to help “take control” of the border.

In recent years, federal authorities have recorded record numbers of illegal crossings at the U.S.-Mexico border — though that trend began to fade in 2024. With limited detention and deportation capacity, many apprehended migrants have been released while they work their way through the nation’s backlogged immigration court system, a development that has strained cities across the country.

Atlanta was never a target of the politically motivated busing campaigns that pushed thousands of migrants from the border to liberal-run cities like New York and Chicago. But migrants moved here of their own accord, convinced that jobs would be plentiful.

It’s difficult to say exactly how many people have recently crossed the border in Atlanta, but immigration court data can paint an instructive picture.

Federal authorities have issued 60,343 summonses for deportation cases in Atlanta so far this fiscal year, according to an analysis of immigration court data by the Transactional Records Access Clearinghouse, a research institute at Syracuse University. Not all people served with summonses in Atlanta immigration court necessarily live in the metro area; many also reside in other parts of the state. In 2023, there were 52,913 summonses in Atlanta immigration court. In 2019, before the post-COVID global migration surge, that number was 21,734.

In addition to new arrivals who crossed the border illegally, the annual number of summonses also includes people who have lived here for a long time or who have moved to other states but are being tried in Atlanta. But the data broadly reflect trends at the border and provide insight into the identities of new arrivals.

During this fiscal year, the largest groups of people subject to new deportations in Georgia were from Mexico (19,022), Venezuela (12,877), Guatemala (9,365), Colombia (4,710) and Honduras (3,664).

To help administer the FEMA grant for the last fiscal year, the Atlanta city government announced plans to hire a third-party contractor for $200,000.