5 July 31 - August 6, 2025 miaminewtimes.com | browardpalmbeach.com NEW TIMES | CONTENTS | LETTERS | NEWS | NIGHT+DAY | CULTURE | CAFE | MUSIC | July 1 - August 31, 2025 Municipal lots, garages and street parking $1 per hour parking for up to 3 hours per parking session with the ParkMobile app only Parking rates are cooling off this summer in Miami Beach! Learn more at miamibeachfl.gov/summerparking “From the toilets and sink systems they use, which, if not cleaned regularly, can cause seri- ous environmental contamination. We also un- derstand there are temperature control issues in the cages. Sustained exposure to heat will not only help propagate germs and viruses but can also cause severe health issues, up to car- diac arrest. This kind of treatment to human beings is not the American way.” Nonprofit officials say more than 1,000 de- tainees are cramped into the 39-acre camp offi- cials swiftly built on the remote Dade-Collier Training and Transition Airport, an airstrip in the middle of the inhospitable Florida Ever- glades. As the gathering wore on, the sun beat down on participants in sweltering, humid air, with the heat index reaching 106 degrees by 3 p.m. Tuesday, according to the National Weather Service. ICE has refused to answer New Times’ multiple data requests, making it difficult to pin down the number of detainees. Detainees are sleeping in overcrowded pods and drinking water from toilet spigots. They’ve reported sewage backups that flood cages with feces, constant light exposure, and denial of medical care, according to nonprofit officials and family members who spoke at Tuesday’s press conference. “The immigration detention camp in Miami is not just a policy failure, but a blatant assault on human rights in a country that no longer upholds constitutional protections,” Armen Henderson, executive director at Dade County Street Response said. “By imprisoning innocent people in tents surrounded by fences and barbed wire, with no proper sanitation, it is nothing less than a concentration camp. This is a public health crisis unfolding in our own backyard.” According to a Yale School of Public Health study, the area is swarming with more than 7 billion mosquitoes, many carrying dangerous viruses, including the Everglades virus, West Nile, Zika, and dengue. During our less than two-hour visit, one member of our team counted six mosquito bites on just her face. We swatted the bloodsuckers away to no avail, de- parting with countless itchy welts, some more swollen than others. Florida Immigrant Coalition officials and their nonprofit partners are calling for emer- gency health screenings for detainees, medical monitoring for workers and contractors, full le- gal access for detainees, independent inspec- tions of conditions at the facility and, optimally, they say, the immediate evacuation of the facility. “This isn’t a detention facility. It’s a public health experiment gone horribly wrong,” said Sebastian Caicedo, Miami-Dade regional director at Florida Rising. “People are being ex- posed to viruses, sewage, and extreme trauma. It’s state-sponsored cruelty, and it has to stop.” [email protected] tabby named Vader — whose owner, accord- ing to Soto, “was just deported but had enough time to surrender them before leav- ing the country.” The pair still needs a home. The trend unfolds as shelters across South Florida continue to operate beyond capacity. Miami-Dade County Animal Services has long struggled with overcrowding in its shelters. In past years, its Doral shelter, built to hold 350 dogs, has housed nearly 600. To manage the overflow, the county relies on a facility in Medley. (For more than a decade, New Times has documented ongoing issues at the Med- ley site, including a severe canine distemper outbreak in 2012 and reports of unsafe clean- ing chemical use that caused severe irritation to dogs’ scrotums in 2015.) Miami-Dade County Animal Services spokesperson Mylena Gonzalez acknowl- edged that the county shelters face an ongo- ing “severe overpopulation crisis.” She says that while the department doesn’t specifically track animals surren- dered due to deportation, it has seen a “no- ticeable increase in owner surrenders tied to personal circumstances” since last year. “We understand these are incredibly diffi- cult decisions for pet owners, and we recog- nize the hardships many in our community are facing,” Gonzalez wrote in an email to New Times. “As these challenges continue to emerge within our community, we are fo- cused on connecting residents to resources and providing support wherever possible.” Gonzalez says the overcrowding at the shelters has strained the county’s ability to provide proper care and increased health risks for the pets. She emphasizes that the shelter urgently needs support from adopters, fosters, and res- cue partners. “Although we are currently facing a severe overpopulation crisis, our commitment to serving the people and pets of Miami-Dade remains unwavering,” she says. “Each pet that finds a home, whether temporary or per- manent, helps alleviate overcrowding, re- duces stress for the animals who remain, and gives us the ability to focus more resources on those still in our care.” [email protected] Orphans of the Deported from p4 ‘Humanitarian Crisis’ from p4 Nino, a 7-year-old Pointer mix, is one of an untold number of South Florida pets recently surrendered to a shelter after his owners were deported. Photos by Humane Society of Broward County ALWAYS IN YOUR FEED. CHOOSE YOUR CHANNEL
