IMMIGRATION
PUBLIC SAFETY
Professors aim to document mortality of migrants at border
Three fentanyl-related deaths shake the Hays CISD community
THE PROJECT CAN ALSO HELP AGENCIES DESIGN BETTER POLICIES, IMPROVE PUBLIC HEALTH, MAKE SEARCH AND RECOVERY EASIER, AND HELP REUNITE FAMILIES WITH THEIR LOVED ONES’ REMAINS.”
BY ZARA FLORES
BY ZARA FLORES
Police Chief Je Barnett said. “We’re talking about children as young as 14 years old.” The bedroom community of Kyle has grown by 60% in the past decade. With that growth comes change, Barnett said. “We can come to the conclusion that these drugs are harming our children and our adults. Our messaging at Kyle PD is multifold,” he said. “First, we want parents to have the conversation with [their] children. Even if you do not think that they’re exposed to illegal drugs, you need to ask them what they see, what they hear ... and give them the coping mechanism to say ‘no.’” In recent cases, the pills in ques- tion are light blue and are meant to mimic the appearance of Percocet or oxycodone. Barnett added that parents should also be vigilant of their children’s social media.
Texas near the border. In doing so, he found that there were many migrants who died as a result of exhaustion and thirst. When a funding opportunity came about through the NSF, they jumped at the chance to create a systematic analysis of all the migrant deaths that could be found at the border, Giordano said. Several other groups concurrently advancing study in the eld will aid in applying multiple datasets for the team, including Operation Identi- cation, directed by Kate Spradley, a professor in the department of anthropology at Texas State, the Border Project and Arizona’s Open Geographic Information System for Migrant Death Mapping. The nal objective of the project is to build a web portal that will help answer questions such as where these deaths are more likely to occur and
Following the fentanyl-related deaths of three Hays CISD students in late July and August, district o - cials were joined by the Kyle Police Department and San Marcos-Hays County Emergency Medical Services on Aug. 24 to discuss the dangers of the drug and what plans are in place to address the epidemic. Over the summer, two 17-year-old students died from fentanyl overdoses at their homes in Kyle, just weeks before the start of their senior years of high school. On Aug. 20, a 15-year-old student from San Marcos died from a sus- pected fentanyl overdose, just days after starting their sophomore year of high school. “It’s sad to report that we’ve had seven fentanyl-related deaths in the city of Kyle this calendar year and many more that survived,” Kyle
With $1 million in funding from the National Science Foundation, two Texas State University profes- sors will seek to document the large but unknown number of migrant deaths that happen each year at the United States and Mexico border. The data will be gathered and will culminate in a publicly available website for potential families of the deceased, researchers and policymakers. Alberto Giordano, a professor in the department of geography and environmental studies, and Nick Herrmann, professor in the depart- ment of anthropology, will lead the project titled the Migrant Mortality Mapping Portal Project over the next few years. Giordano said he started working on this project several years ago by mapping cemeteries in South
At the podium, Kyle Police Chief Je Barnett discusses the three fentanyl student deaths in recent weeks. (Zara Flores/Community Impact Newspaper)
ALBERTO GIORDANO ON THE MIGRANT MORTALITY MAPPING PORTAL PROJECT
IDENTIFYING AN OVERDOSE
unconsciousness very small pupils slow or shallow
faint heartbeat limp limbs pale skin purple lips and ngernails
what leads to these situations. The rst part of the project will be to gather all data that can be found starting in 2009 to 2021; after which, the hope is to continue to update the portal once it is live, over time, once there is a standardized process in place, Giordano said. The second part will be to build a geographical information system and create the procedures and best practices for accessing the data. Finally, the web portal will be built with customized functions for the complex data that will live there, he said. Since the data will be gathered
from a variety of databases from various counties along the border, police and re departments, emer- gency medical departments and border patrol, it will all be di erent and will need to be standardized, like patchwork, Giordano said. “The site will be available to anyone who wants to study the phe- nomenon of migrant deaths at the U.S.-Mexico border,” Giordano said. “It can also help agencies design better policies, improve public health, make search and recovery easier, and help reunite families with their loved ones’ remains.”
Someone who is experiencing an opioid overdose will exhibit: SOURCE: NATIONAL INSTITUTE ON DRUG ABUSE COMMUNITY IMPACT NEWSPAPER breathing vomiting inability to speak
“People that have these illegal drugs to o er for sale will use code words, and they will use apps on their [cell phone] to enhance their anonymity,” he said. “Be an active parent; be active in your children’s life. Talk to them; give them the help that they need.” Additionally, all high schools have school resource o cers monitoring
the campus, and they are all equipped with naloxone, which treats narcotic overdoses. Nurses’ o ces in the district also have naloxone available. HCISD o cials said they will release educational videos for students to view in classes and created a dedi- cated page for more information about fentanyl, www.hcisd.net/fentanyl.
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