A Pennsylvania community is furious over proposed plans to house 1,000 undocumented immigrant children at a historic Civil War-era orphanage.
A recent letter from a representative of Indiana-based disaster response organization USA Up Star requested to use the facility to “provide shelter to refugee families.”
The Scotland School for Veterans Children, formerly an orphanage, was recently used as a summer camp and is located in Scotland, Pennsylvania.
Several state lawmakers and Franklin County residents rejected the potential plan to house migrants at a city-sanctioned meeting packed with concerned citizens Tuesday.
“We are united in our opposition to illegal immigrants being housed by federal government contractors in Franklin County,” reads a combined press release from Rep. Rob Kauffman and state Sen. Doug Mastriano.
The Scotland School for Veterans’ Boys was founded in 1895 to educate the children of Pennsylvania service members.
Concerns about the housing market and population growth topped the Pennsylvania lawmaker’s list, with a focus on rising demand for basic services like water, sewer, trash collection and broadband.
“We join our neighbors, friends and constituents committed to defending Franklin County from foreign invasion coming from our southern border,” they added.
Franklin County resident Sue McPhail said: ‘Our concern is that we have no idea who these people are.
“They are not investigated, we do not know where they come from, we do not know if they are involved in gangs, we do not know if they are drug traffickers or sex traffickers,” he added in an interview with WGAL8.
In an August letter to a USA Up Star staff member, Greene Township Zoning Officer Daniel Bachman wrote that the former school’s most recent use as a summer camp falls within the area’s low-density residential code and that its use as a higher-density shelter would not be permitted.
A main building on the campus of Scotland School for Veterans Children in Scotland, Pennsylvania
Several state lawmakers and Franklin County residents pushed back against the potential plan to house migrants at a city-sanctioned meeting that exceeded capacity Tuesday.
USA Up Star reached out to Bachman and wrote that they were working with the federal government on the issue and requesting additional zoning information from the city, according to a letter obtained by Fox News Digital.
Mastriano said that if plans to house immigrants at the historic property go through, officials could still try to prevent that from happening.
He referred to the nearby Letterkenny military depot, noting the national security sensitivity of that tactical weapons and missile repair site and its proximity to the proposed housing site which could prove a major liability if the migrants get their way.
“If it goes into effect here, there will be anarchy. This will be a dangerous community,” Mastriano said at Tuesday’s meeting.
“People are going to run away because of crime. A chain link fence wouldn’t keep out a teenager. I used to climb chain link fences when I was a kid, even before I was a teenager. It’s going to be devastating for the community,” he added.
The city-sanctioned gathering saw Franklin County residents “lined out the door and around the corner,” the WGAL8 broadcast states.
Additional concerns were raised as the joint press release continued: “In addition to impacting the housing market, an increase in population creates greater demand for basic services such as water, sewer, trash collection and broadband.”
‘It also puts a strain on school systems, child care services, physical and behavioral health care providers, and public safety personnel, such as our fire departments, emergency medical services, police, and criminal justice system.’
Viewers took to social media to express their outrage, as one user wrote on X: “It could be used to house homeless Americans and military veterans. I’m sick of giving all kinds of freebies to illegal immigrants while American citizens suffer.”
Another commented: “We need to stop accepting millions of illegal immigrants or ‘migrants’. This country cannot afford this. We cannot afford the blow this will cause to our economy, our system or, frankly, our culture.”
The Scotland School for Veterans Children was founded in 1895 to educate Pennsylvania military children. Its Chambersburg campus closed in 2009, leaving 70 vacant buildings, including a library, gymnasium and chapel.