4 days. 60,000 people. 10 legal service providers and lawyers. What are the full requirements? Don't know. What does the application look like? No idea. Were we up for the challenge? Oh yeah.

Houston Immigration Legal Services Collaborative, your friendly neighborhood immigrant champion, along with several legal service provider allies were faced with quite the challenge: how can we help as many eligible Houstonians as possible apply for Parole in Place with little upfront guidance and racing against a potential litigation clock? Let's back it up; for those who don't know what Parole in Place (PIP) is, it is a "new program that will allow certain spouses of United States citizens to apply for “parole-in-place" from the Department of Homeland Security (DHS). This program... will not only allow up to 550,000 people to receive temporary protections and work permits in the United States, but will generally allow them to apply for lawful permanent resident (LPR) status (also known as a green card) through their spouses without risking years of separation from their families" (American Immigration Council). Check out our very own Legal and Advocacy Director Vickie Giambra speak more on it here!

So, who are these 550,000 people? Our neighbors, our yard guys, the folks out there building houses, the sweet kid who lives down the street who's going to university, small business owners, the kind caretaker who assists your elderly mom... who have all been living beside us for at least 10 YEARS and mostly more.

On August 17th, HILSC hosted a PIP legal clinic with the help of Catholic Charities Cabrini Center, the University of Houston Immigration Clinic, Justice for all Immigrants, the Galveston Houston Immigrant Representation Progoject, Boat People SOS and numerous volunteers to determine eligibility for members of the community, gather the required documentation, ensure the documents were in the correct format, and provide counsel for those whose cases were complex. With very little time to plan, convene, register, and coordinate to make this clinic a success, we managed to:

• Round up approximately 30 volunteers
• Gather 10 legals service providers and private attorneys to provide counsel
• Assist 48 people determine if they qualified for PIP
• Identify 21 people who met requirements, but needed to collect more documents

August 19th, the Department of Homeland Security began accepting applications, so we gathered for the second part of the clinic and guided 9 people through the PIP application process. It was a lot of work, but we all left with a feeling of community and hope.

Although the program is now stayed, we are proud of the work the immigration legal services community put into HILSC’s clinic and the number of people we could help in such a short time frame. And our sense of hope and community persists--hope that the court case gets resolved in the favor of the PIP program and that our community can benefit.