A delegation of about a dozen people organized by two west-central Pennsylvania Indivisible groups urged the Clearfield County commissioners Tuesday not to renew their contract with the company that operates the Moshannon Valley Processing Center — an immigration detention facility that has been widely criticized for its treatment of detainees.

One attendee cited the New Testament passage where Jesus tells his listeners that whatever they do for the least of those they encounter, they do unto him; one compared detainees at the facility with vulnerable nursing home residents, asking whether the commissioners would put up with poor treatment of their loved ones in a nursing home; another said unfavorable coverage of the facility is damaging the county’s reputation; and another said, “We’re better than this.”

It didn’t seem that the visit changed the minds of the commissioners on whether to re-up with The GEO Group in September, given that if the county declines to renew, it would wound the region’s economy, even as it’s likely the facility would continue operating as is — and without the advisory oversight and facility access the contract currently provides, the commissioners said.

When asked whether GEO would like to comment on the delegation’s visit, someone who answered the phone at the facility said, “Nope, no one will want to talk about it.”

Recent allegations from inmates have included black material in milk, worms in food, chilly conditions that have required inmates to sleep in their coats, verbal abuse, overcrowding, inadequate medical care, physical and psychological abuse and excessive use of solitary confinement, according to statements at the meeting and online sources.

Interviews with 77 detainees “reveal that Moshannon is punitive, inhumane and dangerous,” states the conclusion of a 2023 study conducted by the Center for Social Justice of the Temple University Beasley School of Law — “In the shadow of the valley: The unnecessary confinement and dehumanizing conditions in immigration detention at Moshannon Valley Processing Center.”

“They have tightly controlled schedules, live in a ‘pod’ with 60-70 other people, wear brightly colored jumpsuits, and are restricted from accessing the outside world,” the Temple study states. “Immigration detention is not supposed to be punishment. Yet there really is no other label.”

Seventy percent of the detainees at Moshannon Valley don’t have criminal records and many of the rest have only committed minor infractions, according to Kali McLaughlin of Indivisible Outcry of Clarion, co-leader of the delegation with Bobbi Erickson of Indivisible Mayday in Brockport.

There have been three deaths at Moshannon Valley, which is also a cause for concern, McLaughlin said.

There has recently been a hunger strike at the facility, attendees said.

One attendee is married to a Moshannon inmate.

She is Charlotte Moyal of Cumberland, Md., and her husband, “K,” from Afghanistan, has been at the facility for 14 months, according to Moyal.

He was arrested when a sheriff in West Virginia stopped his rental car after he’d crossed into the state because he’d taken the wrong exit from a highway.

K might have been stopped due to racial profiling, or because of a red flag from the rental company, as he was a day late in making payment for the car, Moyal said. Her husband had a valid five-year work permit not due to expire until 2029, a valid Illinois driver’s license and an asylum case that had been pending for nine years, Moyal said.

He applied for asylum because his family was persecuted in Afghanistan due to its wealth, she said.

Nevertheless, in March, a judge in New Jersey ordered him to be deported to Afghanistan, she said.

That is pending, due to an inability to obtain a flight to that nation, Moyal said.

“It’s a mess,” she stated. “Life just sucks.”

“Even if a little bit of this is true, we have a big problem,” meeting attendee Luther Gette, a member of Philipsburg Borough Council, told the commissioners.

“I’m asking you to do everything in your power to ensure that people under your care are treated with dignity and respect,” one attendee said.

Two sides of the story

The commissioners take the allegations about Moshannon Valley seriously, but don’t have actual authority over the facility, said Commissioner Dave Glass.

And while they’ve visited the facility multiple times, they can’t afford to always be there, or to conduct a full-scale investigation of the place, Glass said.

At some point, “we have to trust the people we’re in business with,” Glass said.

Moreover, it’s ultimately a federal issue, he said.

“(And) we don’t set federal immigration policy,” said Commissioner Tim Winters, adding that the policy is in need of overall reform.

Most detainees at the center are likely being cared for better than they would be on the outside, anyway, given that they receive medical and dental attention, according to Winters.

He knows people who work in the medical department there, he said.

He was one of the parties on a phone conversation with an inmate, and heard “a litany of complaints,” said Commissioner John Sobel.

Afterwards, he spoke with a facility administrator who contradicted all the allegations, Sobel said.

Still on one issue, at Sobel’s suggestion, the administrator gave way, he said.

It’s likely that inmates at the county jail would also provide a “litany of complaints” if prompted, Winters said.

The number of detainees at Moshannon has never swelled beyond its listed capacity of 1,900, as far as he knows, Glass said.

The detainees typically aren’t there long, the commissioners said.

The average has been 14,000 a year.

News about the alleged hunger strike has been vastly “overblown,” according to Winters.

A kerfuffle about lack of pillows was likewise of little account, because it’s normal for pillows to be a unified part of mattresses in prisons, Winters said.

Still, an allegation like that “gins people up,” Winters said.

There is federal oversight at Moshannon, according to Winters.

Various members of Congress and also members of the state’s General Assembly have visited, Winters said.

If everyone who has spoken reassuringly about the facility is lying, it would be bad, but he can’t imagine such universal lying, he said.

Generally, the administration there has been “pretty open and cooperative,” according to Sobel.

Most of the time “they have a pretty good explanation of why they do what they do,” he said.

He’s satisfied the detainees are receiving adequate care, Sobel said.

Alone among the commissioners, Glass has committed to voting not to renew the contract.

It’s not because of Moshannon Valley, however, but because of the actions and policies of Immigration and Customs Enforcement more broadly — and particularly because of an ICE raid on a housing complex in Chicago and the shooting deaths of two protestors against ICE behavior in Minneapolis, Glass said.

“I don’t want to support that,” he said. “I don’t want to be in business with ICE.”

Still, not renewing the contract with Moshannon is unlikely to result in closure of the facility, according to Glass.

If the county owned the property, it would be different, he said.

But the facility is on GEO ground in a GEO building, he said.

The county is involved only because the Biden administration was uncomfortable for some reason with ICE dealing directly with GEO, according to Glass.

It wanted a mediating organization or buffer, he indicated.

That decision led to the five-year contract, which pays the county $200,000 a year.

It would seem that if the county doesn’t renew the contract, the Trump administration could simply contract directly with GEO, Glass indicated.

No one has shown him evidence otherwise, he said.

The $200,000 annual administrative fee is insignificant compared with the major economic benefit the facility creates for the area — estimated to be about $40 million annually, according to Winters.

The payroll alone for the 400-plus GEO employees is $37 million, he said.

Mirror Staff Writer William Kibler is at 814-949-7038.