Jessica Dovalina is an assistant director in the San Antonio Department of Human Services. She supervises the new Migrant Resource Center, which opened July 7, 2022. In an interview on KLRN’s On the Record she said, “It [the center] will allow us to to do intake for everyone that’s arriving in San Antonio in a coordinated way, share that information among partners to coordinate services…also provide respite and connect people to overnight shelter if they need that.” (Dovalina’s portion of the interview begins at 8:14.)
The City became involved in caring for asylum seekers in March, 2019, when the San Antonio Food Bank began providing meals for that year’s spring surge in migrants. A few months later, the first iteration of the Migrant Resource Center opened just down the street from the bus station. The city has remained consistent in its support of compassionate care for legal asylum seekers since that time through the San Antonio Immigration Liaison, Tino Gallego, and its Faith-Based Liaison, Rev. Ann Helmke.
Dovalina has a BA from Texas A & M in Sociology and a Masters in Public Administration from Texas State University. Praised by her colleagues for her work in the areas of public policy and economic development, the Laredo native now lives in San Antonio with her husband Kris Stevenson.
The G
eneral Meeting of IWC takes place by Zoom on the second Thursday of each month at 10 a.m. If you receive this newsletter, you will also receive a meeting invitation with the meeting agenda and zoom address.
- Slides presented at the July 2022 meeting are available here.
- Slides of earlier meetings are available on the IWC website here.
Each 90-minute meeting consists of a speaker from a collaborating organization, a report of current immigration/detention news as covered by the media, reports from IWC committees and ministries, a financial report, info about the number of people served by our various ministries, and any other current issues which affect our volunteers and supporters.
