Governor Maura Healey’s administration is urging newly arrived migrant families who land at Logan Airport to leave the state, and offering to pay for their airplane tickets out of Massachusetts.
New notices distributed in recent days warn people in Haitian-Creole that they will be barred from staying overnight at Logan Airport starting Tuesday and that the state’s shelters are at capacity. Families, instead, are encouraged to participate in the state’s Reticketing Program. The program covers travel expenses if families have a safe, long-term place to stay outside of Massachusetts.
The flyers are being distributed to families seeking shelter when they arrive at the Quincy Family Welcome Center and other area offices.
Relocating migrants to other states is far from a new strategy and has been deployed aggressively by Republican governors in recent years for political purposes and to underscore the costs of the border crisis.
Texas Governor Greg Abbott has taken aim at Democratic enclaves viewed as too lax on immigration by sending busloads of migrants to New York, Chicago, and Washington, D.C. And in September 2022, Republican Florida Governor Ron DeSantis flew about 50 migrants in private planes from Texas to Martha’s Vineyard, a move widely blasted by Democrats and immigration advocates as a political stunt that took advantage of vulnerable people who were stunned when they arrived on the island with little access to jobs or services.
Healey, who was at the time running for Massachusetts governor, called DeSantis’ move “incredibly cruel.” Since taking office, Healey has repeatedly sought to contrast her governing agenda to DeSantis’ and balked at any comparison between the Massachusetts program and the Florida governor’s actions, which spurred a lawsuit by the migrants shipped to the Vineyard.
“There is absolutely no comparison between Massachusetts’ reticketing program and the cruel, illegal actions of Governor DeSantis, who used human beings as pawns, lied to them, and sent them off to states where they had no family connections or places to stay,” Karissa Hand, a spokesperson for Healey, said Wednesday.
That Massachusetts relocation program is part of the Healey administration’s stepped-up efforts to curb the number of families coming to the state — many of them Haitian migrants fleeing political upheaval and economic distress.
The reticketing program has been in place for several months, but has until now been informal. Only 18 families have been relocated out of Massachusetts since March, according to state officials.
But the program is expected to grow with the state’s recent restrictions on shelter stays and the prohibition of overnight stays at Logan.
“As a result of continued capacity concerns and a lack of federal action on immigration reform, the state is working to increase the number of families using this option, particularly at Logan Airport,” Noah Bombard, a spokesperson for the Executive Office of Housing and Livable Communities, the state agency leading the emergency shelter program, said in a statement.
Massachusetts has spent about $1 billion this past fiscal year on its emergency shelter program, about three times what was budgeted, to help house homeless families, about half of whom are migrants.
The Massachusetts reticketing program is voluntary and nonprofit groups are working with those in the emergency shelter program to determine if this is the best option for families, Bombard said.
“Families will only be reticketed if it is confirmed that they have a safe place to stay at the alternative location,” Bombard said.
Burdened by the costs of sheltering migrants, Illinois, New York, and Denver have all used government funds to pay for some of them to travel elsewhere. Illinois has relocated at least 3,200 people, and the governor’s office there told the Globe in March that the state estimates the program reduced its shelter population by 10 percent.
The Healey administration is hoping to send a clear message to migrants considering Massachusetts: The state has no more room.
In late June, administration officials traveled to Texas and told border officials, nonprofits, and families that the state is out of shelter space.
The Healey administration also imposed new policies limiting the stays for homeless and migrant families in shelters to nine consecutive months. Families could be kicked out as soon as Sept. 29
Dalain, who only provided his first name, arrived at Logan Airport on June 25, just days after he, his young son, and wife, crossed the border in Texas. He had heard from friends that there were organizations in Massachusetts that helped migrant families. But when he went to the welcome center in Quincy, he received the flyer urging him to get a flight out, because the time he could spend at the airport was limited and the shelters were full.
He and his family don’t know anybody in the US and have nowhere else to go, said Dalain, who has been sleeping on the airport floor.
“It’s scary for my wife and son,” Dalain said. “I don’t want to be out on the street.”
Deirdre Fernandes can be reached at deirdre.fernandes@globe.com. Follow her @fernandesglobe.