Order extended blocking child-care license for immigrant detention center

AUSTIN — A judge extended her order Wednesday that at least temporarily blocks a residential child-care license for one of the nation's largest detention centers for families caught crossing the southern border illegally.

State District Judge Karin Crump issued a temporary injunction Wednesday in Austin, blocking the state from licensing the privately owned and managed, 2,400-bed South Texas Family Residential Center in Dilley until a full hearing scheduled for September. An activist group contends the center is a prison inappropriate for family detention.

The licenses are needed because a federal judge ruled last year the center would have to eventually release the immigrant children without them. Crump had issued a restraining order in May.

The Dilley center is about 70 miles southwest of San Antonio. Grassroots Leadership, the Austin-based group fighting to block the license, also wants the judge to strike down a temporary residential child-care license issued to the privately owned and managed, 500-bed Karnes County Residential Center in Karnes City, about 50 miles southeast of San Antonio.