Amid the uproar over a deluge of Haitian migrants relocated into the small town of Springfield, Ohio, a tiny Pennsylvania town is also under the spotlight over its influx of Haitians.
Charleroi, with a population less than one-tenth of Springfield, has seen a rise in the immigrant population. Some note the difficulty in “how to bridge the gap between the local immigrant community and other residents.”
Similar to Springfield, Charleroi is feeling the pressures of immigration on its public services. According to KDKA, the immigrant population of the small Washington County town has increased by 2000% in just two years, and the local school district has had to spend $400,000 on English-as-a-foreign-language teachers and interpreters. The local superintendent has so far been unsuccessful in finding additional resources to help address the challenges arising from the mass immigration.
Others are more skeptical, with one resident telling local media that he doesn’t see what good it’s doing to their town and that it’s a punishment of sorts from the federal government since they aren’t being located to more affluent liberal areas like Fox Chapel and Cranberry. Also like in Springfield, local Charleroi residents have complaints about the immigrant population not understanding local driving laws.
One resident told Newsmax a young relative was denied entry to the Head Start program as immigrant children now occupied all of the program’s slots, while another resident said “this is beyond immigration. At this point it feels like an invasion.”
Charleroi’s spotlight is partially the result of former President Trump noting the increase in the Haitian population during a campaign rally recently, in which he noted the town’s massive increase in immigrant population. Even local officials believe the influx has increased the town’s population by 50%.
Employment has become a controversial topic in the town. One local delivery driver complained that the rush of immigrants has hurt Charleroi’s job market, saying local temp staffing agencies are able to fill job openings with immigrants willing to work at wages far less than what they’d have to pay Americans.
Despite the recent headlines related to the presidential election, the relocation of immigrants to Charleroi was noted, and in a sense, celebrated by local paper The Lewistown Sentinel a year ago. Previously, Vice President Kamala Harris said to The View. about providing or extending temporary protective status to more than 150,000 Haitian migrants in the United States.
