David Martin Davies

Texas Matters: A radio documentary investigating the increase in the number of immigrant refugees, many of them unaccompanied minors, that are turning up at the Texas-Mexico border. The greatest percentage of migrant youth are coming from Honduras.

Arriving in Texas

President Obama is requesting that Congress authorize $2 billion and special powers to deal with the surge of unaccompanied minor immigrants.

In record numbers the children are coming from Central America, crossing the Rio Grande and overwhelming the U.S. system after being apprehended at the Texas border. Most are coming from Honduras, Guatemala and El Salvador, but Honduras is the leading source country.

*This show is a rebroadcast of the April 18, 2014 episode of Texas Matters

Texas Matters: Dive into the hidden history of early Texas photographs with Lawrence T. Jones, III, whose new book, "Lens on the Texas Frontier," presents a stunning look at life in early Texas.

• Click here for an expanded post with additional text and pictures

Thousands of unaccompanied children are coming from Central America, crossing the Rio Grande and being apprehended at the Texas border. They are coming from Honduras, Guatemala and El Salvador – but Honduras is the main source.

As night seizes Tegucigalpa, Honduras, the streets of one of the capital city’s toughest neighborhoods, Comayagüela, are virtually deserted. Most people here know that it’s not safe for anyone to be caught out alone at night. This is where the killer gangs are notorious.

Texas Matters: As Texas politicians continue to put the federal government under fire to do something about border security and the recent immigrant surge, what is happening to those who are already here or those who continue to come? Also on this show: On Juneteenth, Texas before racial equality.

Humanitarian crisis at the border

Texas Matters: In their new platform, the Republican Party of Texas has called for a right to reparative therapy – a controversial method that claims to turn gay people straight. We look deeper into this therapy practice that critics say doesn’t work.

Texas Matters: This week we explore the current state of Texas state-supported living centers (SSLC), which house people with developmental and intellectual disabilities. How are these centers doing five years after the U.S. Department of Justice discovered inadequate conditions and care? The story of Sean Yates, who escaped from the Corpus Christi SSLC and was later found dead. What is the future of SSLCs in Texas?

Recently the Texas Sunset Advisory Commission released a report that was highly critical of the Texas state-supported living centers. The system of institutions has a proven track record of providing substandard care and the report says they cost too much money to maintain.

Texas state-supported living centers are under a tremendous amount of pressure and scrutiny as state leaders consider where they will fit in the state’s future. And as questions are raised about the substandard quality of medical care that the residents receive at the centers, a recent tragedy in Corpus Christi exposes the issue of neglect.

To hear Ashley Yates talk about her brother Sean – he certainly sounded like one of a kind.

Five years ago the state of Texas settled a lawsuit with the Department of Justice over the way the state housed and treated some of the state’s most vulnerable citizens.

The DOJ unearthed conditions at Texas state-supported living centers where mentally disabled residents were found to be neglected, beaten, sexually assaulted and even killed by staff members.

Some are calling for the centers to be finally shut down, but others say that despite their flaws, the centers are needed.