When you imagine ProBAR at work, you might picture our office or a courtroom; but for ProBAR’s Community Team – who primarily serves individuals who are not in detention – the workplace can change multiple times per month.
Our Community Team is dedicated to bridging the gaps between our services and the Rio Grande Valley community, and more recently, helping ProBAR meet the moment at a time when public access to knowledge and resources about immigration is in high demand and short supply.
Every day for the last 12 months, people around the country have seen their neighbors and loved ones taken away by masked individuals in unmarked vehicles, whether they are at home or attending a routine ICE check-in. Many of these individuals are already in the process of securing legal status in this country, and some may even already have citizenship. The rate at which immigration policy has been changed over the last 12 months is more than the average person can keep up with, leaving many undocumented individuals confused and living in fear. That is, until they meet ProBAR’s Community team.
In the first quarter of 2026, the Community team delivered five presentations reaching community members across the Rio Grande valley. These included Know-Your-Rights (KYR) sessions and Power of Attorney (POA) presentations at the Mexican Consulate in Brownsville (both in-person and via Facebook Live), the Family Crisis Center in Harlingen, and Dr. Raul Garza STEAM Academy in San Benito. The team also tabled at events sponsored by the Mexican Consulate, Bob Clark Social Services, and UTRGV, providing information about ProBAR’s full range of services—from orientations and legal clinics to legal representation of unaccompanied children, detained adults, and non-detained community members, especially non-detained victims of crime across Hidalgo, Cameron, Willacy, and Starr counties. The team connected with a total of approximately 269 individuals, with one in-person KYR reaching an audience of more than 70 people.
For this upcoming quarter, ProBAR is focused on connecting with communities who have been affected by the Department of Housing and Urban Development initiative “Cleaning House.” In the Rio Grande Valley, this operation has caused alarm, especially with mixed status families who fear being evicted from their homes. For more information on our community efforts, contact us at [email protected].
