Unverified rumors on the internet are, as I have learnt, most likely to remain unverified not because of any untruthfulness but rather because verifying them is inexplicably difficult if not impossible without edging onto many peoples bad sides.

For sometime I have been aware of governmental plans and programs dealing with the construction of detention facilities on American soil. Most recently is the $385 million contract given to a Halliburton subsidiary, KBR, by the Department of Homeland Security to finance the construction of detention facilities for influxes of illegal immigrants or, as KBR stated, “to support the rapid development of new programs” that, as the New York Times reported, “require additional detention space.” Furthermore there is the Army’s Civilian Inmate Labor Program made public in 2005 which details how American citizens can be made to work on detention camps on military installations under the supervision of the Army.

More notorious, in some circles, though is Oliver North’s 1980’s REX-84 program, a theoretical exercise that entailed FEMA rounding up 400,000 imaginary refugees and placing them in camps. This program coupled with a proposed executive order written by then FEMA head Louis Giuffrida in 1982 which called for suspension of the Constitution and enactment of martial law under the pretext of securing continuity of government raised serious civil rights concerns. In addition, the execution of training operations by the military entailing detention of American citizens in camps has been documented and admitted, Operation Urban Warrior for example. Clearly, there are many open admissions of federal plans that entail the detaining of American citizens and or other people in camps.

Not officially admitted though is the existence of hundreds FEMA detention camps in America; however, photographic evidence of these facilities is readily available through documentaries and online articles. Not verified though is the claim I found on an internet message board that in Tobyhanna Pennsylvania such a FEMA detention camp exists and perhaps is operational. Understandably my intrigue was piqued by the claim and I began an effort to verify the statement which has lead to my belief that a detention camp does exist in Tobyhanna Pennsylvania and efforts have been taken to hide its existence from the public.

As a large Army Depot is located in Tobyhanna I began my investigation by contacting the Depot; I asked via email “Does a FEMA relocation center(a euphemize for detention center as detention occurs under the guise of relocation for national security) or facility exist in or near the Tobyhanna Army Depot?” to which I received a long list of transfers and forwarded messages and the final statement that “TYAD (Tobyhanna Army Depot) does not have an office on the installation - here is a web link with contact information: fema.gov.”

Thus, the main question was answered and the message board statement was verified: yes, there is a FEMA detention center in Tobyhanna. I was compelled to follow the contact information and call the FEMA national office to obtain more information about the installation. I called the general contact number and asked for information regarding detention facilities in FEMA’s Region III, which Pennsylvania is apart of, only to receive rude attitude from the contact line. I was told that the line I had called did not have access to that information, I asked has such access and I was told that the line I called does not have access to that information, I asked to be transferred to a different line and I was told that I could not be, I asked for the contact number of the Region III office and I was told that the line I called did not have access to that information. I considered the probability of being assisted by the “person” I called and decided that the best thing to do was to hang up and not escalate the situation. I then called the Pennsylvania Emergency Management Agency and was told by a very cordial man that PEMA does not have that information and that the Monroe County Emergency management office would tell me where the” detention camps are located.”

And so I phoned that office and was informed that no one has ever heard of such an installation. Perturbed by the futility of me efforts I re-contacted the Army Depot saying that FEMA at the federal state and local levels have either never heard of the installation or “doesn’t have access to that information” and that “FEMA seems generally loathe to assist me.” I received an odd response saying “We (the Army Depot) are an Army installation. I tried to help you as much as I can; unfortunately I too am now considered a dead end.”

Given the strange and erroneous nature of the letter I opted not to re-contact the Depot. The notion dawned on me that since the Department of Homeland Security now more or less runs FEMA and oversees most FEMA powers I might be able to acquire information concerning FEMA from DHS. However, I was meet with a sense of unease when I spoke to the various offices of DHS, for example an imposing female voice nearly ordered me to go to “F-E-M-A DOT G-O-V” to which I had to explain that I had already been on that website and have searched it many times to no avail; I was transferred, I then was told that information concerning detention facilities is “not available to the public” to which I sarcastically replied “so you’re telling me I’m not allowed to no where prison camps on located in my country” and I was told that any public information is posted on the DHS website; once again I was transferred. I was transferred several more times until I was put through to someone’s cell phone whose possessor apparently deemed important enough not to answer.

The lack of information seemed appalling and I was spurred to find the camp myself; however, when I arrived at Tobyhanna I found the woods, which used to be an artillery range, non-navigable, hence I went to a local restaurant in an effort to see if the local could enlighten me. Regretfully the locals never heard of such an installation and my effort to find the location of the FEMA camp failed. I reconciled to give FEMA one last chance to reveal the location of the Tobyhanna FEMA detention camp. I called the general contact line and said “I have been told by the Army that a FEMA relocation center exists in Tobyhanna Pennsylvania but I cannot find any information on it on the internet. I would like for you to tell me the camp’s location and contact information.” The FEMA operator gave me the address of an aid distribution center and I responded that I was looking for information on a detention facility. The man then said that “that information is not available to you.’ I asked to be transferred to a different office and he said that I called the FEMA general contact line and that I could not be transferred. I then said “let me speak to the national office of FEMA;” he said that I was speaking to that office, I then said “how can I contact the actual entity FEMA not just a vague contact line.” The man said he would ask his supervisor to help me and after a minute of absence he returned and said that I had called the general contact line and that the information I want is not available to me. I supposed his supervisor was not around and would not help me so I asked “whom should I contact?” The man gave me the number for a Pennsylvania Inclement Weather Office. The man at this office was friendly and attempted to help me however he said that dentition facilities are “not anything I know about or work with.” I thanked the man and conceded to the grim reality that the national government is simply unwilling to tell the public about its detention camp location.

The implications of this understanding are grave and pressing. To my understanding as the late Congressman Henry B Gonzalez stated, “the truth is yes - you do have these stand by provisions, and the plans are here. . . whereby you could, in the name of stopping terrorism, evoke the military, arrest Americans and put them in detention camps,” there are detention camps built and planned to be built in America, one of these camps, according to the Army, exists in Tobyhanna, and the Federal Emergency Management Agency and the Department of Homeland Security are engaged in a stonewalling of research and de-facto cover-up of the camps. From my experience I can affirm that this concealing of information is possible by ensconcing information in a compartmentalized mechanism of knowledge where in the high federal officials in FEMA and DHS for example are fully aware of certain information but the Public Affairs Offices, switchboard operators, and go-fors are kept unenlightened. Consequently, a person attempting to find out information is left unknowledgeable as he can only deal with ignorance and not the higher echelons of the pyramidal institution of understanding. Due to this system of trickle down knowledge distribution the populous has been bypassed and hoodwinked by departments of the federal government which are concealing information from them.

A further implication is that the federal government can covertly operate detention facilities on American soil without appraising the American people. Although this revelation is appalling it is but one example on a long catalogue of pernicious federal augmentation (The John Warner Act, The Military Commissions Act, NSA spying, Patriot Act, for example.) The American federal government has gone from the vision of the founding fathers to a monolithic and secretive beast that can arrest American citizens, deem them enemy combats, detain them in secret prisons, put them before a military tribunal, and execute them all in secrecy and without due process of law. The absurdity of American’s current predicament is manifest and the encroachment on civil liberties and American ideals by the federal government interminably continues.

The final conclusion that I have arrived at through my experiences with FEMA and DHS is that verifying rumors through the federal government is nearly impossible as one must contend with labyrinths of rudeness, incompetence, secrecy, dead ends, bureaucracy, politics, and limitless transfers.