ROA

“Its not a great place for kids,” said their mother, Alexandra Roa, 21, standing in front of the family’s plywood-and-plastic dwelling.

“We are disillusioned, desperate,” said Roa, who left Venezuela at age 16, settling in Chile for several years before heading toward the United States.

“We don’t want to take the risk of going to the border and then something really bad happens,” Roa said.

“We build a new city every Sunday,” his colleague Katherin Amaya Roa shouted over the clatter.

Edgar Roa was mostly raised by an immigrant mother without a high school degree, surviving on welfare benefits as his family frequently moved around Southern California in pursuit of affordable housing.