A path to citizenship for illegal immigrants is laid?
the move is part of a larger strategy to lobby Congress to pass a version of the Dream Act, which would give students who completed two years of college or military service a path to citizenship.
http://gothamist.com/2011/10/22/albany_expected_to_pass_agenda_that.php
Nov 4, 2011 The City Draws a Line
With states such as Arizona and Alabama passing immigration laws that go far beyond those of the federal government, the New York City Council weighed in on the issue yesterday and took a decidedly different stand.By an overwhelming majority, the council passed a bill sponsored by Melissa Mark-Viverito of Manhattan that would end the Department of Correction's policy of cooperating with federal efforts to deport undocumented immigrants. The bill, said by supporters to be the first of its kind in the country, will end two decades of cooperation between the city jail system and federal immigration authorities, now called Immigration and Customs Enforcement, or ICE.
This bill, Intro 656, Mark-Viverito said shortly before its passage, "sends a strong message we will no longer be complicit in this country's broken immigration system."
City Council Speaker Christine Quinn cited another message as well. "When signed by the mayor," she said, "the entire government of New York will send a message the city of New York is supportive of, friendly to and welcoming to immigrants."
Detained and DeportedUnder the current system, the city gives names of people arrested -- whether or not they are convicted of any crime and regardless of the severity of that crime -- to the federal agency, which then can check whether the person is here legally. If the person is undocumented, ICE can then request that he or she be detained for additional time so ICE can arrange to transfer the immigrant to a federal facility to await deportation proceedings.
Of the people detained under this system in 2010, Quinn said, almost half -- 49.5 percent -- had no prior criminal record. She estimated that some 1,000 to 1,500 people deported in 2010 would not have been detained if the measure passed yesterday had been in effect.
Overall, according to council, 13,295 people born outside the United States spent time in city jails in fiscal year 2010. ICE took custody of 2,522 of those people for possible deportation.
In passing the bill, council member cited what they saw as various abuses of the immigration and deportation system, including detention of people in facilities far from New York and deportation of people who came to the United States with their parents as small children.
The bill singles nine categories of people, including possible terrorists, whose names would still be turned over to ICE. In Quinn's eyes, this removes any public safety concerns.
The Administration's ShiftThe bill now goes on to the mayor, who in a reversal of previous policy, is expected to sign it.
In response to criticism of the cooperation earlier this year, the mayor's office maintained helping ICE improved public safety. John Feinblatt, the mayor’s chief policy advisor and criminal justice coordinator, went so far as to write a letter to the Times raising the specter of terrorism. "As our country has learned tragically, when government agencies fail to cooperate and share information, not only is public safety compromised, so is national security," he said.
With more than 30 City Council members, including Quinn, supporting a change in the policy, the issue seemed sure to incite a rare public clash between the Bloomberg administration and the council. But in October, the mayor changed his position, indicating he would support a bill limiting the cooperation with ICE. Feinblatt then told the Times that the council bill "strikes the right balance."
The Bloomberg administration "truly came around in offering their support," Mark-Viverito said.
The OppositionSome council members, though, have doubts. Four members voted against the bill though only one – Peter Vallone of Queens, who has emerged as a frequent opponent of Quinn's policies in recent months, spoke out against it.
"This will make us less safe," Vallone said, faulting the measure for not making a distinction between violent crime on one hand and less serious offenses, including misdemeanors on the other. Under it, he said, a man recently arrested for assaulting a woman would have been released. "With this law," Vallone complained. "this groper would be out on the street groping our women."
As the vote drew to a close, Councilmember Lew Fidler weighed what he saw as pros and cons. "The immigrations system in this country is badly broken," he said and so, "in an effort to be compassionate and fair, … we will be endangering public safety."
Having said that., Fidler said, he would abstain in protest of federal immigration laws.
source: http://www.gothamgazette.com/article/searchlight/20111104/203/3630
Awesome.
If Obama's not going to lead on this issue, I'm glad our local government will.
The feds are growing more powerless by the day.
whynot_31 said:
The feds are growing more powerless by the day.
It seems the Feds have since ate their Wheaties and/or Spinach. They now have successfully forced the NYC area participate.
Some time has passed, and some city council members are now trying to find a new way to not participate:
City Considers Limiting DeportationsTwo bills set to be proposed in the City Council today would further limit the city's cooperation with federal programs that seek to deport immigrants. The bills are in response to The Secure Communities Act which mandates fingerprints taken at local jails are compared to a Department of Homeland Security database. Anyone who is deemed an illegal immigrant is then marked to be detained. If the City passes these laws it will strengthen its reputation as immigrant-friendly. Gov. Andrew Cuomo symbolically withdrew New York from the program earlier this year. “What we don’t want is New York City’s agencies having to participate in deporting people who present no risk and in fact may be adding a great deal to the City of New York,” Council Speaker Christine Quinn told the Times yesterday in an interview.
Source: Gotham Gazette, Dec 13, 2012
Feb 28, 2013
The City Council seems to agree, "Let's set limits to how much we are going cooperate with the Feds"
It remains to be seen whether the Feds will respond, in part because the restrcitions the City Council wants to implement aren't really different from the guidelines Homeland Security is supposed to be following ALREADY.
http://www.ice.gov/doclib/detention-reform/pdf/detainer-policy.pdf
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