Posted: Wednesday, June 4, 2014 10:30 pm
Karen Antonacci | The Monitor

Come September, Hidalgo County law enforcement entities will have extra cash to combat crime along the U.S.-Mexico border.

The Hidalgo County Sheriff’s Office was awarded more than $3.3 million from Operation Stonegarden, a grant administered under the Federal Emergency Management Agency — the most the county has received under the program.

The Sheriff’s Office will keep $1.6 million of the grant money and distribute the rest among constable precincts and 12 city police departments, to be used to fund new equipment, fuel costs and overtime pay.

The grant is meant to grease the wheels on a partnership between local law enforcement and the Border Patrol to combat human smuggling and drug and weapon and currency trafficking, said Sheriff Eddie Guerra.

The Sheriff’s Office and the other law enforcement entities that applied for the grant had to have the paperwork in by June last year, so the funds Guerra’s administration is receiving this year were applied for and divvied up under former sheriff, Lupe Treviño.

The Treviño administration allocated about 46 percent of this year’s funds to the Sheriff’s Office and split the remaining 54 percent among the four Constable Precincts and the 12 police departments. That is similar to 2013, when Treviño’s administration opted to keep 48 percent of the Stonegarden funds.

Guerra said under the Treviño administration, Stonegarden funds were only allocated for pay to patrol deputies, but he is opening it up so the investigative division can access the money to work on cases that involve drug cartels or human smuggling rings.

In the same vein, sheriff’s patrol deputies “working grant,” or volunteering to work hours on time and a half pay funded by Stonegarden, are to assist Border Patrol in planned operations and at the Ports of Entry bridges.

When they aren’t assisting Border Patrol, deputies are directed to keep their eyes peeled and enforce traffic laws. They will respond to only “hot calls” in the area that require immediate attention like homicides, kidnappings or armed robberies. Deputies working grant will not generally respond to “cold calls” like asking for someone to take a shoplifting report, or a missing wallet or cell phone.

While they are working with federal partners, the $3.3 million partnership doesn’t mean the Sheriff’s Office, Constables’ Offices and city police departments will enforce immigration laws.

“We don’t enforce immigration law. That’s not our job,” Guerra said, adding that Immigration and Customs Enforcement comes to the Hidalgo County Jail every day to interview those suspected of being in the country illegally. If the suspicion is founded, ICE places a flag on the person’s record, which prevents them from being released on bond, or they move them to a federal detention center.

Besides paying for deputy overtime and fuel, law enforcement entities can also use a portion of the Stonegarden funds to buy new equipment.

While the city police departments will buy new vehicles, under Treviño, the Sheriff’s Office had their eye on two more mobile observation towers. Those two additional towers would have brought the Sheriff’s Office total of the surveillance towers to eight, but Guerra said he felt the Office needed other equipment instead.

http://www.themonitor.com/news/local...a4bcf6878.html