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07-30-2006, 06:33 PM #1
Group pushes for local reform
http://www.naplesnews.com/news/2006/jul ... local_news
Group pushes for local reform
Americans Standing Tall petitioning community governments to restrict undocumented migrants' access to public services
By Anne Marie Apollo
Sunday, July 30, 2006
If it is the promise of work that brings many immigrants to el norte from impoverished regions of Latin America, a Cape Coral group hopes the denial of aid they need to survive here will send them back.
Inspired by the passage of a similar ordinance titled the “Illegal Immigration Relief Act” in Hazelton, Pa., two weeks ago, a group called Americans Standing Tall is circulating petitions in Lee and Collier counties asking area municipalities to pass ordinances restricting access to services to documented citizens.
Among the programs they hope will be off-limits are education and medical care for conditions that aren’t life-threatening.
Americans Standing Tall is a grass-roots Cape Coral organization formed in support of broad-based federal immigration reform.
While there is pending federal action on the immigration front, Americans Standing Tall co-founder Tony Maida said he believes change has to start locally.
He paints a picture of hospital emergency rooms that triage the uninsured, and a school system hobbled by fast growth in part due to an influx of immigrants.
“The cost is rising dramatically and the taxpayers are sharing a heck of a big burden,” he said. “The problem doesn’t go away, it gets worse.”
The group, which organized this year after local Hispanic groups brought a record number of protesters to Fort Myers in an outcry against stricter immigration reform, has a list of hundreds of people who volunteered to work in the event of labor protests. Maida believes those same people will now be willing to collect signatures in Naples, Bonita Springs, Cape Coral and Fort Myers to support an anti-illegal immigration ordinance.
Those who aren’t in a life-or-death medical situation would be refused care by emergency workers, under the changes the group is urging.
Children without documents wouldn’t go to school.
And rather than incarcerating illegal immigrants who have committed a crime, they would immediately be deported.
Not possible, some local officials responded.
“We cannot deny educational opportunities to anyone in this country,” Lee County School District spokesman Joe Donzelli said. “We can’t even ask the question (of citizenship), not even to collect data.”
To enroll a child in local schools, parents need to prove they are a resident of the county, not necessarily a U.S. citizen, Donzelli said.
If they are under age 16, children are required to be in school and the district is required to accept them, he added.
Aid programs like those offered through the Lee County Department of Human Services already almost exclusively require participants to have a Social Security number because they are largely state and federally funded, said its assistant director, Ann Arnall.
One exception, a low-income home energy assistance program, allows the department to offer help so long as anyone in the home has a Social Security number — often two parents without legal status who have children born in America. In that case, the household can receive aid, but those who are not citizens cannot be included in the calculation of benefits, she said.
The specific services Americans Standing Tall plans to target, including EMS and the Sheriff’s Office, are controlled by the county, as well.
Lee County Attorney David Owen said he couldn’t comment on the petition unless it comes before commissioners.
Collier County already is thinking along Maida’s lines.
It has plans to check the papers of people working on job sites fueled by tax money from economic incentive programs.
That’s not far from where the ordinance that inspired Americans Standing Tall started.
Hazelton, Pa., earlier this month passed an immigration act brought forward by its mayor, Louis Barletta.
The measure refuses licenses to businesses that hire undocumented residents and fines landlords who have illegal tenants.
It also makes English the city’s official language. Those who don’t speak it can’t receive services.
The passage of the bill has cast a light on the Pennsylvania city and led to a push for similar measures elsewhere, including an ordinance approved last week in Riverside, N.J., and one that failed in Avon Park in Central Florida.
In an open letter posted on Hazelton’s Web site, Barletta said he believes illegal immigration is to blame for higher crime rates and crowded hospitals and says it has destroyed the city’s neighborhoods.
“Let me be clear, this ordinance is intended to make Hazelton one of the most difficult places in the country for illegal immigrants,” Barletta writes.
That’s not an image Bonita Springs Mayor Jay Arend covets.
“I don’t think the city wants to have that type of reputation,” he said. “There are problems (with immigration), I admit that, but I think they are problems we can overcome.”
Even if the city could pass an ordinance denying services to immigrants, Arend said, it likely won’t.
To do so would be un-American, he said.Support our FIGHT AGAINST illegal immigration & Amnesty by joining our E-mail Alerts at http://eepurl.com/cktGTn
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07-30-2006, 06:40 PM #2That’s not an image Bonita Springs Mayor Jay Arend covets.
“We cannot deny educational opportunities to anyone in this country,” Lee County School District spokesman Joe Donzelli said. “We can’t even ask the question (of citizenship), not even to collect data.”
Among the programs they hope will be off-limits are education and medical care for conditions that aren’t life-threatening.
"Give a mouse a cookie, and he'll want a glass of milk."
We must cut off ALL benefits to illegals."Doing the same thing over and over again and expecting the same results is the definition of insanity. " Albert Einstein.
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