Escondico council to vote on proposal to punish landlords

[Brian503a]

http://www.kesq.com/Global/story.asp?S=5494743&nav=9qrx

Escondido, CA Focus Campaign
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Escondico council to vote on proposal to punish landlords


ESCONDIDO, Calif. A new front in the debate over illegal immigration opens up tonight in Escondido.

City Council members are expected to vote on a proposal that prohibits landlords from renting to illegal immigrants.

The proposed ordinance would require landlords to submit documentation of their tenants' immigration status to the city, which would then verify the information with the federal government.

Landlords found renting to illegal immigrants could lose their business licenses or face misdemeanor charges.

Latino civil rights activists protested the proposed law yesterday at city hall. Members of the anti-illegal immigration group the Minutemen say they plan to gather outside city hall for the vote tonight .

[Brian503a]

http://www.signonsandiego.com

Escondido to vote on housing ordinance

By Mark Sauer
UNION-TRIBUNE STAFF WRITER
October 4, 2006


ESCONDIDO – The immigration debate raging here and across the nation seems to attract metaphors about rushing water – flood, deluge, awash, rising tide – to describe the numbers of people flowing illegally across the border.
City Councilman Sam Abed prefers precise figures to metaphorical references. Abed's numbers are startling: One Escondido resident in four, he contends, is an illegal immigrant.

Abed is a proponent of a controversial ordinance barring landlords from leasing to illegal immigrants, which the City Council is to vote on tonight.

He has raised eyebrows on all sides of the immigration debate by repeatedly maintaining that 35,000 of Escondido's 140,000 residents are illegal.

Abed, who called the numbers “alarming,” said the continued influx of people with poor education, minimal job skills and the inability to speak English will lead to “an increase in poverty, as well as health and safety issues.”

But others who deal with the multifaceted issue of illegal immigration said Abed's numbers are seriously out of whack.

“That rate of 25 percent of the population would be about eight to 10 times higher than the national rate for illegal immigration, according to the federal government's best estimates,” said David Shirk, director of the University of San Diego's Transborder Institute.

“The official rate of undocumented immigration in this country is 11.1 million out of a population of 300 million – that's 3 (percent) to 4 percent. I would look at (Abed's) numbers with great skepticism. That's an astonishingly high estimate.”

Escondido Mayor Lori Holt Pfeiler, who opposes the landlord ordinance, had this response: “I don't think his numbers are solid at all. And I don't think there is any way to get accurate figures.”

Abed, a naturalized citizen who was born in Lebanon, said he did not pull the figures out of the air. He cited a 2003 study of the Latino population in Vista.

The study was commissioned by Vista officials in response to an investigation by the federal government into possible voting irregularities. The Vista study reported that more than half of Latinos in Vista could not vote because they were not U.S. citizens, based on responses from residents in the 2000 U.S. Census.

For Escondido, the 2000 Census found that about 26,000 foreign-born Latinos of all ages were living in the city. Of those, 83 percent, or about 21,600, were not eligible to vote because they were not citizens, or just over 15 percent of the city's entire population. In all, about 42 percent of all Escondido's Latino residents were foreign born and illegible to vote.

Abed, who said he did not read the Vista report nor interview its authors, said he used the Vista figures and extrapolated for Escondido.

“I'd say the overall Hispanic population of Escondido is close to 48 (percent) or 50 percent,” Abed said. (The San Diego Association of Governments puts it at 42 percent.)

“Vista, which is very similar to Escondido, found that 50 percent of its Hispanic population is illegal. Using that figure for Escondido, you come up with 35,000 people, or one in four residents.”

But Abed's assumptions are not valid, said Doug Johnson, president of National Demographic Corp. of Claremont, which conducted the Vista voting-trend study in 2003.

The problem: Being foreign born and a noncitizen is not the same as being an illegal immigrant.

Census takers, Johnson said, are barred from asking people about the legal status of their residency.

“They ask, 'Were you born in the United States?' If the answer is no, they ask, 'Are you a citizen.' But if that answer is no, that does not mean the person is an undocumented immigrant,” Johnson said.

“They could be here on a work visa, a student visa; they could have permanent resident-alien status,” he said. “All we cared about was voting eligibility. The Census numbers we used tell you nothing about whether a person is undocumented.”

Confronted with that explanation, Abed, who owns an Escondido gas station, remained undeterred. “I still say that at least 50 percent of our minorities are here illegally,” he said. “But even if it is only 45 percent or 40 percent, that's still an enormous figure.”

Abed, who notes with frustration that his brother has been waiting in Lebanon for 16 years to become a naturalized U.S. citizen, said regardless of the numbers, the issue remains the same.

“If we can stop additional people from coming to Escondido illegally, we can use our resources to help those already here to learn English and get job training,” he said.

“This (landlord ordinance) is about defending the standard of living here – we can either spend our limited money on residents and illegals who are here, or we can allow more of such people, and more poverty, into the city.”

Pfeiler doesn't see it that way. Illegal immigration, she said, is a federal issue.

“If you want to stop the flow of illegal immigrants, you have to stop it at the border and on the job,” she said. “This whole debate about quality of life – how do you measure that? How do you define it?

“If the figures here really were 25 percent, what would happen if we removed 25 percent of our workers, 25 percent of our renters, 25 percent of our customers, in one fell swoop? It would be fascinating to do that and see what would happen.

“Don't ask for what you want; you just might get it.”

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Mark Sauer: (619) 293-2227; mark.sauer@uniontrib.com

[Brian503a]

http://www.kfmb.com/stories/story.65395.html#

Video: http://www.kfmb.com/flv/video_pop?startID=65395


City Council To Vote On Illegal-Renters Measure

Last Updated:
10-04-06 at 7:29AM

The Escondido city council is set to take up a controversial vote Wednesday night on whether to punish landlords who rent to illegal immigrants.

Tuesday night, opponents of the measure held a candlelight vigil at city hall.

The proposed ordinance would require landlords to submit proof to the city that their tenants are legal residents.

[2ndamendsis]

We could use every spare hand to help out here.
If anyone has a minute or two, please zap out a few emails to the illustrious folks in Escondido. They need all the courage they can get

Escondido, CA Focus Campaign
http://www.alipac.us/modules.php?name=F ... ic&t=39450

[houston]

I think I type in my sleep nowadays............

[2ndamendsis]

I think I type in my sleep nowadays............