Campos Demands Hearings on Juvenile Policy
Mission Loc@l

By Rigoberto Hernandez

Supervisor David Campos has called for public hearings about the Juvenile Probation Department's refusal to implement an ordinance that would relax the city's policy on when to report youth to immigration.

Juvenile Probation Department staff are required to attend the hearings, now scheduled for March at the Rules Committee, which Campos chairs.

The hearings pave the way for a potential legal showdown between the Board of Supervisors and the probation department.

The law in question, which is supposed to be implemented today, states that juvenile probation can report undocumented youth to U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement or ICE only if their felony is upheld. At present, probation officers report youth to ICE at the time of booking.

So far, the department has refused to implement the new policy and William Sifferman the chief of the Juvenile Probation Department told Campos on Tuesday that the department's position remained the same.

"I think that the community needs to hear directly from JPD what they are doing," Campos said referring to probation. "We need to know about their activities and how much time are they spending on the enforcement of immigration law."

Posted By: Mission Loc@l (Email) | February 10 2010 at 08:46 AM

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