Thread: Councilman Wants To Crack Down On Illegals (updated)

Councilman Wants To Crack Down On Illegal Immigrants

By Nefertiti Jaquez
POSTED: Tuesday, September 7, 2010
UPDATED: 7:51 am CDT September 7, 2010

TOMBALL, Texas -- A Tomball city councilman wants to crack down on illegal immigration.

WATCH IT: Tomball To Consider Immigration Ordinance
"We got illegal immigrants coming into our county right now and picking up Social Security. How is that fair?" Councilman Derek Townsend asked.

Towsend said he's been working on fighting illegal immigration for 10 years. He said that in the wake of the controversial Arizona immigration bill which was largely struck down by a federal judge, his ideas are gaining traction.

On Tuesday, Townsend plans to introduce an ordinance that would prevent illegal immigrants from renting or owning property and owning and operating a business.

"I feel like people who come here illegally are taking the bread and butter away from those who have come here legally off their table," said Townsend.

Some residents said they agree with Townsend.

"I work and I pay my taxes, and I feel everyone else should too," said one resident.

Some residents said they don't agree with Townsend. Elizabeth Hunt said that as the daughter of South American immigrants, she believes this isn't a cut-and-dried issue.

"Everyone wants to be treated fairly. They should be able to get their paperwork and become legal," said Hunt.

The meeting where Townsend will introduce the ordinance will be at Tomball City Hall at 7 p.m.

Councilman Wants To Crack Down On Illegal Immigrants
By Nefertiti Jaquez

POSTED: Tuesday, September 7, 2010
UPDATED: 7:51 am CDT September 7, 2010

EmailPrintTOMBALL, Texas -- A Tomball city councilman wants to crack down on illegal immigration.

WATCH IT: Tomball To Consider Immigration Ordinance
"We got illegal immigrants coming into our county right now and picking up Social Security. How is that fair?" Councilman Derek Townsend asked.

Towsend said he's been working on fighting illegal immigration for 10 years. He said that in the wake of the controversial Arizona immigration bill which was largely struck down by a federal judge, his ideas are gaining traction.

On Tuesday, Townsend plans to introduce an ordinance that would prevent illegal immigrants from renting or owning property and owning and operating a business.

"I feel like people who come here illegally are taking the bread and butter away from those who have come here legally off their table," said Townsend.

Some residents said they agree with Townsend.

"I work and I pay my taxes, and I feel everyone else should too," said one resident.

Some residents said they don't agree with Townsend. Elizabeth Hunt said that as the daughter of South American immigrants, she believes this isn't a cut-and-dried issue.

"Everyone wants to be treated fairly. They should be able to get their paperwork and become legal," said Hunt.

The meeting where Townsend will introduce the ordinance will be at Tomball City Hall at 7 p.m.

http://rss.msnbc.msn.com/id/39037161/ns ... ouston_tx/

well when did you open your eyes this been going on for some time Now it about time Amercian open up & stand up for Amercian Impeach Obama No Amnesty no illigal immigrant & Not to citizen ships to babys

Houston suburb doesn't ban illegal immigrant rents
By JUAN A. LOZANO Associated Press Writer © 2010 The Associated Press
Sept. 7, 2010, 10:22PM

TOMBALL, Texas — A Houston suburb has decided not to step into the fray over illegal immigration.

The Tomball City Council voted Tuesday night not to consider banning illegal immigrants from renting property or owning businesses or that would have made English its official language.

Council members discussed several controversial ordinance proposals Tuesday night that would have also prevented illegal immigrants from owning property or operating any business. Finally, they were dissuaded in part from pursuing a ban on renting to illegal immigrants based on the experience of Farmers Branch, a Dallas suburb that for years has been trying unsuccessfully to enforce a similar ordinance.

Council members also tabled a proposal that called for requiring any company awarded a city contract to not hire illegal immigrants.

http://www.chron.com/disp/story.mpl/ap/tx/7190624.html

Tomball migrant foe isn't done yet
He says people 'need to rise up' if the feds won't act
By SUSAN CARROLL
Copyright 2010 Houston Chronicle
Sept. 8, 2010, 11:01PM

Derek Townsend Sr. sat at a table in a diner with his wife Wednesday afternoon, sipping contentedly on a big mug of sweetened coffee without the slightest air of defeat.

About 14 hours earlier, the first-term Tomball city councilman and traffic signal salesman saw all of the anti-illegal immigration measures he'd proposed voted down by fellow City Council members. The council voted against making English the official language and defeated another measure that would have prohibited illegal immigrants from renting or owning property or a business there.

The council also voted to keep the city's day laborer center open, rejecting Townsend's idea of allowing only legal workers to gather at the center off dMain Street.

Despite the defeat, Townsend, whose personal slogan is "P.C. (political correctness) and me don't agree," seemed satisfied with the outcome of the previous night's meeting.

"I knew they wouldn't pass, some of them," the 53-year-old said. "But it gave the voting public an opportunity to see where their elected officials stand.

"I feel like the illegal immigration issue needs to be addressed, and if federal officials are not willing to enforce their own laws and uphold the Constitution, citizens need to rise up," Townsend said.

'I think it's getting worse'
But some in this town of about 10,000 to 12,500 northwest of Houston said the controversy over the day labor site and Townsend's anti-illegal immigration proposals had created an uncomfortable climate for many Latinos, including U.S. citizens.

The 9.2-square-mile city of Tomball, like many other suburbs on Houston's flanks, has seen significant growth in its Hispanic population over the past two decades. At the 1990 census, Tomball had 487 residents of Hispanic descent. By 2000, that number grew to 1,080. The Tomball Economic Development Corporation now estimates that as of 2007, Tomball had an estimated 10,298 white residents and 2,300 residents of Hispanic origin.

In a column in the local newspaper, Mayor Gretchen Fagan wrote that City Hall employees have fielded more than 200 calls from people outside Tomball over the day labor site, which became an issue earlier this summer when the lease renewal came up on the agenda. Fagan wrote in her column that one city employee "ended up in tears" and was afraid to go to the parking lot after work because she is Hispanic.

Angela Mendoza, an instructor at a Tomball beauty academy off FM 249, said she has started carrying her U.S. passport in her purse since the controversy started brewing earlier this summer. Mendoza, a naturalized citizen from Honduras, said she was talking with co-workers Wednesday morning about feeling uncomfortable in Tomball just because of "the color of my skin."

She said she senses stares when she walks through the local H-E-B, particularly if she's speaking Spanish.

"I think it's getting worse," she said. "I don't understand. I don't know if it's just the way people have been raised here. It's hard. It's really hard."

Rogelio Najera, a 52-year-old illegal immigrant from Guerrero, Mexico, said the push to shut down the day labor center has resulted in fewer employers coming to look for workers there. Najera, one of 11 men at the center Wednesday afternoon, said he's noticed that some white men who park near the center are jotting down the license plates of people who hire them.

On Wednesday morning, he said only three trucks pulled up looking for workers.

"Some of the men here haven't had any work for months," he said, attributing the drop in work opportunities to the poor economy and to the efforts of "racists" working locally to shut the center down.

Fears of 'Little Mexico'
Pastor Richard Brown, a newly elected City Council member, said most constituents he heard from on the day labor issue wanted the center to remain open. The site, near Sycamore and Main streets, was opened about a decade ago to give the workers a place to gather off the town's main drag.

"That may not be a perfect solution, but it's been a good one for Tomball," Brown said.

Brown said he researched a housing ban for illegal immigrants that was passed in the Dallas suburb of Farmers Branch in 2006, and saw that the legal fees ran to millions of dollars. "They are spending a lot of time and a lot of money and not getting anywhere with that," he said. "For us to go down that path, I think, is ill-advised."

Some locals have suggested that much of the fervor over the day labor site and the related illegal immigration ordinances was stirred up by people who live outside Tomball, although Townsend insisted he acted on his own.

Townsend said his concerns about the impact of illegal immigration span from the school system to the economy to rumblings among constituents that the city's Main Street has become "a Little Mexico" because of the prevalence of Mexican butcher shops and taco trucks.

"I've been called a racist and a Nazi," he said. "It has nothing to do with race. It has everything to do with what's legal and what's illegal."

http://www.chron.com/disp/story.mpl/met ... 92210.html