Thread: S.C.: Pickens moves toward crackdown on illegal immigrants

July 21, 2008


Pickens moves toward crackdown on illegal immigrants

By Julie Howle
STAFF WRITER

Companies that employ illegal immigrants would be banned from doing business with Pickens County under a proposal that took a step forward Monday night.

Pickens County Council voted 5-1 to approve the ordinance, leaving it one affirmative vote from becoming law.

The law would make English the county’s official language and require sheriff’s deputies to make a reasonable attempt to check the residency status of everyone booked into the Pickens County Detention Center.

Councilman Ben Trotter, who supports the law, said illegal aliens take millions of dollars out of the economy every year.

"Our welfare department is giving them food stamps, all the medical attention they need," Trotter said. "We have senior citizens that cannot get some of this help."

The sole dissenter, Councilman Jim London, said he would support a law that "reflects what’s happening at the state and federal level."

"I think what we want to do is be a little bit careful in terms of the tone of what we do," he said. "I still have a hang-up with the phrase in there that English is the official language."

If given final approval, the ordinance would require county vendors to certify that they "do not knowingly recruit, hire or employ" anyone who is an unauthorized alien and would require businesses to verify their employees’ status with a Web-based program.

Violators would be barred from doing business with the county for three years.

The ordinance would also require that county business be conducted in English, except in emergencies or to protect due process.

Assistant Sheriff Tim Morgan commended the action and said it’s a positive step. "If there’s not gainful employment, they’ll go elsewhere," he said.

The ordinance also says that agencies that receive county discretionary funding wouldn’t be able to knowingly employ or provide assistance to unauthorized aliens, except to protect civil liberties or provide emergency services. Violators couldn’t request county money for three years.

www.greenvilleonline.com

Pickens County tries to block hiring of illegal aliens
By Vince Jackson/Special to the Independent-Mail
Monday, July 21, 2008



PICKENS — The Pickens County Council voted 5-1 Monday night to adopt an ordinance that would regulate employment by “unauthorized aliensâ€

Thompson praises Pickens’ effort to crack down on illegals

By Greg Oliver (Contact / Staff Bio)
July 24, 2008 - 12:05 a.m. EST


PICKENS — Clemson City Council member Margaret Thompson, one of the leading proponents for tougher legislation to address the influx of illegal immigrants, praised Pickens County Council for taking a stand on the issue earlier this week.

On Monday night, county council voted 5-1 to approve the second and final reading of an ordinance banning companies from conducting business with Pickens if they employ illegal immigrants.

The ordinance also would make English the official language in Pickens and require deputies to make a reasonable attempt to check the residency status of individuals booked into the Pickens County Detention Center.

Thompson, who attended the meeting, said council, at her request, also agreed to use the E-Verify system. The system requires employers to submit every new employee to a federal government database system for a background check.

“I said to make the ordinance fair across the board and ensure that no one is being discriminated against, the E-Verify must be used,â€

ws Posted on Thu, Jul. 24, 2008reprint or license print email Sheriff proposes tent jail to ease overcrowding
BEAUFORT -- A compound on county-owned property complete with razor wire, chain-link fencing, canvas tents and portable showers and toilets dubbed "Camp Beaufort" may be the county's best chance to alleviate crowding in the Beaufort County Detention Center, Sheriff P.J. Tanner said.

New immigration-related legislation from the state and Beaufort County, coupled with the promise of additional immigration enforcement from the Beaufort County Sheriff's Office, stands to put more pressure on a jail already exceeding its capacity by more than 150 inmates.

With countywide audits under way to verify federally required employee records, a state law cracking down on businesses that willingly hire illegal immigrants,and five new Sheriff's Office Immigrations and Customs Enforcement agents expected to generate "hundreds" of immigration cases weekly, the number of inmates is expected to soar.

"We're not going to stop putting people in jail, so we've got to look at some modifications here," Tanner said. "You can't build a jail any time soon that will handle this problem, so we're looking at the possibility of taking some county property, and we're probably going to have to create Camp Beaufort."

Just since July 12, more than 35 foreign-born nationals have been detained at the Beaufort County Detention Center on a variety of charges -- none felonies -- and Tanner estimates that as many as 100 illegal immigrants were being held at the detention center awaiting deportation.

Tanner said county officials need to determine whether such a facility would meet S.C. Department of Corrections standards before pricing the project or looking at county property that could be used as a temporary holding facility.

"It's a temporary fix to a problem that must be dealt with," he said. "The overflow at the jail consists of not just foreign-born illegals. We've got weekend warriors, we've got deadbeat dads taking up bed space, we've got foreign-born illegals that are on detainer, and then we've got the general population that are waiting to be tried."

While the county is "exploring every available option" to alleviate the crowded jail, a site for Camp Beaufort has not been identified, said Phil Foot, director of the Beaufort County Detention Center.

"We've got to look at where the county has property and where we have the infrastructure to support something like this," he said. "You can't just throw up some tents and some fences. You've got to deal with feeding the inmates, security, and staffing levels, and all of these other things. It's not an easy decision."

Foot estimated that a realistic capacity for prison camp would be between 50 and 100 inmates.

A tent city is just one of the concepts that the county is looking at to relieve crowding at the detention center, said Weston Newton, chairman of the Beaufort County Council.

"We are looking at the possibility of some temporary misdemeanor-type facility, which would all have to be certified by the state," he said. "Clearly, we have issues at the jail and we're exploring a lot of long-term and short-term ways to deal with those issues and we are looking at a temporary facility as one of the possible short-term solutions.

"It's nothing more than a concept right now," he said.

The conceptualized Camp Beaufort closely resembles a tent city built by Sheriff Joe Arpaio in Maricopa County, Ariz., in 1993 to handle overflow from a county jail. The Maricopa County inmates must wear pink underwear and sleep in canvas tents in remote parts of the Arizona desert.

Arpaio's controversial policies have drawn the ire of the American Civil Liberties Union and other civil rights groups that claim the way in which he houses inmates is inhumane.

Tanner said a minimum-security tent city in Beaufort is not an imitation of Arpaio's practices.

"We're not copying Sheriff Arpaio in Arizona," he said. "If we can meet the minimum standards from the Department of Corrections on temporary holding, and it can be done in a tent city-type thing, a Guantanamo Bay-type setting, then that's what we'll do."

-- The Beaufort Gazette



http://www.thestate.com/breaking/story/470040.html

Pickens moves toward crackdown on illegal immigrants

Thats wonderful news! I like to see towns clamp down on illegal aliens!

But I thought the headline meant T. Boone Pickens moves toward crackdown on illegal immigrants.

I like his energy plan though. And it will give Americans alot of employment opportunities.