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Ordinance targets Covington illegals

By Kevin Eigelbach
Post staff reporter

On Wednesday, a Boone County, Ky., judge sentenced an illegal Honduran immigrant to 30 years in prison for raping a 9-year-old girl.

In court, defendant Angel Juarez went on a tirade about his innocence and suggested he was singled out because of his ethnicity.

He also admonished the United States and the government, incoming Covington City Commission Member Steve Megerle said.

It was a good example of the disrespect illegal aliens have for this country, Megerle said.

When he takes office in January, Megerle plans to push for a Covington city ordinance that would address the problem of illegal immigrants.

He wants to see employers who knowingly employ illegals and landlords who knowingly rent to them lose their licenses to do business in the city.
At a meeting earlier this week, the commission gave first reading to an ordinance that would make that happen.

The ordinance would also make knowingly hiring or renting to an illegal a Class B misdemeanor, punishable by 90 days in jail and a $250 fine.

To become law, the commission would have to give a second reading to the ordinance and vote to approve it.

City Manager Jay Fossett said he would recommend the commission table the measure until he can research the matter further.

A similar ordinance in Hazleton, Penn., is tied up in litigation at the moment, he said.

"We're monitoring that to see what happens," he said.

But Megerle said he would make sure the ordinance does get a second reading. He thinks the city would prevail in a legal fight, and wouldn't mind if it forced the U.S. Supreme Court to clarify the issue.

"I agree with Commissioner (Rob) Sanders that this has reached epidemic proportions, and we're getting no help from the federal government in enforcing immigration laws," he said.

Sanders said government has ignored the issue "for so long, we've got a monster on our hands now."

Sanders plans to step down from the commission at the end of the year to become commonwealth's attorney for Kenton County. He introduced the ordinance as a favor to Megerle, who raised the issue in his campaign this fall.

Sanders said he does a lot of ride-alongs with Covington police officers, and has found an ever-increasing problem with illegals.

"Rarely do they speak English," he said.

Dealing with them ties up police officers and poses problems for ambulance drivers because of the language barrier, he said.

There's also a fairness issue, he said.

"It's not fair to the taxpaying residents and business owners in this town for someone to be here and consume our city services without paying their fair share (of taxes) like the rest of us do," Sanders said.

In a time of tight budgets, the city must squeeze every penny it has, he said.

Megerle doesn't have a problem with immigrants here legally, he said.

But Gilberto Esparza, an Hispanic businessman and member of the Covington Human Rights Commission, said he fears the ordinance would also hurt legal immigrants.

Rather than take a chance they might get prosecuted for hiring illegals, employers would chose not to employ anyone who looks like he might be an illegal - namely, someone who looks Hispanic.

That's the ethnicity most people think of when they hear the words "illegal alien," Esparza said.

"We're the newcomers. We stick out like sore thumbs."

The ordinance would come as something of a slap in the face to local Hispanics, who have pumped money into the city and revitalized some of its depressed areas, he said.

"We're not embracing the change that's revitalizing communities like Lower Price Hill," he said.

There, landlords are renting buildings that have stayed empty forever, he said.

If the commissioners are concerned about balancing the city budget, they should do something about the costs of providing pensions to former employees, he said.

And if they would check the city's arrest records, they would learn that Hispanics are not the troublemakers, he said.

"There are more people on welfare in that city and people at risk in that city, and it's not the Hispanics that are causing this," he said.



Publication date: 12-16-2006