Thread: Mayor Orders City Agencies To Crack Down On Church Housing Illegal Alien

Mayor Orders City Agencies To Crack Down On Church Housing Undocumented Immigrant

By PAUL TUTHILL • 22 HOURS AGO

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  Springfield Mayor Domenic Sarno spoke with reporters the day after activists said a Springfield church had given sanctuary to an undocumented immigrant.
  

The mayor of Springfield, Massachusetts is threatening the tax-exempt status of a church because an undocumented immigrant is being sheltered there.

The clash between Mayor Domenic Sarno and immigration-rights activists had been brewing for some time.

Since last year, Sarno had insisted Springfield would not join the list of cities unwilling to cooperate with federal immigration authorities and the new enforcement efforts under the Trump administration.

"We are not a sanctuary city. Period. And I am not going to become a sanctuary city" Sarno stated last year.

Last June when members of the Springfield Interfaith Sanctuary Coalition announced that the South Congregational United Church of Christ would be prepared to house people facing imminent deportation, Sarno warned that such an arrangement would violate building, housing, and sanitary codes.

So it was not surprising when the mayor reacted sharply to the announcement by coalition members this week that a Springfield woman facing deportation to Peru and separation from her American-born children and husband had taken up residence inside the church.

" The church has done this in defiance of the edict that we are not a sanctuary city," Sarno said'

In addition to ordering the city’s inspectional services to check out the church property, Sarno also targeted the church’s exemption from paying city property taxes.

" Legally I am going to have it reviewed and if they are going to continue to do this they could be under the specter of a taxable property," Sarno said.

Speaking with reporters, Sarno referenced his parents, who emigrated from Italy, and called on the federal government to “make some decisions” about legal immigration.

" I hear from a lot of immigrants that they played by the rules and followed all the laws and requirements to come to our beautiful America," said Sarno. " You have to send a message that there is a pathway to American citizenship. That is absolutely key."

Rev. Tom Gerstenlauer, the senior minister at South Congregational, said the decision to offer the church as a place of sanctuary was not motivated by politics.

"Our faith calls upon us to love our neighbor and welcome the stranger among us," said Gerstenlaur. " Our sense of vigilance is heightened during this most holy week on the Christian calender. We must and we will persist in faith."

He said the woman who has taken refuge in the church, whom activists have asked be identified only as Gisella, can stay for as long as it takes for her to obtain legal residency in the United States.

Tara Parrish, director of the Pioneer Valley Project, said preparations have been made for Gisella to live in the church along with her children, ages 10 and 4.

" Our coalition has formed teams, so they have taken on different pieces of responsibility related to insuring care for the whole family and their needs," said Parrish.

South Congregational is the second church in western Massachusetts where an undocumented immigrant has taken up residence. Lucio Perez has been living in the First Congregational Church in Amherst since last October.

Sarno has been an outlier among Democratic mayors in Massachusetts when it comes to the immigration debate. Mayors in places including Boston, Worcester, Northampton, and Holyoke, have openly defied the Trump administration’s threats to punish sanctuary cities.

Boston Mayor Martin Welch has gone so far as to say he would use City Hall as a sanctuary for undocumented immigrants.

Springfield City Councilor Adam Gomez, who is a candidate for State Senate, said in a press release that many people he knows have started referring to Sarno as “Mayor Trump.”

http://wamc.org/post/mayor-orders-ci...nted-immigrant

IT IS ABOUT TIME!!!

CHURCHES ARE NOT ABOVE THE LAW...THEY ARE SUBJECT TO THE SAME LAWS WE ARE!

YANK THE TAX-EXCEMPT STATUS FOR ALL CHURCHES!

THEY NEED TO PAY UP BILLIONS INTO THE COFFER! PAY FOR OUR ROADS, BRIDGES, WELFARE, FOOD STAMPS, MEDICAID, ALL OF IT LIKE WE DO!

Where's Trump, Secretary Kirstjen (DHS) and Director Homan (ICE) on this? The Trump administration is lambasting California for being a sanctuary state, yet all we hear are crickets when it comes to the many churches throughout the United States that are acting as sanctuaries for illegal aliens!

Our government shouldn't be picking and choosing who does and doesn't get to provide sanctuary for illegal aliens. ENFORCE THE LAW, NO EXCEPTIONS!

5 hrs ago
Aaron Colen

The Springfield, Massachusetts, City Council has blocked Mayor Domenic Sarno’s attempts to punish a local church that is providing sanctuary to an illegal immigrant against his orders, WNPR-TV reported Tuesday.

Gisella Collazo, a Peruvian immigrant facing deportation, has been living at South Congregational Church for more than two weeks along with her two children, who were born in the U.S.

Sarno has made it clear in the past: Springfield is not a sanctuary city.

So when he found out South Congregational Church was shielding an illegal immigrant from deportation, he sought out any legal options he could to punish the church.

“Please re-inspect the property in question for illegal housing aspects,” Sarno wrote in an email to city staff. “Also, please start the review process to strip them of their tax-exempt status. Please again pursue to the fullest extent of the law. Thank you and God Bless.”

According to the Boston Globe, the church recently passed an inspection, but the city found only “minor violations” such as a broken door lock and a window that needed repair.

What did the City Council do?
The Springfield City Council unanimously passed an order Monday night preventing the city from interfering with religious institutions that give sanctuary to illegal immigrants.

One councilor, Michael Fenton, called the mayor’s efforts to punish the church “executive overreach.” Another, Adam Gomez, criticized Sarno for using city resources to attack a church.

“This, right here, you’re attacking a church,” Gomez said during last week’s inspection. “We could use those resources on other buildings, other blighted property that are really run down and making our community look deplorable.”

South Congregational Church, like other churches in the past, is taking advantage of the fact that immigration authorities usually avoid taking people into custody in houses of worship, although they technically have the legal authority to do so.

https://www.theblaze.com/news/2018/0...egal-immigrant

CHURCHES ARE NOT ABOVE THE LAW

ICE NEEDS TO GO IN AND REMOVE THIS ILLEGAL AND DEPORT HIM!

It's far more than providing "sanctuary". These churches take their money they earn illegally through illegal employment and illegal enterprises. That money is dirty and the churches solicit for it and take it and in return provide networking, protection, advocacy and sanctuary. It's racketeering. RICO.