Nashville accepts immigration detention deal
If finalized, Metro would hold fewer immigrants in jail
By Janell Ross
October 9, 2009

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Davidson County Sheriff Daron Hall spent much of the summer warning that his office might drop a federal immigration enforcement program because of changes that would have kept case details under wraps.



Now, Hall and a Metro attorney working with the sheriff's office say they have reached an agreement with federal officials from U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement over how to handle requests for information. That means the controversial immigration program known as 287(g) probably will continue in Nashville, though with limitations on the number of people who will be detained.

That scaled-back version of the program — originally passed under the Bush administration in an atmosphere highly charged over immigration — also would mean less revenue for the Metro General Fund going forward.

In June, the federal agency issued a directive calling for local law enforcement agencies participating in the 287(g) program to stop holding individuals arrested for all but the most serious crimes after they served time on state charges.

Before the policy change, Davidson County was reimbursed $61 for each day individuals were held in Nashville awaiting pickup by federal immigration authorities, often for a few days at a time.

The cost of housing an inmate in the Davidson County jail ranges from a low of $25 a day for inmates in a work release program to $100 a day for high-security inmates with health problems. The cost of housing most of the inmates detained on immigration matters falls somewhere in between, said Karla Weikal, a Davidson County Sheriff's Office spokeswoman.

Overall, Hall expects to see about 30 percent fewer inmates held in the jail on suspected immigration violations, leading to a corresponding decrease in the amount of reimbursements from ICE.

That drop in revenue — from $818,986 in fiscal year 2008-2009 to an estimated $573,290 this fiscal year — is one that Hall says was fully anticipated and doesn't change the fact that 287(g) has been an effective program that has reduced crime in Nashville.


"This program was never about money; it's not something on which we depend. So that's not a problem," Hall said Thursday.



It's been a year of change for the 287(g) program.

In March, a U.S. General Accounting Office report said enforcement programs such as Nashville's, which screened all foreign-born individuals rather than those accused or convicted of serious crimes, led the 287(g) program to fall short of its goal.

A Tennessean investigation last year showed that of the roughly 3,000 people deported during the program's first year, about 81 percent were charged with misdemeanors. About half were caught during traffic stops.

Hall said that federal officials have repeatedly described the Nashville 287(g) program as a "model" operation and have not requested additional changes to the way the Nashville program operates in the new contract. Federally trained Davidson County sheriff's deputies will continue screening all foreign-born individuals brought to the Davidson County jail. Hall had objected to sections of a proposed new agreement with ICE dealing with public access to information about details of individual cases.

"I think we need to be prepared to show the public whenever possible what the program is doing, who it is identifying and just how much crime it is preventing in this county," Hall said. "I think openness and honesty and access to information is always a good policy with only a few law-enforcement-related exceptions."

Lawyer disputes claim
Elliott Ozment, a Nashville immigration attorney and one-time member of the sheriff's 287(g) community advisory board, who was removed by Hall, also has expressed concerns about closing information about the program from public review. Ozment fears that the inability to access public information could put detained individuals at risk and make it harder for families to track their whereabouts.

Ozment disagrees with Hall's assessment that the number of deportations has reduced crime in Nashville, because some of the people arrested were brought to the jail on charges such as fishing without a license or in many cases driving without a license.


"He wants more transparency so that he can continue to issue press releases about the accomplishments as he sees it of Nashville's 287(g) program," Ozment said. "I think this summer when it looked like (Hall) wasn't going to get the political glory or generate much revenue he thought he wanted out altogether."



Hall says that his reasons for considering a withdrawal from the program were limited to the issue of public access to information.

Earlier this week, Department of Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano announced plans to change the way that illegal immigrants awaiting deportation are confined.

Instead of nonviolent, noncriminal immigrants being housed in local jails, individuals and families ordered deported by an immigration court or awaiting a court's decision on a special visa or asylum claim would be housed in former hotels, nursing homes and other sites.

The alternative sites are intended to cut the costs of detaining immigrants, which reached nearly $2 billion in 2008.

Immigration and Customs Enforcement, the division of the Department of Homeland Security that administers the 287(g) program, will submit to Congress in coming weeks a plan for using alternatives to detention. The agency says possible alternatives will cost only about $14 a day. The alternatives include electronic ankle bracelets for those released on their own recognizance.

Before the new 287(g) agreement can be finalized, the contract will have to be approved by the Metro Council and Immigration and Customs Enforcement.


http://www.tennessean.com/article/20091 ... /1001/NEWS