Restaurant executive promoting immigration coalition
Story Discussion BY ART HOVEY / Posted: Friday, September 18, 2009 4:30 am | (3) Comments

Over a long career that he ended as a rear admiral, Jim Partington heard the deafening roar of Navy jets off the coast of Vietnam.

Now the executive director of the Nebraska Restaurant Association is listening to the debate over immigration reform and finding it almost as overpowering.

"I think the level of noise has just gotten too high," he told a League of Women Voters audience in Lincoln on Thursday.

Partington would like to lower the volume. He also has a more specific goal: He wants to form a Nebraska coalition of business leaders, academics and others to counter the emotion surrounding immigration reform.

It's important to understand the pros and cons, he told about 50 luncheon listeners, "but at least let's get a rationale debate going."

"If we don't want immigration, we're going to have a stagnant economy."

From a Nebraska perspective, 50 percent of the population growth from 2000 to 2008 was of Hispanic origin. And demographics translate to economic development.

In a more practical vein, he conceded that a highly restrictive version of immigration reform "would affect the restaurant industry quite severely."

In an interview after his hour-long presentation, Partington readily acknowledged the coalition isn't a reality yet.

Nor does he have a specific endorsement from members of the association at either the state or national level to promote such goals as increasing the number of visas for legal immigration or creating a national identification card.

"They are very interested in comprehensive immigration reform," he said.

At the state level, "I expect to reach that point" of a coalition within in a year. He wants it to be one that emphasizes education over political lobbying.

When the time came for questions after Partington's remarks, it seemed apparent there's no such thing as an audience without reservations about where immigration reform might go.

Deb Andrews, who's back in Lincoln after living in Portland, Ore., for several years, said she found it "very disconcerting" to see Hispanic demonstrators waving Mexican flags during a reform rally in Portland.

Diana McNeil clearly had misgivings about penalty-free amnesty for 12 million or more people already living in the United States without legal status.

"If I broke the law," McNeil said, "I would have to answer for that.

"I don't think you can ever get it away from being political, because it is political."

Partington said reform should include some sort of penalty for illegal entry.

However, "it shouldn't be too onerous and we shouldn't be sending them back to their country of origin."

When it comes to rational debate, he said, "we should take this out of the realm of politicians who use it as a wedge issue against each other."

Securing borders is an important part of that debate, Partington said, but he sees making that the top priority as the politically correct approach.

"The truth is if we don't have a legal way for people to come across the border. ... We're not going to get control of our international borders."

Another sign of strong and conflicting feelings about immigration in Nebraska is an ongoing battle over a proposed ordinance in Fremont that failed by one vote at a City Council meeting last year.

As summarized Thursday by City Administrator Bob Hartwig, the failed ordinance "relates to harboring, hiring or renting to illegal aliens."

It is now before the Nebraska Court of Appeals.

Hartwig isn't sure what would happen next, regardless of how the court rules.

"Anything is possible now," he said. "I wouldn't even try to give options for the future."

Reach Art Hovey at ahovey@journalstar.com.




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