Thread: Beaufort County Council works to limit illegal workers

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County Council works to limit illegal workers
Published Tuesday October 3 2006
By JEREMY HSIEH
The Beaufort Gazette
Beaufort County's latest -- and simplified -- approach to dealing with the area's illegal immigrants exclusively targets their employers, though potholes plague the process.

County Attorney Kelly Golden presented a draft amendment of the county's business license ordinance to the County Council's Community Services and Public Safety Committee on Monday. The amendment makes the county's business license office a clearinghouse for complaints about illegally employed workers and uses three-day and 20-day business license suspensions as penalties for businesses with illegal workers.

The plan replaces a draft ordinance distributed Friday that had dealt with harboring illegal immigrants, a section that was cut out to simplify the vetting process.

"We're not trying to enforce federal immigration law," said committee Vice Chairwoman Starletta Hairston, who had informally presented the previous draft to the council on Sept. 11. "This is about business."

The committee did not formally vote on the new draft, which Golden still described as a "very, very rough draft" but scrutinized it for potential pitfalls and legal viability.

Immigration control is unquestionably under the federal government's jurisdiction, Golden said, though there are "carrot-and-stick" approaches states and municipalities have started to use to address illegal immigration where the federal government has failed.

"If you can't go across the mountain, how can we go around the mountain?" committee Chairman Bill McBride asked rhetorically.

The carrot in the latest draft is a business owner's voluntary enrollment in the federal Basic Pilot Program, which verifies Social Security numbers and checks an employee's status with the Department of Homeland Security. Businesses must enroll in the program to be eligible for county grants and contracts of more than $10,000. Businesses enrolled in the program will not be subject to license suspensions under the county amendment for violations that follow verification under the program.

The stick is the county's right to suspend business licenses.

The dropped portion of the old draft that attacked illegal immigrants literally where they live required the creation of a county rental permitting process. It also blurred lines between the federal and county jurisdiction, making the ordinance more open to a legal attack.

Committee member Mark Generales said he anticipates in any case that the American Civil Liberties Union or Hispanic organizations will sue. To counter costly litigation, Generales said the staff should "craft the best language possible" in the ordinance.

Golden cited several similar laws that have been challenged with lawsuits, including California's Proposition 187 and the Illegal Immigration Relief Act of Hazleton, Pa., from which Hairston borrowed much of the language for the county's amendment.

Councilmen Dick Stewart and Frank Brafman pointed out another problem in that the burden to prove a worker's immigration status is on the county in some parts of the amendment but on the employer in other parts. It also is unclear how the county will make the leap from taking a phony Social Security number flagged by the Basic Pilot Program to illegal immigrant status.

McBride asked the committee to submit questions and concerns about the amendment to Golden. The committee will revisit the issue again at its next meeting.

"Is the consensus to move forward with this?" McBride asked to close the meeting.

"With haste," Hairston added, as the committee members nodded.

According to the U.S. Census, 27 percent of the county's population growth between 2000 and 2005 was Hispanic or Latino. The Census Bureau does not ask about migrant status, though its Web site states, "We expect that unauthorized migrants were included among people who indicated that the United States was their usual place of residence on the survey date."

County Administrator Gary Kubic noted that he would make the plan's draft and other relevant materials available at the county's Web site, bcgov.net.

"Is the consensus to move forward with this?" McBride asked to close the meeting.

"With haste," Hairston added, as the committee members nodded.

GO BEAUFORT, SOUTH CAROLINA!!!

"With haste"

Classic America.

Lets GO AMERICA!!

You can do this and you must "with haste".

Join us.......SEND MAIL!!
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