Santa Barbara Police Chief Sanchez: No grace period for drivers without licenses

By Kyle Rokes

January 8, 2011

Despite pressure from a prominent activist group, the city of Santa Barbara has decided not to allow a grace period before towing the cars of people driving without licenses.

Last summer a local activist and PUEBLO called upon Police Chief Cam Sanchez to consider a grace period. They claimed that illegal immigrants were being unfairly targeted, and that sobriety checkpoints were often fronts for finding and towing the cars of illegal immigrants without licenses.

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'You won’t find a constituency in town that says ‘let’s enable illegal behavior.' The only people who would consider doing that are the people at PUEBLO.'

--Santa Barbara City Councilman Dale Francisco

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Sanchez considered the idea of a grace period, but decided to scrap the idea.

The decision has thrilled some elected officials, but further fanned the tension between PUEBLO and some city officials.

“You won’t find a constituency in town that says ‘let’s enable illegal behavior,â€