Immigration rules may lack funds
Labor agency says budget doesn't provide enough for full enforcement
By Tim Smith • STAFF WRITER • April 25, 2009

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COLUMBIA -- The director of the state agency responsible for enforcing South Carolina's mammoth new immigration law says her department doesn't have the money needed to fully enforce it.



Adrienne Youmans, director of the state Department of Labor, Licensing and Regulation, wrote a four-page letter to Sen. Larry Martin of Pickens on Friday explaining that while her agency can provide a "scaled-back start-up" of immigration enforcement this summer, it won't have the funds necessary to prepare for full enforcement under the budget now being debated.

The Legislature passed the law last year, with some lawmakers boasting that it was the toughest in the nation. Part of the new law requires each business in the state to verify the legal status of each new worker. LLR is to begin enforcing the law with large businesses this summer and small businesses the summer of 2010.

Sen. Tom Davis of Beaufort told the Senate on Wednesday during budget debate that LLR, under the Senate Finance Committee plan, wouldn't be able to enforce the law because it didn't have enough money.

But Martin, one of the leaders in last year's immigration debate, assured the Senate on Thursday that wasn't true, saying he had been told by staff that enforcement was paid for through the agency's carry-forward funds.

Youmans wrote to Martin that while the agency has $38 million in carry-forward money, the money is committed for other uses.

She wrote that 20 percent of the fund, for instance, is used for fire and life safety services, such as those being used to fight the wildfires in Horry County. The majority of the money is the result of licensing fees, which are issued once every two years, she said, and must pay for services over that two-year period.

This year, legislators want to take $13 million from the carry-forward fund, she wrote, $4.3 million of which would go to fund cultural agencies.

"Any additional cuts will jeopardize the OSHA (Occupational Safety and Health Administration) state plan, affect services provided by the Division of Fire and Life Safety, and limit the implementation of the Illegal Immigration Act," she wrote. "We will be left with no alternative but to consider increases in licensing fees."

She said her agency already is facing the prospect that licensing fees, particularly those in real estate, may dip in the coming year because of the economy.

LLR was assured last year when lawmakers passed the immigration law that enforcement would be "fully funded," she wrote. While the agency might have been able to provide the $2 million cost of preparing for full enforcement, that was before legislators carved out money from the carry-forward fund, she said.

"If the General Assembly cannot fully fund implementation of the Illegal Immigration Act in this budget, we will not be prepared to meet the July 1, 2010 date for the enforcement of the law statewide," she wrote.

To prepare, Youmans wrote that the agency needs in the upcoming fiscal year to hire eight temporary full-time employees, plus about 40 investigative and support staff to cover all 46 counties. She said she wants to begin training all the staff next March.

The agency also plans to outsource auditing of businesses. The outsourcing is necessary, she wrote, because even if the agency only audits 10 percent of businesses annually for compliance with the law, that amounts to 12,000 companies.

Legislators had said they hoped the program could become self-sustaining through the collection of fines under the new law, but Youmans doused that idea.

"Generally, fines collected are not sufficient to fund programs and are not received in a consistent enough manner to be useful," she wrote, adding that it has been deemed "unethical" for an agency to keep fines it generates because "it gives the appearance that fines are being issued, not because the law has been broken, but because the agency needs money to operate."

Martin said before he read the letter that he was surprised that Youmans didn't have the money she needed after what he had been told by Senate Finance Committee staff. He said after reading the letter that he plans to do what he can to find extra dollars in the budget to provide the "cushion" Youman needs.

"That program needs to be funded," he said, "and it would be a huge diappointment to all of us if it's not."

Davis said he also plans to work on making sure the $2 million is provided, saying that his alternative budget plan includes the money.


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