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Towns look to mirror Elsmere
Increase in out-of-state tags moves Marydel, Md., to consider law
By SUMMER HARLOW, The News Journal

Posted Saturday, September 30, 2006

MARYDEL, Md. -- Jose Morales has Pennsylvania license plates. But he's never lived there. With only a Guatemalan driver's license, he said, it was easier to get Pennsylvania tags when he came to the U.S. two years ago.

"I tried to get plates in Maryland, but I didn't have the documents," said Morales, who immigrated illegally with his wife to this area on the Delaware border, just 13 miles west of Dover.

Many immigrants who came to the Delaware/Maryland area illegally say it's easier for them to register cars in Pennsylvania -- which some say has resulted in more vehicles with out-of-state plates driving in Delaware and Maryland.

To crack down on drivers who don't register their cars within the 60-day grace period, Marydel is considering a law that would allow officers to ticket parked cars with out-of-state plates if owners have been in the state for more than 60 days. It would mirror a law Elsmere put into place two weeks ago. The town uses a database to track residents who have not registered their vehicles.

Opponents argue the law is racial profiling because it targets Latino immigrants -- all of the 15 tickets Elsmere police issued in the first week were for cars parked near the mostly Latino Fenwick Park Apartments.

The concern over out-of-state plates in the towns of Elsmere and Marydel illustrates how close to home the national immigration debate has come.

With an estimated 12 million undocumented immigrants in the U.S., according to U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, immigration has become a political hot button, fueling Congress to move closer to approving legislation that would build a 700-mile border fence.

It has also spurred towns nationwide to pass their own ordinances to address immigration.

In Elsmere, Republican Councilman John Jaremchuk, who proposed the vehicle registration ordinance, said the law was a local way to address illegal immigration.

The non-partisan Pew Hispanic Center estimates there are no more than 35,000 undocumented immigrants living in Delaware.

Marydel Commission President Debbie Rowe said she would like to see a law similar to Elsmere's enacted throughout Caroline County in Maryland.

"When you move from one place to another, you have to follow the laws of the land of the place where you are," Rowe said. "It's very disheartening when everyone wants to talk about profiling this or profiling that, because everybody should abide by the same rule -- it shouldn't matter your race, culture, color or beliefs."

Rowe said she doesn't know how many undocumented immigrants live in Marydel or the surrounding area, but she speculated that 80 percent or more of tenants in the nearby Cedar Mobile Home Park are Latino immigrants. Most cars parked along the main drag of the mobile-home park had out-of-state license plates -- Pennsylvania, Tennesee, even Guatemala.

"We are highly densely populated with immigrants," Rowe said. "One would assume if they were legal, they would go get Maryland tags."

Caroline County Sheriff Philip Brown said that more immigrants are coming to Maryland and Delaware because of numerous opportunities in poultry, farming and landscaping industries.

Brown said he has not spoken with Rowe about Elsmere's ordinance, and he's unsure whether the county could issue parking citations because it would be difficult to determine how long the car's owner had lived in Maryland, or if they were exempt for being in the military.

But out-of-state plates are a big problem, he said.

"Twenty-five years ago, they were mostly from Delaware," he said. "Now they're Pennsylvania, and some West Virginia. ... [Illegal immigration] is not just a Marydel or Caroline County or Maryland problem -- it's a U.S. problem."

Enforcement no easy task

Delaware and Maryland require new residents to register their vehicles within 60 days of moving to the state.

Delaware State Police issue tickets for out-of-state license plates only after they've stopped a vehicle for another reason, said Sgt. Melissa Zebley, state police public information officer.

In 2004, 45 tickets were issued for failing to register vehicles in Delaware, Zebley said. In 2005, that number increased to 85. Through July, 69 tickets were issued for out-of-state tags.

The difference with the new Elsmere law is that parked cars can be ticketed. At least 25 tickets were issued in Elsmere in the past two weeks, according to town police.

With an estimated 50,000 people moving into Delaware each year, and with the costs associated with registering a vehicle, it's no wonder so many drivers keep their out-of-state license plates more than 60 days, said Edward Ratledge, director of the University of Delaware's Center for Applied Demography and Survey Research.

Zebley said she did not know how often Delaware State Police have contacted immigration officials after pulling someone over for a traffic violation.

Brown said the sheriff's department has contacted U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement in the past, but without results.

"Generally, if they haven't committed a felony, immigration isn't going to do anything," he said.

There is no federal law requiring local police officers to call immigration officers when they encounter illegal immigrants, said Dean Boyd, ICE spokesman.

"Many jurisdictions prohibit them from contacting us. ... It's a controversial issue," he said.

He said immigration officials would need more evidence than just an out-of-state license plate to arrest and deport someone for illegal immigration.

"If we make an arrest, we have to be able to verify those actions in court," he said.

Boyd said he did not have information on the number of deportees from Delaware. However, nationwide in 2005, more than 168,000 undocumented immigrants were deported. So far this year, more than 168,000 have been deported nationwide, Boyd said.

Getting tags no hassle

When immigrants don't have the documents they need to get license plates in Delaware or Maryland, observers say, they often turn to Pennsylvania.

Although Pennsylvania, like Delaware and Maryland, now requires valid state identification to register a vehicle, drivers don't actually have to go to the state motor-vehicle division to register their cars, making it easier for illegal immigrants to get tags, some say.

Entire businesses are dedicated to auto-tag service in Pennsylvania. Even AAA offers vehicle registration.

"We have issuing agents, many of whom are great, honest people," said Claudine Battisti, spokesperson for the Pennsylvania Department of Transportation.

While it's rare for agents to issue fraudulent vehicle registrations, it does happen, she said.

But it's not just issuing agents who can get involved in fraud.

Earlier this month in Maryland, a federal grand jury indicted a motor-vehicle employee and four accomplices suspected of selling illegal Maryland driver's licenses, according to an Immigration and Customs Enforcement news release.

Also, undocumented immigrants sometimes have friends or family members, who are here legally, register their cars for them.

Finding a solution

Unlike Jaremchuk, Rowe said she doesn't see an anti-out-of-state tags offensive as a way to rid her town of illegal immigrants.

But if she has to comply with the law, she thinks everyone should, too, she said.

Kamran Chishty, who owns the Main St. Market in Marydel, said law-abiding citizens are discriminated against when drivers with out-of-state tags are allowed to get away with breaking the law.

But an onslaught of tickets written for out-of-state plates is not the answer, he said.

"They're going to keep coming, so this is something we have to live with," said Chishty, whose family immigrated legally from India more than 10 years ago. "Something more needs to be done. We need to give them IDs and legitimate papers so they can do the right thing, get on the right track. When they don't have papers, that's when the trouble starts."

Contact Summer Harlow at 324-2794 or sharlow@delawareonline.com.