Brown County
A Step Toward Deporting Illegal Immigrants from the County Jail.

Posted: Nov 7, 2007 08:54 PM PST

By Sarah Thomsen

Tuesday night the Brown County Board of Supervisors agreed to give the heriff the go-ahead to look at a program to make Sheriff's Deputies acting agents of ICE, or immigration and customs enforcement.

The supervisors discussed the issue for over an hour, hearing from a lot of people in the community that didn't like this program.


It's all about the 287-G program, a program of the Department of Homeland Security. It would authorize the Brown County Sheriff to hire three deputies to train under federal ICE agents and deport illegal immigrants. But, only those who've been arrested for other crimes and are being housed at the Brown County Jail. They would not be allowed to raid any homes or businesses.

Several people spoke against the proposal during public comment Tuesday night. Then, the supervisors took their time debating the issue.

Jean Riquelma said "This is a program meant to expand so that we will do the federal government's work, which is to apprehend criminals, and I don't think we need to be in that business and use my money to help the feds do their job which they're already taking my money for."

Kathryn Zavala said "I just want to say I'm very opposed to this ordinance. My biggest fear is my husband is hispanic but a permanent and legal resident. And my vision is that I'll come home someday and he will have been pulled over because this has been expanded and utilized in a manner that you're not meaning it to be used at this point."

Supervisor Steve Fewell said "I've got a document here from the county of Prince Villiam, Virginia. It's 11-12 pages long, and they're estimating that in five years, they'll be spending $14 million on this program. Do we in Brown County really want to be doing that?"

Supervisor Guy Zima said "I got a little turned off with people that say they're concerned with costs of this, but not concerned with the numerous costs illegal immigrants cost this community in other ways."

Brown County Sheriff Dennis Kocken said "There seems to be a notion that because the officers will be trained in ICE they'll do this big roundup and collect all the illegal immigrants in the area. No, it's not gonna happen."

This is just a fact finding mission at this point and not a done deal. The sheriff will meet with federal ICE agents in the next few months to see if they want to work with Brown County and actually do this program.

http://www.wbay.com/Global/story.asp?S=7328866