White steering clear of 287(g) concept Mayor soured on federal plan to train jailers to ID suspected illegal immigrants 287(g): White prefers another ICE program

The Houston Chronicle
October 7, 2009 Wednesday
By SUSAN CARROLL, HOUSTON CHRONICLE

JAIL SCREENING PROGRAMS

Two immigration screening programs - 287(g) and Secure Communities - frequently are deployed together but can be used separately.

287(g): This program trains local law enforcement to help ICE enforce immigration law, including questioning suspects about their immigration history. Sixty-five law enforcement agencies have active 287(g) partnerships, according to ICE.

Secure Communities: A technology-driven program that automatically notifies immigration officials when someone fingerprinted at a jail or prison has an immigration record. More than 80 counties participate in Secure Communities.

SOURCE: Immigration and Customs Enforcement

Mayor Bill White is distancing himself from a federal program that trains local law enforcement to identify suspected illegal immigrants, saying this week that he favors an automated immigration screening program in the city's jails.

This spring, after a Houston Police Department officer was critically injured in a shooting by an illegal immigrant, White formally requested that Department of Homeland Security officials expedite his request that the city participate in the 287(g) program, which would train jailers to act as de-facto immigration agents.

ICE officials announced in July that HPD had been accepted into the program. But since then, the city and Immigration and Customs Enforcement officials have been locked in negotiations over a range of issues related to the program, from how it should be administered to which agency should shoulder the costs.

White, who is running for U.S. Senate, now appears to be backing away from the program, saying ICE officials were "bureaucratic" in the negotiations. Vincent Picard, an ICE spokesman, declined to comment on the Houston negotiations.

"Rather than letting us simply write the agreements on our own terms, they want to put language in there that we object to," White said. "We don't want anything that creates obligations on the part of the city, or that would be inconsistent with our policies not to divert patrol officers from solving crimes."

White said this week that he has not eliminated the possibility of participating in 287(g) on the city's terms but would prefer to participate in another ICE program instead. That program, Secure Communities, gives local law enforcement agencies access to a massive immigration database to check suspects' immigration history.

White said that unlike 287(g), the Secure Communities program would require "no special agreement" with DHS or cost nearly as much. City officials had estimated 287(g) would cost $1.5 million to $2 million a year to operate and require training for 22 police officers and two supervisors in Houston's jails.

However, the city so far lacks the technical capability to directly access ICE's immigration database. White said he plans to have the technical problems resolved before the end of the year, when he leaves office. Immigration screening in the city jails likely will be a key issue for Houston's mayoral candidates, who are vying to replace White in January.

Political downside

White is expected to take some heat for backing off of 287(g), which is under review by DHS and has sparked protests locally and nationally. The program has been criticized by some members of Congress and immigrant advocates as being vulnerable to racial profiling and lacking oversight by ICE.

Locally, the program's opponents praised the mayor's decision. Cesar Espinosa, a Houston immigrant advocate who has organized protests against the program, said he was "definitely happy" that the mayor was shying away from having the city's jailers trained as immigration agents, calling 287(g) "flawed."

Some supporters of the program expressed dismay but not surprise about the mayor's position, accusing him of playing politics.

"I didn't think he meant it out of the chute," Larry Youngblood, a member of Texans for Immigration Reform, said of White's request last spring. "He's pretty much a political animal."

Spurred by shooting

White denied politics played a factor in his decision.

He said he realized after the March shooting of HPD Officer Rick Salter, who was critically injured by an illegal immigrant with a criminal record, that the city needed better access to suspects' immigration records.

White said he would have preferred for the city to just have access to the government's immigration database last spring but was told by DHS officials that he would need to sign up for 287(g) in order to use the database.

The city's goal from the start was to target "noncitizens who have committed violent crimes, serious property crimes and serious narcotics crimes" and ensure that they are deported after coming into the jails, White said. He stressed that the city never intended to go after minor offenders.

Youngblood said the added manpower from 287(g) is needed to help target dangerous offenders at HPD's jails.

"It's not about mowing the grass," he said. "It's about crime. If they show up in our city jail, or they're arrested at an accident scene, they need to be deported."

White said the city has allowed ICE agents full access to the city's jails since 2006. Suspects who are charged with Class B misdemeanors and more serious crimes already are screened against immigration databases because they are transferred to the custody of the Harris County Sheriff's Office, which participates in Secure Communities and 287(g).

Espinosa said immigrant advocates will monitor the city's planned participation in the Secure Communities program with the goal of ensuring that it does not lead to racial profiling or the deportation of people who are accused of minor crimes.

susan.carroll@chron.com

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