Long Island top official calls for investigation of Federal raids.

Coming on the heels of NY Governor Eliot Spitzer's recent announcement that his state would start making driver's licenses available to its approximately 500,000 undocumented residents in December, a spate of recent Federal immigration raids on Long Island, that infuriated local officials, have drawn the state to the center of the heated national debate on immigration.

The raids, which occurred on September 24 and 26, were characterized at a press conference held yesterday by Nassau County Executive, Tom Suozzi , as poorly structured and executed, leading him to call for a Federal investigation into ICE's handling of the matter.

Click for Video Courtesy News12 LI

Federal agents displayed a "cowboy" mentality while running roughshod over local police officers _ at times pointing their weapons at cops _ and ensnared more suspected illegal aliens than targeted gangsters in raids on Long Island last week, officials said Tuesday.

"There were clear dangers of friendly fire," Nassau County Police Commissioner Lawrence Mulvey said. "We did have members that were actually drawn upon."

Mulvey and County Executive Tom Suozzi want Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff to investigate the tactics used by Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents; ICE is under the jurisdiction of the Homeland Security department.

Newsday

"The Ice official failed on three occasions to check the names and addresses of their arrest suspects against the Naussau County Police Department's Gang Intelligence Files," Suozzi said Tuesday."The result was that many wrong residential addresses were raided, and in one instance, ICE sought a 28-year-old defendant using a photograph taken when the he was seven year old boy.

He stressed that, "Of the reported 82 county arrests, our police records indicate that there are eight active gang members and one is a gang associate."

Suozzi went on to say that “tactically the operation was structured poorly,” and that “some ICE members wore cowboy hats and in the view of some of my members displayed a ‘cowboy’ mentality. This, in my view, posed unnecessary dangers to all parties, including my members, who in fact were drawn upon by the agents."

According to Nassau' Police Commissioner, Lawrence W. Mulvey, officials of Immigration and Customs Enforcement originally claimed they would be executing warrants for residents who were known gang members, but given the final outcome of the raids, he now believes that ICE's initial characterization was "misleading."

Stating that the lack of current intelligence and organization created unnecessary risks to officer safety, Mulvey announced last week that the county would no longer be cooperating with Federal officials on immigration related matters.

Federal agents acted like "cowboys" ... mistakenly pulling their weapons on Nassau Police officers -- during immigration raids in the Nassau County last week, the county police commissioner charged Tuesday.

On two separate occasions during the raids, the federal agents mistakenly aimed their weapons at Nassau County police officers who were serving as backup, Commissioner Lawrence Mulvey said at a news conference with County Executive Thomas Suozzi.

Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents had asked for county police to assist them in arresting gang members on warrants, but the agents appeared to be just rounding up undocumented immigrants, Mulvey said.

However, the special agent in charge of the federal operation, Peter Smith, denied that his agents acted improperly, or that they ever aimed their weapons at Nassau officers.

"We stand behind our operation," Smith said. He said all agents and local officers wore distinctive marking on their vests or shirts, but said "a couple" of agents from other parts of the country might have worn cowboy hats.

Newsday

The Police Commissioner also expressed anger over the damage the raids have done to the departments ability to operate effectively in the immigrant and Latino communities. "This sets us back" with the Latino community, Mulvey said. "We suffer the consequences of the mistrust that develops."

October 2, 2007

Michael Chertoff
Secretary of the Department of Homeland Security
Department of Homeland Security
Washington, D.C. 20536

Dear Mr. Chertoff:

I bring to your attention serious allegations of misconduct and malfeasance committed by Immigration and Customs Enforcement personnel in executing arrest warrants in various Nassau County communities on September 24 and 26, 2007. I ask that you investigate the allegations and advise me of your written findings.

The immigration laws of the United States should be enforced and I fully support the execution of lawfully issued arrest warrants in Nassau County, particularly for known gang members. I condemn, however, any tactical actions which cross the lines of legality and law enforcement best practices.

In order to facilitate an appropriate inquiry, enclosed is a copy of Nassau County Police Commissioner Lawrence W. Mulvey’s September 27, 2007 letter to Joseph A. Palmese, the Resident Agent in Charge of the Immigration and Customs Enforcement (“I.C.E.”) office located in Bohemia, New York. A portion of the letter has been redacted so as not to interfere with planned I.C.E. operations. Commissioner Mulvey’s letter raises important issues as to how I.C.E. personnel, in the presence of Nassau County police officers, conducted themselves, including these observations:

• The operation on Monday lacked current intel.” I.C.E. officials failed on three occasions to check the names and addresses of their arrest targets against the Nassau County Police Department’s Gang Intelligence Files. The result was that many wrong residential addresses were raided and in one instance I.C.E. sought a 28 year old defendant using a photograph taken when he was a 7 year old boy. Of the reported 82 Nassau County arrests, our police records indicate that 8 are active gang members and 1 is a gang associate.


• “Tactically the operation was structured poorly.” The federal operation utilized border patrol personnel from around the country who had not trained together for this complex mission. “[S]ome [I.C.E.] members wore cowboy hats and in the view of some of my members displayed a “cowboy” mentality. This, in my view, posed unnecessary danger to all parties, including my members, who in fact were drawn upon by some of the agents.”

I know you agree that these are serious allegations and deserve a serious and prompt response.


Very truly yours,


Thomas R. Suozzi
County Executive


Cc: Julie Meyers, Assistant Secretary for I.C.E.
Roslynn Maskopf, United States Attorney for the Eastern District
Kathleen Rice, Nassau County District Attorney

Watch video of press conference HERE

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A Tale of Two Suburbs

This past week we witnessed the responses of two local law enforcement agencies to increasing political pressure to rely upon them to enforce federal immigration policy:

In Irving Texas, a suburb in the Dallas/Fort Worth area, 2000 protester marched this week to highlight that city's participation in a Federal program that has caused deportations to increase 500% from that city in the last year alone.

In Nassau County NY, a suburb in Metro NYC, the county's highest ranking police official announced this week that his department would no longer assist federal authorities with the apprehension of undocumented immigrants.

Across the country, municipalities large and small are now being forced to examine exactly what their rights and responsibilities are when it comes to enforcing federal immigration policy.

In a heated political climate where incendiary speech and inflammatory rhetoric often pass for public discourse, too many local leaders have chosen to make political hay by claiming it is now their responsibility to take on the burden of enforcing Federal law.

Others have taken a much wiser approach.


Whether passing local zoning ordinances to limit housing in immigrant communities, or empowering local law enforcement to enforce laws beyond their constitutional jurisdiction, some municipal leaders around the country clearly appear to be using the "immigration issue" as a way to garner support within certain segments of their constituency or further their political ambitions.

Most of these local initiatives have been challenged in court, and many, after wasting precious taxpayer resources, have been struck down as unconstitutional.

In other municipalities, officials have taken a much more enlightened and practical approach to the Federal Government's unwillingness to repair its fatally flawed immigration policy, and decided to do what is not only best for their residents, but prescribed by the Constitution.

In Irving, the protests were sparked by that city's participation in a federal program that allows local law enforcement to screen the immigration status of all people arrested. With a Latino population that exceeds 30%, many see the huge increase in arrests that end up with deportation as evidence that the local police are targeting the Latino community. Evidence coming from the Mexican Consul in Dallas who interviews Mexicans being deported, seems to back up this assertion. With jurisdiction over a huge area from East Texas all the way to the Texas Panhandle, Consulate officials say that half of the deportation cases it reviewed in the last few weeks originated from Irving. They have advised all Mexican nationals to stay away from the area for fear of arrest.

Organizers of the demonstration called on people to boycott Irving businesses and flood the mayor's office with phone calls demanding an end to the Criminal Alien Program. Officials have denied accusations of racial profiling and said everyone arrested in the city is screened for a possible referral to immigration officials.

Irving police have been screening arrested people and have turned over 1,373 to Immigration and Customs Enforcement officials this year. Data from the city show that the number of prisoners turned over to ICE is increasing.

About four illegal immigrants a month were identified among people arrested in Irving before police began the Criminal Alien Program, according to police data.

About 50 a month were identified after police started the program in September 2006.

About 130 a month were being identified by April.

Up to 300 a month are being identified now, according to the mayor

Star-Telegram

Clearly the numbers look suspicious. A six-fold increase in the number of deportations since the program's inception would lead one to wonder whether police are searching out those who they suspect are here without documents, and then targeting them for arrest on even the most minor of charges.

Latino advocates accuse police officers of racial profiling and overzealously arresting suspected illegal immigrants so they can be deported, a claim the Mexican Consulate takes so seriously it's advising people to avoid driving through this Dallas suburb.

Police Chief Larry Boyd, however, says he's merely providing information to immigration agents as part of a national program designed to streamline the deportation of illegal immigrants who have been incarcerated.

"In terms of immigration enforcement, we're not doing anything on that," said Boyd, whose city joined the program last year. "The officers are arresting people for offenses like they always have."

Houston Chronicle

In Nassau, NY, the situation seems to be the polar opposite.

The Nassau County Police Department has a long history of working with Federal law enforcement agencies on various sorts of criminal maters. Yet, after assisting in a series of Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) raids earlier in the week, that they were informed would target gang members, Nassau's top cop announced an end to all inter-agency cooperation when only three out of the 82 people apprehended turned out to be gang members.

A top police official on Long Island said Friday he has "no desire to cooperate any further" with federal immigration agents after his department was kept in the dark about many of the details of raids and arrests conducted earlier this week.

"We withdrew from any involvement in any further operations," Nassau County Police Commissioner Lawrence Mulvey said following the arrest of 82 people. "There will be no further cooperation unless these issues are ironed out."

Mulvey said agents from the federal Immigration and Customs Enforcement agency were repeatedly asked to supply a list of suspected gang members targeted with arrest warrants to the local police department, but the request was only granted on Thursday afternoon _ four days after the raids commenced.

"We had asked for a list of the targets on the warrants because we have a very accurate and up-to-date database on gangs in Nassau County," Mulvey said. "It was promised and not delivered."

…

Only three of those taken into custody, Mulvey said, were actually suspected gang members; most were undocumented immigrants. He said the ICE agents appeared to have outdated intelligence on where some of the suspects were located.

…

"They pick up and leave town and we're left to deal with the missing persons reports from families whose relatives were taken," Mulvey complained. "I have no desire to cooperate any further."

He said he has shared his complaints in a letter to ICE officials, but has yet to receive a response.

Mulvey also said if he had known that ICE had sought to arrest undocumented immigrants, the department would not have assisted. "This sets us back" with the Latino community, Mulvey said. "We suffer the consequences of the mistrust that develops."

Newsday

It’s obvious that the officials of these two suburban municipalities are separated by more than mere geography.

Chief Larry Boyd, with the apparent full support of the Irving City Council, has decided to utilize the power of the Federal government to engage in a systematic program that would rid his city of those that are deemed "undesirables."

Commissioner Lawrence Mulvey, on the other hand, has taken a defiant and courageous stance to do the right thing for his entire community, and not allow Federal authorities to use local law enforcement, and divide his community against itself.

Let the Federal government do their job and enact legislation that will finally fix an immigration system that all can clearly see is broken. Their lack of leadership on this issue only perpetuates situations ripe with abuse like that in Irving, or tries to force local officials to act in a matter that runs contrary to their community's own best interests.

Immigration policy needs to be set in Washington, as prescribed by the Constitution, not in the chambers of City Councils or County Legislatures.

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New study looks at Hispanic immigration impact on Long Island

When talk turns to immigration and immigration reform more often than not the discussion will revolve around the border states or California with its large Latino population, or even the southeast where the recent influx of new immigrants has sparked backlash and controversy. But rarely do people think of traditional immigrant gateways like New York. Yet, every year New York is in the top three states for the number of foreign born residents both legal and illegal, and as anyone with even a cursory knowledge of the state can figure out, the bulk of those immigrants live in and around the NYC area.

Over the past 25 years, one region that has seen the greatest increase in immigrant population, and particularly in Latino immigrant population, has been Long Island. Originally a prototype for the mostly white, middle and working-class, suburban communities that sprung up in post-war America, Long Island has matured over time into a much more diverse, multi-ethnic, immigrant gateway. Today it is home to one of the fastest growing Latino populations in the nation made up of both new immigrants and native born.

A new study from the Horace Hagedorn Foundation and Adelphi University takes an in-depth look at over twenty five years of Latino immigration to Long Island and it's effects on the economic growth of the region.

In 1980, fewer than one out of every twenty Long Islanders was Hispanic. Today, the proportion is nearly one in eight. This rapid demographic change has resulted in increased ethnic tension and anti-immigrant sentiment. Suffolk County Executive Steve Levy recently made national headlines by sponsoring legislation that would make it illegal for businesses with contracts with the county to employ undocumented immigrants. Congressional Representative Peter King, one of the nation's most vocal opponents to immigration reform, co-sponsored last years House immigration bill, H.R. 4437, that sparked protests throughout the country.

While King and Levy pander to the lowest impulses of human nature, the new study, "The Economic Impact Of The Hispanic Population On Long Island, New York" from Mariano Torras, Ph.D.,of Adelphi University and economist Curtis Skinner, Ph.D. shows that rather than lowering the quality of life for Long Islanders, over 25 years of Latino immigration has brought great benefits.

The study takes a comprehensive look at how continuing immigration effects a mature “immigrant gateway”, focusing on the demographics and economic effects of Latino immigration in the area.

Executive Summary

Long Island’s Hispanic population has grown dramatically in recent years, led by new immigration from Latin America. Indeed, Hispanics have emerged as the major source of demographic growth for the region—excluding new Hispanic residents, Long Island would have lost, rather than gained, people since 1980. The new Hispanic presence is visible both in cities and villages with established Hispanic populations and in smaller and more remote communities, especially in Suffolk County.

As workers, consumers, entrepreneurs and taxpayers, Hispanics make important contributions to the Long Island economy. Hispanic residents add nearly $5.7 billion to total Long Island output as a result of their consumer spending. Hispanic employment continues to grow very rapidly—increasing by almost one third from 2000 to 2004 alone—and Hispanic workers are an important presence in diverse regional industries, including Manufacturing, Accommodation and Food Services, Landscaping Services and Construction. Hispanic-owned business is also booming in the region, posting almost $2 billion in sales in 2002. In addition, Long Island Hispanic residents contribute positively to local government budgets. This study finds that Hispanics contribute $614 more per resident to local revenues than they receive in local expenditures on education, health care and corrections.

The importance of Hispanic Long Islanders to the regional economy will only deepen as this population continues to grow in the years ahead. This study documents the extraordinary recent changes in the region’s Hispanic residents and describes the key demographic characteristics of this population. It then quantifies the Hispanic population’s contributions to production, employment and new business creation on Long Island. The report concludes by analyzing the Hispanic contribution to local government revenues and costs.

Among the study’s major findings:

Demographics: The Long Island Hispanic population tripled to nearly 330,000 residents since 1980, and it now represents approximately 12 percent of the general population.

• The rate of increase was far greater than that for the Long Island population as a whole and significantly more rapid than the Hispanic population growth rate nationwide.



• Immigrants from Central America, the Caribbean, and South America accounted for almost half of the growth in Long Island’s Hispanic population since 1980.



• Sixty-five percent of Nassau County’s Hispanics lived in Hempstead town in the year 2000, while 68 percent of Hispanics in Suffolk lived in either Brookhaven or Islip.



• Almost half of all Long Island Hispanics are in the “prime working age” category of 18 to 44, compared to only a little more than one third of all Long Islanders.

Entrepreneurship: From 1997 to 2002, the number of Hispanic-owned businesses in Long Island rose by almost 35%, and total sales and receipts by 21%.

• Growth was especially strong in Suffolk County, where the number of firms increased by 51% and sales by 39%.



• Long Island Hispanic-owned businesses earned almost $2 billion in sales and receipts, and employed an estimated 25,000 people.

Economic Impact: Long Island’s Hispanic population contributed an average of $614 more per resident than it received in local expenditures on education, health care and corrections.

• The buying power of Long Island Hispanics in 2004 amounted to $4.4 billion. Hispanic spending produced an economic impact of nearly $5.7 billion—of which more than $3.2 billion was in Suffolk County—and created more than 52,000 jobs.



• In 2004 Hispanics contributed about $925 million in taxes and other government revenues (directly and indirectly), while costing Nassau and Suffolk local governments (counties, towns/cities, villages and school districts) about $723 million for K-12 education ($520 million), health care ($158 million), and corrections ($45 million). The net benefit to Long Island was about $202 million.

The Economic Impact Of The Hispanic Population On Long Island, New York, Horace Hagedorn Foundation

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