Sheriff promises review of immigration agreement with federal government

Louis Berney
Daily News Correspondent

A group of Collier County residents asked Sheriff Kevin Rambosk at a public meeting Monday to end the county’s cooperative agreement with the federal government that empowers local law enforcement to assist Washington in cracking down on undocumented immigrants.

Chants of "No hate, no fear, immigrants are welcome here" could be heard from the corner of U.S. 41 and Third Avenue South in Naples on Monday, Dec. 11, 2017. Valerie Minuche holds up a sign alongside other protesters who gathered to demonstrate opposition to the 287(g) pact.

The sheriff listened as they denounced the agreement, known as 287(g), for 90 minutes at the Leila B. Canant Professional Development Center, and he promised to review their concerns and respond to them by the end of the week.

Yet he seemed disinclined to give them what they wanted — an end to the county’s cooperative agreement with federal Immigration and Customs Enforcement officials, as all but three other Florida counties already have done.

“Some of your information is not accurate,” he told the 15 speakers and more than 50 of their supporters.

Sheriff Kevin Rambosk

He also disputed their contention that 287(g) enforcement in Collier County is racially biased and their suggestion that the law on which it is based operates on skimpy legal grounds.

“The program has withstood legal challenges up to today,” the sheriff told its critics.

And during a brief interview after the meeting, he said he believed 287(g) has made the county a safer place to a live since its adoption nine years ago — a stance that is diametrically opposed to one of the opponent’s key arguments.

Bryan Oliva-Infante marches alongside other protesters who gathered to demonstrate opposition to the controversial 287(g) pact in Naples on Monday, Dec. 11, 2017.

The opponents said 287(g) has made immigrants in the county fearful about coming forward to report crimes or to serve as witnesses.

“Immigrant communities in Collier County live in fear,” said Karynn Claro, a U.S. citizen and 10-year resident of the county. She questioned reports from the Sheriff’s Office and ICE that crime has diminished here because of 287(g).

“Has crime really decreased or gone unreported,” she asked. “Why would you call police if you might be deported?”

Phyllis Andrews, another speaker, asked whether the sheriff and other officials believed crime victims should “be afraid to contact the police.”

Others reported that some immigrants even are reluctant to attend school meetings for their children because they might be questioned or detained by local officers.

They also said this fear in the immigrant community is emboldening criminals to act more aggressively.

“Assailants know the victims are not going to report” crimes, Andrews said. “That’s what makes us unsafe.”

The speakers gave a number of other reasons why they believe the cooperative agreement between Collier County and ICE is counterproductive and bad for residents:

» It encourages racial profiling.

» It disrupts families by deporting parents of American children who might be undocumented, and it creates anxiety among children that their parents might be apprehended by local officers and sent away.

» It transfers what should be a federal responsibility to local police officers.

» It forces officers to spend time on federal work and prevents them from attending to their local law enforcement duties, thus making the county less safe.

» It costs the county money that should be coming out of the federal treasury.

Rambosk defended his officers, saying, “Your deputies do an excellent job in protecting the community.”

After their demonstration, protesters gather outside the Leila B Canant Professional Development Center in Naples to attend a meeting with Collier County Sheriff Kevin Rambosk and representatives from the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement on Monday, Dec. 11, 2017.

Yet he acknowledged that the question of how much 287(g) was costing the county was a legitimate one, and he said he would try to find out the cost and report back to those who had raised the issue.

He also said he would report on “what do we see as the positive or negative impact” of the county’s agreement with ICE.

While the county can pull out of the agreement whenever it chooses, as hundreds of other jurisdictions around the country have done, it currently runs through June 30, 2019.

Sean Teeling, a program manager with ICE, reported at the hearing that the number of 287(g) encounters in the county with people born outside the United States dropped from 2,155 in fiscal year 2016 to 1,632 in the most recent year. Those encounters led to the removal of 237 people this year and 75 in 2016.

He also detailed five cases in Collier that involved people who had committed violent crimes and were either imprisoned or deported, or are awaiting deportation.

Teeling described Collier as a model jurisdiction when it comes to its involvement with 287(g).

The agreement’s critics, however, were not as laudatory.

“287(g) is un-American,” said Angela Cisneros, co-founder of the group Collier for Dreamers.

Before the meeting, more than a dozen opponents of 287(g) held a protest march that ended at the professional development center. They chanted and held signs expressing ideas like “Immigrants welcome here” and “End 287(g).”