Tucson leaders are moving forward on local ordinance that could bar immigration enforcement from taking place on city property.
Tucson Mayor Regina Romero and the council voted unanimously this week to direct the city attorney to draft an ordinance that would bar ICE from staging enforcement operations on city-owned property. It also aims to set up a policy for handling requests from the federal government to use city facilities.
Vice Mayor Lane Santa Cruz told reporters this month that the proposal was in response to enforcement seen in other cities.
“So in the past, we haven’t had that policy, but as we’re seeing more and more federal agents using parks, or parking lots, or empty, city-owned lots to stage, that we’re not going to participate in that way,” Santa Cruz said.
The Tucson attorney’s office is expected to return a draft of the ordinance to city leaders within the next month for a vote.
Santa Cruz says federal immigration enforcement is not part of the Tucson Police Department’s mandate. And local officials want to clarify the city’s role.
“We’re not here to be immigration enforcement. We want folks to feel safe calling 911 to report a crime and that makes it really challenging when they're seeing on the news or on social media what seems to be police collaborating with federal agents,” she said.
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