Leon County and Tallahassee elected officials don’t like the state’s requirement that forces them to enter into agreements between their local law enforcement agencies and federal immigration enforcement, but they say their hands are tied.
The elected officials made those comments during the Our Town panel discussion Thursday hosted by the Village Square and WFSU.
The Tallahassee Police Department and Leon County Sherriff’s office have already entered into 287 (g) agreements with ICE. Those agreements were the focus of a dozen or so protestors outside of WFSU Public Media where the panel discussion was held
When asked about the agreements, City Commissioner Curtis Richardson said city staff entered them because of requirements in a new state law that would subject elected officials from removal from office if they refused. He said the city is following the minimum compliance that is required by law.
“We have allocated one police officer to that effort, one we're not funding that position. It's going to depend on federal funding and training. The training will be a 40-hour online training, and we will not go to people's homes, their churches, their neighborhoods, picking up people off the street, arresting them and sending them places that we don't know where they're going. We're just not going to do that here in the City of Tallahassee,” he said.
Leon County Commissioner David O’Keefe said he disagrees with the law and believes local elected officials should do everything they can to legally resist.
“We need to do everything we can legally to make sure that people in our community who aren't harming anybody aren't afraid to go to school, afraid to go to the doctor, afraid to call the police when a crime is being committed,” he said.
ICE has been collaborating with law enforcement throughout Florida at an unprecedented rate. Those efforts led to the arrest of more than one thousand immigrants in a week around the state.