The public-comment period of the Albany Common Council gave a group of more than a half dozen people, immigrants and the advocates who provide them support, the opportunity to speak out in favor of Councilwoman Barbara Smith's nonbinding immigrants' rights resolution.
The resolution, which aims to "support a welcoming and compassionate environment for immigrants and their families within our city and its institutions," would "instruct public safety personnel to refrain from asking people their immigration status. . ."
Earlier, during caucus, the resolution and its supporters, including councilmen Corey Ellis and Glen Casey among others, met limited but vehement opposition from Ward 15's Councilwoman Sandra Fox and Councilman Joseph Igoe. Igoe, who represents the 14th Ward, said that he wanted to hear from the police department before voting. Smith said that she had heard that the police weren't interested in getting involved in this legislative discussion.
More pointedly, Fox opposed the resolution, she said, because, "I don't want to turn Albany into a sanctuary city."
The resolution is simply to urge the police, Smith said, to not insert immigration status into the course of a routine police activity, such as a traffic stop. Questioning a person's status based solely on how they might look or sound, Smith said, is a form of profiling. She, along with many of the speakers, said that many legal immigrants are scared to reach out to the police for help because they worry that their status might be questioned.
Illegal immigrants, also, are left extremely vulnerable due to this fear, one advocate said.
The resolution, as introduced, included amended language calling on the federal government to step up its act in providing a fair legal framework for immigrants, as well as the clarification that it's not the goal of the council to urge immigrants to reside in the country illegally. The inclusion of this language softened Igoe's view of the resolution.
A majority of the council members wound up speaking, and speaking, in favor of the resolution, drawing from their own families' stories of immigrating to this country. (There is nothing like a well-meaning, nonbinding resolution to prompt long-winded monologues from politicians.)
The resolution passed 14 to 0 as Fox left before the vote.
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