| Council
Makes Quick Work, But For What? |
| The Herndon Town Council is making good progress at reshaping
the town's policy towards dealing with day laborers on the
streets and towards combating illegal immigrants in the town. |
| Last week, Herndon Police Chief Toussaint E. Summers Jr.
received notification from the federal government that the
town had been approved for controversial law enforcement partnership. |
| The program, called 287(g) after the section of the law
that created it, is administered by the Bureau of Customs
and Immigration Enforcement, which trains and supervises local
police officers as they assume some ability to enforce federal
immigration law. |
| Tuesday night, the Town Council authorized town staff to
submit a request for proposal for a new contractor to operate
a new day labor center for the town. The council is upset
that illegal immigrants are allowed to find work at the current
labor site and would like to set up a new one solely for legal
residents. |
| Those who elected the current politicians to their post
should be pleased with the pace of their reforms. But what
remains to be seen is what lasting effect any of the actions
the council is taking will have. |
| The 287(g) program has been criticized as ineffective at
making real progress in discouraging illegal immigration,
and the town will have to bear the costs of doing the federal
government's job inside the town's borders. |
| And the town's current labor site is operated by and funded
by Fairfax County. The town stands to assume more cost and
responsibility by re-inventing the labor site to unproven
ends. |
