In 2007, Prince William County Supervisors passed the “Immigration Resolution” which stated in part that “illegal immigration has been determined to cause economic hardship and lawlessness.” Has our outcome supported the assertion that ‘more illegals cause more crime and worse economic conditions’ with the converse being ‘less illegals therefore less crime and a better economy’?
According to the Prince William County Crime Report for 2008, crime now, one year after the resolution’s passage crime is slightly increased. This effectively ends our 5 year decreasing crime rate trend which obviously must have existed during our “influx of illegals.”
In financial terms, can we state that our economic hardships have lessened since the introduction of the resolution? Prince William County now leads the state and ranks top in the nation in foreclosures, and our home values have dropped 32%. The neighborhood issues that existed prior to the passage of the resolution are resurfacing as foreclosed homes bought by real estate investors are turned into rental properties. And our County budget is facing deep cuts this year with an equally dismal prospect for next.
Many predicted dire consequences but Supervisors refused to heed their warnings. Probably nobody said it better than Oklahoma Republican State Representative Shane Jett, who opposed similar legislation in his state, when he stated:
“[the passage of these types of legislations] will be the single most destructive economic disaster since the Dust Bowl,”
Now with almost one full year of crime figures, foreclosure numbers, home values, and tax revenue numbers compiled can we definitively state that the assertions in the resolution were completely unfounded? Strictly speaking, we had lower crime rates and a better economy when the ‘illegals’ were here. Will the status quo remain, as Stewart continues to assert that the resolution is working well?
Obviously this issue has been the single most divisive issue to happen here. Will Supervisors heed Dr. Fuller’s advice, and change course? Or, are they content with allowing Chairman Stewart to continue down this path hoping that voters will only hold him responsible?
Wow. Confronted with the cold hard facts, I have to say I’d preferred it if Chief Deane, Dr. Fuller and the other experts HADN’T been right. It’s about as sad as possible to know we were led into this complete disaster for one person’s political gain. I say one person because I think Jackson Miller and John Stirrup would have won anyway.
Great analysis and great question Alanna. I hope that it wouldn’t be true that the other Supervisors are not changing course because they think only Corey Stewart will be held responsible on election day. I would want them to try to counteract the economic part of the disaster rather than letting us live with it.
I feel like Corey’s goose is cooked anyway. So I hope the Supervisors take some steps to improve our reputation. That would be the first step.
I wonder how the “rule of law” proponents will spin this?!
They will spin it like a top!!
How long will it take Mr. Murphy to crunch the numbers? If they start up again with crimes against persons being down and property crimes being up, well it all gets so convoluted then.
The explanation is partly because of the economy. Of course, it always was. That’s why they came and that’s why they aren’t coming now.
I would like to see a presentation by Chief Dean and perhaps a sociologist breaking down the stats by ethnicity, income and location and crime type. That would give us a clearer picture of what’s going on here.
Either way, “the illegals did it” proves to be a logical error and a scapegoating technique.
Oh, please … What faux logic you people exhibit. This is a multi-variate problem. Home prices were driven extraordinarily high by speculation — people were buying three or four houses at a time and then selling them a few months later. This was harder to carry out in neighboring counties where prices were already much higher. When prices fell and speculation stopped, Prince William Co was much more unstable and therefore housing prices fell much farther.
I think you have to first understand that crime statistics are not “immediate indicators” of the conditions that cause crime to increase or financial situations to worsen. There are lead and lag drivers that eventually show up in statistics (well after almost everyone else starts to know something is different and wrong.)
First there is the issue of what constitutes “crime” and what “categories” or crime are the only categories reported in these statistics.
“illegal” immigration is a federal crime, housing an illegal alien is a federal crime, and transporting an illegal alien is a crime and yet, NONE of these crimes (that have increased enourmously in PWC in the past 5 years) are reported in these crime statistics.
I think before you can draw a “cause and effect” relationship, which may not be indicated in your assumptions, you first have to classify what “crimes” illegal immigrants do the most (document fraud, zoning violations, extortion, gang violence, identity theft, illegal driving, illegal voting, illegal tax evasion, illegally parking vehicles, loitering, peeing in the streets, stealing electricity, stealing jobs, etc.) are all NOTICEABLE CRIMES that are committed by “illegals” that have deeply upset this community, have GREATLY increased in the past 5-10 years and ARE NOT reported in ANY of your “quoted crime statistics”.
They do cause a general decrease in the standard of living in a community, largely caused by a large influx of “illegals” into the community, that is a “lagging indicator”, that precedes general deterioration and poverty in a neighborhood, that CAUSES a DELAYED increase in more serious crimes (theft, rape, shootings, gang activity, drug activity and murder) that are reported in these statistics. If citizens WAITED until only the most serious crimes increased in what used to be high standard of living neighborhoods, then we would be TOO LATE to save the community from collapse. The increse in more serious crimes, is a RESULT of a general decline in the standard of living, increased poverty, and undesireable “illegal” alien activity that has increased steadily in the past five years (eventually causing a rise in serious crimes at some point). Evidently NOW is the time these more serious crimes are on the rise as a result of the last five years of general decline in standard of living of PWC and influx of “illegal” activity into PWC over 5 years. It happens this way in the cities too.
The economic impact of mortgage defaults and reduction of the median family income, and over population growth CAUSED by 25 years of “illegal” immigration into the US, did not surface until mortgages were purchased in 2004-2006, and did not “DEFAULT” until 2007-2008 when large numbers of “illegals and formerly “illegal” families who make up the bulk of these mortgage products, falsified mortgage documentation, misreported income, and led bankers to believe they were capable of paying AAA rated securities and factual underwriting (false credit reporting and illegal underwriting practice prevailed instead by “illegal actions”)as ARM and HUD 8A candidates (get every minority ethnic person into a home policy) were targeted by ethnicity privileged 8A policies issued by HUD. These families then “defaulted” after one to two years, but the impact of what they did did not show up in the securities industry until Bear Sterns and AIG collapsed in Sep 2008, when creditors realized the number of “illegal” and formerly “illegal” families were defaulting in LARGE numbers, and very rapidly, indicating the securites they had insured as AAA rated certificates, were actually securities back by HIGH-RISK families that did not intend to continue payments and grossly mis-reported and over-estimated the growth of their financial futures and ability to pay future debt. Significant over-leveraging by these families way beyond their income means (illegally reporting lower income to debt ratios required by LAW), and unwillingness/inability to pay their debt, CAUSED the entire mortgage insurance underwriting and mortgage trading industry to collapse, and that took a year to surface, then in Sept 2008, the Global BANKING industry collapsed because it had overleveraged its assets by holding these fraudulent AAA rated mortgages (but actually illegal and un-ratable) and by not keeping sufficient capital reserves to cover these defaults. This CAUSED the ENTIRE world-wide Global Banking system to collapse, and now in 2009, that in-ability of both families and companies and banks to maintain sufficient capital reserve, is causeing a loss of 4.5 million jobs per year. NONE of that shows up immediately either (it takes 4-5 years to surface from the initial illegal activities of the illegal and formerly illegal immigrants who caused the greatest economic crisis of our lives in the first place.
To understand this you can’t just look at one year’s statistics, and you need to follow the “paper” trail and the entire process, backwards in time to understand the ROOT cause. 12 million currently illegal, and some 35 million formerly illegal families have caused a 25 year decline in economic standard of living to decline in EVERY community they have moved into, and EVENTUALLY these same communties after 5-10 years become gang infested, drug intensive, ethically corrupt, unlawful, and dangerous over a 5-10 year period. You have only to look at the last 25 years of the decline in Los Angeles, most of California, and other BORDER STATES to know this, and it does not happen ALL IN ONE YEAR’S SILLY INFERENCE REGARDING CRIME STATISTICS.
In fact no-one needs ANY crime statistics to understand the long term detrimental effects of “illegal” immigration into our communities, because they can look OUT THE WINDOW, and see it happen and happen worse every year.
@kelly3406
Kelly, the folks here don’t put much stock in logic, they only argue from emotion, which is why they rarely get things right. They can’t understand here that other factors such as economic conditions (that are happening in the whole country, not just Prince William) have an effect on crime rates. They would not comprehend that the most hardcore lawbreakers are the most difficult ones to get rid of and to keep from coming back. the only thing they understand is to blame the resolution for everything from the plummeting stock market to citing the resolution as a cause of the American Civil War. It’s fun to watch, though.
I never agree with Slowpoke but on this point I do agree. As more people get stressed and desperate you will see crime escalate. Hard economic times have an effect on the crime rates. In addition, hard economic times also have an effect on increases in child protective services.
If you love living like the third world, then just continue to “love” and encourage “illegal” immigrants more than you love your community standard of living.
If most of you persist in this stupidity, I have the resources to simply move to a wealthier, “non-illegal” immigrant community, and will tell you I told you so as you naively create the next “crime-infested, impoverished Southern California”. If you win and I don’t, I’ll simply just ignore you and move away to let you rot with your own stupidity.
Kelly and Slow, you lose credibility when you broad-brush with works like ‘the folks here’ and ‘you people.’ Slow, you have been here long enough to know that there are a variety of opinions here.
Slow, you know that we continue to dwell on this topic of crime because Corey Stewart keeps going all over the country telling people that crime was reduced by 20% after the resolution passed. (or the illegals left–depending on his audience)
He is pulling that figure out of his butt.
Micael, that was very impolite. I would prefer our posters not address others like that. We have a variety of opinions on this blog. We aren’t all on the same sheet of music, which is a good thing.
No one here thinks illegal immigration is a good thing, to my knowledge. However, many of us reject the solution offered by the Immigration Resolution. We felt it caused more community problems than it solved. The operative word is MANY OF US, not all of us.
Excuse me, Michael. My family lives in Southern California about 40 miles NW of Los Angeles. It is hardly impoverished or crime ridden. Talk about a broad brush. Don’t label all of Southern California that way.
Hey it is a big country. If you do not like it here move to the mid-west where there a wide open plains where no one lives. You can drive hundreds of miles and not see one soul. Sounds like a place you would like.
You know, it’s funny you mention that, because as I was writing that, I actually did think about you, and had a little twinge of “I’m actually including people in this who show reason”. Then you called me on it. So I have to say, you’re right about the broad brush thing, and I’m sorry for that.
That was aimed at moon-howler…I goofed and didn’t put it in the note.
MH,
With all due respect, this blog keeps hammering the Resolution for all ills as some have accused others of blaming illegals. I’ve asked this before and never get successful examples of how some of the problems attributed to illegal immigrants have been handled. Overcrowding is one example that to this day has no enforceable solution that I have heard. Our HOA has been trying for several months to enforce several rules that some home owners have chosen to ignore, and it is a time consuming and costly process with legal proceedings involved. Take that effort and multiply it by perhaps thousands throughout PWC, and you can see that there has to be a more efficient way to rectify these problems. The Resolution may not have been popular with illegal supporters, but with the exodus of illegals went the related problems.
Now here’s everyone’s opportunity to list problems and successful solutions that have been implemented with successful and timely results. I don’t mean suggestions, but actual cases. Remember, all Herndon was trying to do was remove people who loitered at a local 7-11, and you saw how involved that got!
SecondAlamo,
My husband’s best friend gets a seasonal visa and works for a landscaping company in Maryland. The owner of the company owns a townhouse where his employees live. He takes $200/ paycheck for lodging. The crooked part is that it doesn’t matter how many of these guys he loads into the house, he never changes the amount that he withdraws from their paycheck. If you object to anything, he won’t bring you back next year. So, here you have overcrowding and it’s a bunch of legal guys living there. How are you going to solve that problem? It’s an overcrowding issue completely unrelated to immigration status.
Yes, much of what has happened is tied to the economy. Isn’t that what some of us have stated repeatedly from the get go. Overcrowding is partly a result of lack of affordable housing. I can tell you my great grandparents on my father’s side lived in tenament buildings in NYC. They lived as an extended familial unit. Immigrants regardless of status have exhibited this behavior for quite some time. What’s different now is that they can no longer afford to live in the city and have ventured into the suburbs.
Alanna, clearly, your husband’s best friend is the neighborhood’s nightmare. This is where neighborhood services needs to step in and take a look at how many people live in a townhouse. Its rude of him to load up a townhouse with however many workers he can load in for $200 a month. How can limited parking ever be fair with his attitude towards tennants?
I can’t imagine all of your ancestors in NYC having vehicles in a townhouse neighborhood. What you describe is a neighborhood over crowding issue regardless of immigration status and who would not object to that? Operating a “rooming house” in a residential neighborhood is against zoning regulations in Prince William County. Quite different from extended family.
Alanna,
I think your husband has made a bad choice for a BEST friend. This casts a poor reflection on him and you both. Perhaps this is why you tend to not see the problems that we see. With friends of this nature it’s easy to understand your support for people who exhibit otherwise unacceptable behavior.
Alanna,
I apologize, I misread the part where your husband’s friend wasn’t the owner of the townhouse. Oops! Never mind!
Second Alamo Zavala,
I bet you do not know who Zavala was! As a conservative, I don’t assume or jump to conclusions without investigating everything. SA, your comment and later apology is a common mistake of people of different opinions that are using our Conservative principles to conclude ideas that are sometimes unkind to people. You should read and think before you open your lap tap and write. Oops! I forgot that the First Amendment of our Constitution also allows stupid comments to be heard.
I love it when our resident Duecasters rant and whine that crime rates going up are NOT a good measure of the Immigration Resolution’s utter failure. So funny!!! Economic and housing market trends are NOT evidence of the negative impacts of the Resolution???? Too funny!
It wasn’t long ago that vauge estimations about “crime” and unsubstantiated suppositions about the economic effect of having immigrants around here was THE ONLY justification for the millions and millions of dollars we hurriedly wasted to fund this act of group hysteria.
Talk about hoisting them on petard!
Do you have to have a license to run a rooming house? If so, who oversees that kind of thing? Or does anyone?
Just to be super clear, my husband’s friend is a legal visa holder, presumably so is everyone else who lives there. Anyways, he’s basically stuck because if he opens his mouth the boss won’t bring him back next year. I’ve never been to the place so I don’t know the details. I just know he complained to my husband about the living conditions. Again, this is in Maryland not Prince William County. I guess my point was, yes, that in this instance of overcrowding, it’s not the immigrants fault but the greedy business owner.
I’m not trying to diminish anyone’s neighborhood experiences. We lived in the City of Manassas for over a decade in a townhome. There were issues there, but don’t neighborhoods change over time. New home developments attact a lot of families with kids, then the kids grow up and you’re left with something quite different than it was 20 years ago.
My grandfather’s home in Jackson Heights, NY was an Irish neighborhood when he bought it. There have been different waves of immigrants who have moved in there over the years. It appears to be Asian/Hispanic now.
@Posting As Pinko
No license required, and no oversight. Overcrowding will increase in this economic climate. Nobody should be fooled for one minute, that all that may have lost their home and/or job(this includes American citizens too) will be leaving PWC. They will have to move to more affordable places, and that often means sharing a residence to make the money stretch further. Those families that have school aged children will be the vast majority that stay right here in PWC.
Alanna,
My neighborhood is much different than it was 20 years or even 20 months ago. 😉
Hey Conservador, at least I’m ethical enough to apologize when I discover I’ve made a mistake. I guess I’m just human so Excuuuuuuuuuse Me! God help you if I find you making a mistake…………
“No license required, and no oversight.”
That’s not good, IMHO. Now if there WERE oversight, unfortunately, I wouldn’t trust our local government to do it ethically and objectively. But I DO think there should be some requirements for landlords. Otherwise, no one has protection, not even the landlords.
I want to defend Second Alamo and Slowpoke. I cannot sit quietly by while the heartbreak of Duecaster is hung on them. They do not conduct themselves like that. They are free to voice their opinions here. And both will apologize if they err.
SA has some valid points. There are still neighborhood issues both with the immigrant community and with the non-immigrant community. Yes there are still rooming houses. Yes there are people renting different levels of one house…and lots on each level. Not all are immigrants. I am all for attacking this problem from an issue other than the Resolution.
Not to ask a dumb question, but does anyone really have a copy of the UPdated Resolution? I would like to know exactly what it says. I think maybe SA and I have the same question.
I agree Pinko. Landlords can be as irresponsible as they want. They can pack a house for as much as they can get.
How do we know there are fewer ‘illegals?’
SA:
Zavala fought for the independence of the Republic of Texas. He was the architect of the constitution of Texas, a mix of Zavala and Madison’s views. Unanimously elected Vice President of the Republic of Texas, Zavala was MEXICAN BORN. Zavala fought with the Anglos at the Alamo. There were many other Mexicans with Zavala also fighting for independence from Mexico. Many of Help Save Manassas members would call people like Zavala an illegal alien. I wish to know how his son and daughter will be called by HSM. Information and knowledge will give you better objectivity on the subject. I hope that people that use the brand Republican and Conservative used them in a positive way. I can sit and watch how people in the name of the Republican Party or conservative values incite exclusion or discrimination. Those are not the principles of Thomas Jefferson, Madison or any other Republican.
Conservador,
Thanks for the history lesson, now what’s your point? We are talking about people illegally entering this sovereign nation, and the problems that this undocumented (meaning we don’t know anything about their criminal or health background) group is capable of causing. I’m all for immigration when it is sponsored by this country, but not when it is illegally forced on the country, and then supported only because those entering are human beings. Simple as that. You’re right, exclusion is based on borders, and I’m all for it. The property you own has borders otherwise how would you know what is yours? Why is that such a difficult concept for some?
I tell ya’ what’s getting REAL interesting is the US/Mexico Border drug violence. It’s the most I’ve heard the border in the news in quite a long time. We talk about illegals invading our nation (and it’s true), but what’s going down there is no joke anymore!
SA and Slowpoke Rodriguez.
I don’t think the subject with me is about not wanting to protect our nation. I am all for legal immigration and protecting my country. What I don’t accept are the insults, bigotry and discrimination that some people on Blogs and especially on Black Velvet are using to describe illegal immigrants. That is not the way of a conservative and also not the way of our Founding Fathers. I can’t accept the bigoted behavior as a Conservative and as a Republican, and it is not acceptable, by any means as a Christian Conservative. This discrimination cannot be accepted. That is the distinction between people that criticize illegal immigration with bigotry and me. The very way the two of you have chosen your blogging names suggests that you are prejudiced against Latinos. You’re transparent about it.
In a previous subject I made a comment about the distinction between illegal immigration and the drug trafficking, gang related crime and the drug cartels in Mexico; Rodriguez you should read them. You can watch on Fox news a report on the subject. I know first hand the problem because, and I repeat, I have traveled to Colombia, Mexico, the Mexico/US border and I wrote an investigative paper in college regarding the war on drugs. Have either of you ever used drugs?
While many Americans are fixated on illegal immigration, we have real problems that may be more difficult and complex than immigration. Iran nuclear capabilities, Venezuelan ties with Russia, Cuba reviving relations with Russia, our national debt, and many others… The only subject of importance in PWC appears to revolve around immigration and nothing else.
@Conservador
An investigative paper in college, huh? flip me out!
Okay M-H, you are right. No one is a follower of Mr. Duecaster.
Well, I am sure Mr. Duecaster has some followers. Obviously the Gainesville supervisor must think pretty highly of him since he appointed him to a committee. He has some followers in HSM. I do not think that SA and Slow are followers though and I don’t think that they are like him in their discussion.
Conservator, I don’t think that you can necessarily assume that Slowpoke Rodriguez or Second Alamo are prejudice against Latinos. I think we can count on them disliking illegal immigration but cannot assume that they are prejudiced.
Let me give you an example. I have a friend who lives out in a remote area of Washington State. She has limited exposure to people who are not white. Probably her greatest exposure living in Alaska and Washington has been Native American. She is an older lady and every time she says anything me about blacks, she calls them ‘coloreds.’
I suck air every time she does this. I have tried to explain to her that this terminology is just not politically correct in todays times, regardless of what she grew up with. I can tell you, the lady is not prejudiced. She just uses language that you and I would consider inappropriate. She doesn’t know any better and she doesn’t live in an area that would positively or negatively reinforce her choice of words. Also, all Latinos are Mexicans when she talks.
I have given up correcting her. She gets angry and grouses about people always wanting to be PC.
If you heard her, you might assume she is prejudiced. I know better though….and one would be wrong to assume anything.
Fox News Channel now. Geraldo at Large from the border of El Paso & Juarez, Mexico. The number of murders, rape and kidnappings were unbelievable. Actually they were UFB!!
If anyone else subscribes to Time, there is a blurb on the number of guns sold in the US traced to Mexico and the steady increase over the last few years. In 2006 it was 2,100. In 2007 it was 3,300 and in 2008 it increased to 7,700. An Arizona gun shop owner is going on trial for knowingly selling weapons to buyers working for Mexican drug cartels. Apparently, 9 out of 10 guns recovered from Mexican crime scenes are traced to US gun shops. Now, that is UFB. Supposedly we are fighting the war on drugs, but apparently we are supplying the weapons. That’s just f’ing great.
It sounds to me like we need to change our border policy real fast. Allowing that kind of lawlessness to spill over into the United States will be a real bear to control. It is easier to prevent it in the first place.
I think Twindad was talking about our lawlessness going across the border INTO Mexico, as in our guns on demand culture arming the drug cartels. But yeah it would be nice if contraband wasn’t so easy transport either way.
ShellyB,
That is exactly it. Our wonderful “gun advocates” that don’t want to outlaw the sale of assault rifles because they are afraid their right to hunt a friggin deer, or walk around armed, will be infringed upon. Maybe they ought to discuss the “rule of law” with the operators of these US gun shops that appear to be supplying approximately 90% of weapons to Mexican criminals.
The last two posts are the pinnacle of foolishness. They are so backwards, I wouldn’t even know where to start. I’m guessing they were even typed wrong. I mean….wow.
Wait, I take that back about ShellyB’s comment that it would be nice if contraband wasn’t so easy to transport across the border. It’s more TWINAD that’s so screwed up. Walking around with assault rifles. Hunting deer with an assault rifle. TWINAD, you really don’t know the first thing about firearms, do you?
MH
I am not assuming anything. I am expressing what I think they are doing by using those bloggers’ names; they are clearly making fun of Latinos. I have Hundreds of Latino friends and their common perception of the Republican Party and the Conservative movement is that most conservatives and Republicans are not kind to other people. I am a conservative and a Republican and I’m a Christian; I’m not going to be quiet as long I see people attacking minorities with bigotry and exclusion from our society. There is something that we preach to people all the time and it is called “Personal Responsibility.” We have to take responsibility and act on the duty that we as citizens have. MH, I don’t pretend to be patient and allow misinformation or permit the attitude of, “well, he or she does not know any better,” and then give him or her a pass. I can’t allow that to be my motto while people are being pushed down, excluded, disrespected, insulted…. I am sorry I can’t let that happen and be silent. We have to correct bigoted remarks and realize that their ignorance is not a defense; it doesn’t excuse them.
Many Americans are gluttons to point to the Mexican drug violence and then they relate this to the immigration problem, while at some point in time many of these same people have used narcotics. 112,000,000 Americans have used drugs at some point in life and they have contributed to the drug problem that we face today at the border. Yes, we do need to secure our borders, but the drug violence is not related to immigration in the way these people choose to propagandize. When are we going to take personal responsibility? How convenient is it to blame others and no take accountability?
How about an answer to my question Rodriguez? Have you ever used narcotics? What about your wife or what about your parents, what about any other member of your family?
Slow,
You totally got me wrong. There are people that are outraged that the new administration wants to outlaw assault weapons, as if they have anything to do with people that want to buy guns to go hunting with. They are afraid that if they open the door a tiny crack to ban certain types of weapons, that it will swing it wide open to ban hunting weapons, pistols, etc. WHY is it necessary for Americans to have the right to buy an assault weapon? Can you answer that for me?
Conservador, You misunderstood what I said.
My friend doesn’t know any better as far as being PC is concerned. She has never pushed either group mentioned down, or exclused them or been disrespectful. In fact, she was telling me how much she liked someone she met who was black and had visited her church. She just uses words that might offend those of us who are more politically correct and who do not used old fashioned language that was acceptable 60 years ago but not today.
I don’t think that a name necessarily designates that someone is racist. People come from different times, different cultures and have different experiences. What might be offensive to me might not be offensive to them. That is why it is important to talk about things, such as on this blog, rather than going off assuming people are making fun of anyone else.
I don’t think we need any violence spilling over our borders, regardless. It is time for our government to stop fooling around at the borders. I, like many other people, feel we have to chance of really solving our immigration issues until the borders are secured, not just patrolled.
As for American guns being used, what can I say? that is an age old problem that will probably never be solved. I expect the Palestinians are probably saying the same thing: American weapons. Only difference, its legal gun sales to Israel, not illegal. Same as any other smuggling. What are we going to do about it? If you try to curtail gun sales with laws, you have ever NRA member howling like a stuck pig.