Here is a calendar with the upcoming screenings for the film series. The Unity Film Series at George Mason’s Prince William Campus in the Verizon Auditorium is the first in an immigration film series of nine films, with discussions afterward facilitated by GMU students involved in conflict analysis and resolution.
Parking in the Occoquan Lot is free for the film series.
Thanks to Cindy for the reminder, and NGL for the film review of “De Nadie” below.
Wrong Supervisor Stirrup. They didn’t write you in support of Immigration Resolution, they wrote in opposition. Begs the question, does he even read his emails? My personal email has been selectively purged from their list but this just in from some of his other constituents that DON’T SUPPORT THE RESOLUTION!
Thank you for your support for the Rule of Law resolution, which has been very important to me and to the community.
Beginning on Tuesday, July 1, 2008, the Prince William County Police Department began implementing its revised policy regarding illegal immigration enforcement. The policy was amended that police will now inquire into the immigration status of all persons who are under physical custodial arrest for a violation of state or local law. If an immigration violation is believed to exist, police officers will inform the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) concerning that individual. Police officers retain discretion to inquire into immigration status prior to a physical custodial arrest. Police officers will protect crime victims and cooperative witnesses – regardless of their immigration status. Racial profiling is expressly prohibited. Police officers will not detain or arrest individuals based on their national origin, race, religion or creed. During the month of June, all police officers and relevant civilian personnel received training on the new policy and procedures.
More information regarding the Police Department’s immigration enforcement efforts can be found on the web site at: www.pwcgov.org/police.
Due to the numerous emails I have received, my response to you on this issue is general. If I have not answered you according to your need, please email me again at [email protected]
John T. Stirrup
Gainesville District SupervisorPrince William County Government
Sudley North Government Center
7873 Ashton Avenue
Manassas, Virginia 20109Main: 703-792-6195
Fax: 703-792-7664
Website: www.gainesvillesupervisor.com
It’s my understanding that today is the Chairman’s birthday! ¡Feliz Cumpleaños Chairman Stewart!
An article in the Gainesville Times today provides an intelligent, in-depth review of the 9500Liberty special screening to explain the April 29th roll-back of the Immigration Resolution.
For those who were not there last Friday, there is another screening in the works for next week, probably Thursday. In the mean time, here is the more popular of two clips on the 9500Liberty channel, even though the other one is more interesting:
I feel like this was a much more inquisitive piece of writing. The MJM article focused on varying reactions while this article focused on the content of the film:
The film had its share of suspense and drama, even for those who were familiar with the outcomes of each board vote.
Nohe is presented at some points in a fashion similar to a reality television show star who sits in front of a camera and talks about what was going through his mind in between clips of a particular situation.
His most prominent role comes during the climax when the board was trying to decide on a tax rate. At the centerpiece of the funding issue was the $3.1 million price tag to put video cameras in police cars. Deane has asked for the cameras to allow officers to fight the inevitable lawsuits based on charges of racial profiling.
“The whole program’s getting unbelievably expensive,” said Nohe.
Part of the problem was that the resolution had changed several times since its inception.
Originally, it called for police to check the immigration status of every person stopped for a violation. It was later changed to allow police to check the immigration status if the officer has probable cause to believe that the suspect is an illegal immigrant. That variation is the one that prompted the chief to ask for cameras in the police cars.
In order to pay for the cameras, the real estate tax rate would have had to be set at 98.7 cents per $100 of assessed value. After the 98.7 rate failed on a 4-4 vote, Principi asked for a 97-cent rate on a motion to eliminate the cameras and require all immigration checks to be done post-arrest.
That failed 7-1.
Viewers find out here that during a behind-the-scenes meeting between Stewart and Principi, the Republican chairman asked the Democrat to go back on his resolution.
“There’s not a hell’s worth of chance that I would oppose it,” the Woodbridge supervisor said he responded, later adding that since their break, he had the five votes needed to get a similar version of his motion passed with fewer cameras and all immigration checks moved to post-arrest.
It passed unanimously, leading Principi, who once said the illegal immigration resolution was “essentially failing,” to tell the filmmakers on camera, “I’m going to declare victory and go home.”
The post-arrest scenario, which is what was finally adopted, means that after a person has been charged with a crime, police will investigate their immigration status. Since every person charged will be checked, there is less concern about racial-profiling complaints.
Deja Vu, PWConservative posts about his second encounter(in two months) with a hit & run driver and for the second time he didn’t call the cops. Just to clarify, I have never suggested that the police shouldn’t be summoned to investigate a car accident. If you have property damage and need a police report, call the police! In the same situation, I wouldn’t hesitate to call.
But ,oddly, PWConservative tries to blame me for giving him the “impression that the Gestapo had been going door to door dragging every single Hispanic off to a Deportation Camp.”
Anyway, It’s time to stop the fear mongering, Accusing Conservatives of Xenophobia while using fear tactics to advance a political agenda is not only hypocritical, But it’s also not that different from terrorism.
– Fear mongering? Really.
In both these cases the guys stopped the cars, inspected damage and presumably checked to see if you were alright. In the first incident, there was no damage, you neglected to mention whether or not that was the case this time? Anyways, if someone stops checks, looks etc… that doesn’t sound like the typical hit & run.
Anyways, for clarification, what I have said is the following:
“Apparently the County’s resolution wasn’t as drastic as those on the left would have us believe.”
Just do me a favor, call the cops next time.
This Op-Ed in the NY Times, hits the nail on the head. We owe it to our law enforcement officers to come up with a workable federal immigration policy that does not force police departments to succumb to political pressures to ‘reduce immigration by using racial profiling and harassment’.
Without a national immigration policy, a new culture of lawlessness will increasingly permeate our society. In cities, politicians will pressure police departments to reduce immigration by using racial profiling and harassment. At the same time, immigrants who fear that the police will help deport them will rely less on their local officers and instead give thugs control of their neighborhoods.
Many top law enforcement officials were part of the community policing revolution of the 1980s and ’90s. We have a deep concern for constitutional rights and social justice. We believe that effective policing requires residents, regardless of immigration status, to trust the police.
We are also students of the mistakes of our predecessors. Past police practices helped lead to the civil unrest of the 1960s, which tore our nation apart along racial and political lines. We do not want to repeat those mistakes.
…
America’s police officers deserve thoughtful federal leadership so that we can continue doing our best to provide our country with the security that defines a civilized society.
The Manassas Journal Messenger reports on the Friday night screening of the latest version of the 9500 Liberty screening.
According to the article,
The reaction to the film ran the gamut, after its showing Friday night at Trinity Episcopal Church in Manassas.
Chris Pannell, who left Help Save Manassas this spring, praised the video. Woodbridge Workers Committee Nancy Lyall enjoyed the film, but expressed her outrage at the resolution.
City Councilman Jonathan Way said the presentation was interesting but that he learned nothing new.
“It was far less contentious and argumentative than I thought it might have been,” Way said.
Conversely, Help Save Manassas member Maureen Wood said the video was one-sided, made Prince William County Board of Supervisors Chairman Corey A. Stewart look like a fool and the filmmakers and she would never “see eye to eye on this issue.”
By Mike Lukovich, Atlanta Journal-Constitution.
According to the Manassas Journal Messenger,
The big difference seems to be price. At the same time Prince William’s sales statistics were soaring 72 percent, median and average sales prices for homes were falling by 34 percent and 31 percent, respectively. In the second quarter of 2008, the county’s median price for a home was $242,232; in the same quarter for 2007, that number stood at $366,845. For the average, the second quarter numbers in Prince William stood at $275,311 in 2008 and $398,775 in 2007.
In this same time period, meanwhile, Northern Virginia’s home prices only dropped on average 12 percent …
Selling everything at bargain blowout prices can’t be good; especially come next year when the County has to assess residential real estate and set the tax rate again.
Great article in the Washington Post concerning the new Virginia requirement and its comparison to Prince William.
Under the state law, local jails probably will spend a fraction of the $10.5 million Prince Willliam has budgeted over the next five years for the ICE partnership.
ICE cannot say how many illegal immigrants from a particular jurisdiction are being deported, only that it cannot remove as many as it would like because of budget limitations. So there are no statistics about what ultimately happens to the illegal immigrants who are reported to ICE — either by way of the new state law or through the federal program, which trains local officers to identify and detain undocumented suspects charged with crimes.
Update July 26th: The special guests were Supervisor Wally Covington and Supervisor Marty Nohe. Also in attendance were Kris Nohe, Marty Nohe’s Senior Aide Tracy Gordon, and Supervisor John Stirrup aide Karen Ulrich.
Update July 25th: Getting word that we will have special guests from the county government attending tonight’s screening. I look forward to seeing everybody there!
Friday, July 25th at 7:30pm
Trinity Episcopal Church
9325 West Street
Manassas, VA 20110
From today’s edition of the Potomac News/Manassas Journal Messenger:
OUR OPINION
Published: July 24, 2008As noted in a recent editorial in a nearby national newspaper, it’s been a year since the Board of Supervisors in Prince William County “launched its drive to hound, harass and humiliate illegal immigrants.” The editorial cites what it calls the toxic effects of the board’s resolution against illegal immigration and claims that “across the nation,” our county has become known as an intolerant community.
We have said before that the resolution doesn’t accomplish anything valuable and the machinations necessary to pursue the policy set by that resolution — like all the hoops through which the county police must jump — have certainly put an unnecessary strain the pocketbooks of taxpayers.
But your local paper agrees with the national newspaper that the board’s action is embarrassing for most of us who live here.
It’s not necessarily this newspaper’s job to practice boosterism and, certainly, part of our job is to point out some of the blemishes we see when the community looks in the mirror, but a year after the board’s regrettable move, we thought it might be appropriate to remind ourselves of the county’s attributes of which we can be proud.
So we turned to the Prince William Regional Chamber of Commerce for some assessments that are far from embarrassing:
1. Our location: We are close the capital of the free world and home to many federal government employees. We have access to good housing and affordable office space.
2. Transportation: Yes, we have issues, but we also have access to three major airports and two smaller ones and a county government that, in the past, has stepped up to build needed some road improvements like the Prince William Parkway and the extended Va. 234.
3. Education: The county is home to a university research and development facility at George Mason and a huge public school system, where teachers work hard to foster success among 72,000 students. (That’s more people than a small city.)
4. Quality of life: We have a couple of symphony orchestras, several community choral groups a thriving theater community, national parks, local parks and — despite the impression left by the
resolution — a diverse population that brings much to any table. We also have a huge heart, demonstrated by ACTS and SERVE and many smaller groups that focus on taking care of those in need.Yes, that 1-year-old resolution is an ugly zit, but the overall reflection from our mirror shows us a pretty good place to live, work and play.
According to the Washington Post,
Prince William, a Year Later
A crackdown’s toxic effectsONE YEAR after Prince William County launched its drive to hound, harass and humiliate illegal immigrants, the toxic effects of the policy — on the county’s reputation, social cohesion, political discourse and neighbors — are increasingly clear.
Across the nation, Prince William has become synonymous with an ugly strain of nativist intolerance that has deep roots in American history but which is a slander on the county’s generally well-educated and diverse population. In this region, almost every other major jurisdiction has spurned Prince William’s approach.
Minorities account for almost half of Prince William’s 370,000 people, and a large slice of that population — around 20 percent — is Hispanic. Most of them are legal residents, but many also have ties of kinship, friendship or employment with others who are undocumented. Many say they have been made to feel unwelcome in Prince William. This year, several dozen religious leaders in the county wrote to local elected officials, warning them of the divisive consequences of the county’s venomous campaign.
Predictably, they got the brushoff from Corey A. Stewart (R-At Large), chairman of the Board of County Supervisors, who has done more than anyone else to plant seeds of discord and hatred in the county. Mr. Stewart is an avid opportunist and manipulator who has an arm’s-length relationship with public candor. Not long ago, he said that a plan to install cameras in police cars — a precondition for his preferred policy of allowing officers to ask suspects about their immigration status almost at will before arrest — would be dropped “over my dead body”; then he dropped it. Lately, he has tried to link a decline in crime to the harsh policies he has advocated. Trouble is, much of the drop is attributable to a fall in robberies that predates the crackdown on illegal immigrants and that probably stemmed from an aggressive anti-robbery campaign by the police.
So what has the county achieved with its effort to intimidate undocumented newcomers by ordering checks on the immigration status of all detainees after arrest and by denying certain social services to illegal immigrants? Without doubt, it has prompted hundreds of Hispanics — legal and illegal — to depart the county. Many of them have moved to surrounding jurisdictions, where they are enrolling in public schools and turning to local government services or nonprofits for help. To Mr. Stewart and his allies, this beggar-thy-neighbor policy is a success. In fact, it has simply branded Prince William as the one locality in the Washington area where demagoguery by elected officials has gotten the better of coolheaded public deliberation.
A letter to the editor from a local teen appeared yesterday in the Manassas Journal Messenger.
Suzie Eskelund
Published: July 20, 2008I am a 17-year-old caucasian girl who has lived in Manassas my whole life. I just want to say thank you for allowing the white, self-righteous and supremacist legal citizens of this fine, upstanding county
to once again have the important jobs back, like fast food and construction. I know it has always been my dream to work the drive through at my neighborhood McDonald’s and now you have made that
dream more possible. I am so proud to be a part of a city that is taking a stand against those pesky brown people. I was riding in the car with my Hawaiian friend when we got pulled over so the nice
policeman could make sure she wasn’t an illegal Latina. I know that in my heart I couldn’t be more thankful for those new laws that you helped pass to racially profile everyone with dark skin. Gee, I don’t even know why I’m friends with her.I know that no one who eats tacos and burritos can be a good person. I mean hey, I don’t want that new Chipotle on Liberia Avenue! These people just need to go back to Mexico and take their children.
They deserve to starve, be in constant danger, and have a poor education.After all, they were born in an inferior country! I don’t want any new customs in my life.
I want to be closed-minded and be surrounded by my pasty friends forever. Please get that diversity away from me!
Now people say that all Americans immigrated here. Well that may be true, but at least all of mine spoke English when they came here! Oh wait… except for my Danish, French, and German relatives.
But no matter, at least it wasn’t Spanish. When I was in high school and I was trying to learn another language, I had the hardest time and struggled through all three years. I hardly remember any of that
language, but who cares? Learning a second language may be really hard for anyone, but it doesn’t matter if your first language was English.Now I look around my upper middle-class neighborhood and see that there are far fewer children for my neighbors to play with. But I rest assured knowing that when they play tag, they won’t get tagged by Latino cooties anymore.
Next, we should give them disease-infested blankets; it worked when we wanted to get rid of Native Americans.
Thank you once again for your efforts to cleanse our community,
SUZIE ESKELUND
Manassas
