In a reaction to last night’s Unified Government Commission vote approving a Safe and Welcoming ordinance for Kansas City, Kansas, the Kansas attorney general today urged the Kansas Legislature to prohibit sanctuary cities.
At last night’s meeting, UG officials stated this was not a sanctuary city ordinance that passed. The ordinance was to provide a city identification card, and also to state that local authorities would not notify federal immigration officials about undocumented workers.
The KCK ordinance states that UG resources cannot be used to enforce federal immigration law. It also establishes a local identification card program for people who do not have ID. The ID program will be run through a third-party contractor, not directly by the city. The ordinance also welcomes immigrants and their families to the community.
Attorney General Derek Schmidt’s statement, however, called it a sanctuary city ordinance.
“The local government in Kansas City last night narrowly adopted an ordinance that, in colloquial terms, designates Wyandotte County in some ways as a ‘sanctuary’ jurisdiction for illegal immigrants,” Schmidt stated in a release on Friday. “In part, the ordinance attempts to prohibit or impede Kansas City law enforcement officers from participating or assisting in the enforcement of immigration law. This action is the latest by a Kansas municipality to limit local law enforcement cooperation with federal immigration authorities. In my view, it is unwise to inject a patchwork of local immigration politics into law enforcement activities in this manner, particularly at a time when the Biden administration continues to fail in its duty to secure our southern border. It is possible to welcome immigrants without ordering the police to ignore the law.”
“Despite these serious concerns, it is not entirely clear that current state law prohibits what is being done in Kansas City,” Schmidt wrote in his statement. “Even after years of discussion and debate, the State of Kansas has not adopted a state statute specifically prohibiting local ‘sanctuary’ jurisdictions for illegal immigration. I believe it is now necessary and appropriate to do so, and I call upon the Legislature to enact a clear, strong and effective state law on this subject this year.”
Kansas City, Kansas, Police Chief Karl Oakman spoke at the Thursday night meeting, and he said that the KCK police are not currently notifying immigration authorities about undocumented workers, and he is not aware of any cases where they have not done so for some years. It is not a current practice at the KCK police department, he said. The law asks federal authorities to enforce federal immigration laws, according to police, while the police enforce state and local statutes and ordinances, not federal ones.
Sheriff Dan Soptic also spoke at the meeting and told the commission that his office routinely will notify immigration authorities of the presence of an undocumented person if they are doing a background check at the jail and the name comes up with a federal judicial warrant. The sheriff’s office is not under the new ordinance, however, since the sheriff is an elected county official who is responsible for all the policies in the department, according to UG attorneys. The UG Commission is not over the sheriff’s office in the area of policies, although there is some budgeting that the UG Commission does.
There is nothing in the UG ordinance that would prevent police from enforcing any of the laws, according to supporters of the Safe and Welcoming ordinance who spoke at the Thursday night meeting. Supporters said the new ordinance will make it easier for crime victims who don’t have IDs to come forward and work with the police.
Also, educators who attended the meeting said it will now be easier for parents without IDs to enroll their children in local schools, and it will be easier to get the children and families health care. Only UG departments are required to accept the ID; it is optional for other organizations and businesses whether to accept it, according to UG lawyers. It might also be easier to collect local taxes.
UG Commissioner Melissa Bynum, who supported the ordinance, said nonprofits have estimated there are about 14,000 undocumented adults already in Wyandotte County. She said she is a strong supporter of local law enforcement, and that she sees this new ordinance as an extension of the community policing model that KCK adopted in the 1990s, working more with the community and building trust with the police.
“This is an ordinance that breaks no law,” Commissioner Christian Ramirez said at the Thursday night meeting. “It does not hinder our police. It is something our Police Department is already doing, and we are just putting it in policy.”
Most critics of the new ordinance who spoke at last night’s meeting did not discuss the law enforcement aspect, but instead said that they wanted a citywide vote on the issue.
Lawrence, Kansas, and Roeland Park, Kansas, already have Safe and Welcoming ordinances in place.
To see a story about Thursday night’s UG meeting, visit https://wyandotteonline.com/category/unified-government-commission/.
More information about the meeting, including public comments by many speakers, is at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FGfQkbCorks.
To see an earlier story about a UG committee where this topic was discussed in January, visit https://wyandotteonline.com/modified-safe-and-welcoming-ordinance-receives-committee-approval/.
