By CNS and the San Fernando Valley Sun/el Sol
The Los Angeles County Board of Supervisors declared a local state of emergency Tuesday, Oct. 14, in response to ongoing federal immigration enforcement raids, alleging the actions are preventing people from going to work and forcing some businesses to close.
Car washes now have signs up announcing they are currently hiring as workers are now reluctant to seek jobs at locations that Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) has targeted.
The San Fernando Valley was hit hard this week by ICE agents. On Monday, Oct. 13, at the Home Depot in Woodland Hills on Victory Boulevard at 10:40 a.m., 15 people were arrested by agents. At about the same time, several ICE agents swooped into the parking lot at the Home Depot on Foothill and Arroyo in the City of San Fernando. The San Fernando Police Department (SFPD) confirmed one man was arrested, and an eyewitness reported that an additional man was able to get away.
Minutes later, at Sylmar Square on Foothill, ICE agents were spotted in the parking lot, but it didn’t appear that any arrests had been made. Also on Monday, in Pacoima, one man was arrested at the Superior Market at Laurel Canyon and Van Nuys Boulevard. At another Superior Market in Pacoima, a short distance away at Laurel Canyon and Osborne, ICE agents pulled two workers out of a white pickup truck and arrested them, leaving the truck abandoned. In Canoga Park, a man was aggressively wrestled to the ground by four ICE agents and arrested.
Over recent months, the Van Nuys Home Depot has been repeatedly raided by immigration agents where the Day Labor Center is located. The intent of the center is to provide a better system for workers to locate jobs and for those who want to hire them, but those efforts have been disrupted when ICE appears. The raids have caused a loss of income for those who’ve had a family member detained or are fearful of going to work, which has caused food insecurity and difficulty paying rent.
Supervisor Lindsey Horvath introduced the motion calling for the drafting of the emergency proclamation in response to a report presented to the board last week by county attorneys on options for possibly enacting an eviction moratorium or other protections for people impacted by the raids.
The Los Angeles Tenants Union advocacy group has been pushing the board for weeks to enact such a moratorium, saying the raids are creating enough fear to prevent people from going to work, or prompting businesses to temporarily close, leaving their employees unable to work.
The county attorney’s report noted that an eviction moratorium could be enacted during a declared local emergency, but it would have to be “temporary and narrowly tailored” to address impacts of the emergency, while also protecting landlords’ due process rights and requiring tenants to ultimately repay back rent.
Attorneys said in the report that a local emergency can be declared if there are “conditions of disaster or of extreme peril to the safety of persons and property within the territorial limits of a county.”
Supervisors voted 4-1 on Tuesday to proclaim the emergency.
“We have to make sure that we are living our values and putting them into action, and that’s what this proclamation is about,” Horvath said.
Supervisor Janice Hahn said the proclamation was needed in response to “the fear, the pain and the disorder these ICE raids are causing our community.”
“We have entire families who are destitute because their fathers or mothers were taken from their workplaces,” Hahn said, later adding, “I want our immigrant communities to know that we are in this emergency with them, we see them and we understand what they are going through.”
Supervisor Holly Mitchell said she believes the aggressive actions of immigration agents “have emboldened others” to carry out race-based violence and acts of hate in the community.
Board of Supervisors Chair Kathryn Barger was the lone no vote against the proclamation. She said previously she believed the action would lead to legal action by the federal government.
“The federal government has sole authority to enforce federal immigration law, and local government cannot impede that authority,” Barger said in a statement last week. “I believe the county should focus its efforts on advocating for meaningful federal immigration reform. We need policies that are fair, pragmatic and create legal pathways for individuals who want to remain in the country, work hard and contribute to their communities.”
The proclamation approved by the board states that the raids that began around June 6 “have caused residents to be fearful of leaving their homes, to go to work, take public transportation, access county services, including medical services, access open public programs and resources and attend appointments with immigration lawyers and legal service providers.”
The immigration actions “have created a climate of fear, leading to widespread disruption in daily life and adverse impacts to our regional economy due to decreased attendance at workplaces, the temporary or permanent closure of businesses and restaurants and increased strain on our local institutions such as schools, hospitals and places of worship,” according to the proclamation.
The document also cites a recent survey that found a 62% drop in average weekly earnings for immigrants. The survey also found that 71% of immigrants have returned to work despite deportation fears, because they were facing possible eviction, and some contended their landlords threatened to report them to the United States Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) if they did not pay rent, according to the proclamation.
“Based upon these conditions of extreme peril and the county’s commitment to protect the health, safety and welfare of its residents and property, the county is likely to require resources well beyond the control of the services, personnel, equipment and facilities of the county,” the proclamation states.
“The mobilization of local resources, and the ability to coordinate interagency response, accelerate procurement of vital supplies and use of combined forces of other political subdivisions, will be critical to successfully respond to the ongoing conditions and adverse impacts.”
According to Horvath’s office, the proclamation will “empower the county to expedite contracting, procurement and hiring; request additional financial assistance and mutual aid; and take all necessary emergency actions to support and stabilize impacted communities.”