Councilman Bob Zemel said Thursday that he plans to fly to Washington this month to lobby for federal money to station an immigration agent at City Jail.
Zemel contends that an Immigration and Naturalization Service officer would help identify illegal immigrants, so they would not be freed pending a court appearance. Zemel and others argue that they often do not show up for court but remain free to commit crimes.
"I feel like we've had to swim upstream to get this understood," Zemel said. "We're not talking about kids in school or patients in clinics. We're talking about repeat felons in this country illegally."
Zemel's plan received only lukewarm support from a majority of the City Council, who said that the control of immigration is the responsibility of the federal government and that they did not want to spend city money on an INS agent. Hence, Zemel is seeking federal help.
