Springfield may change contract with ICE

SPRINGFIELD — The City Council may revise a contract that for six years has allowed U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement to house undocumented immigrants in the Springfield Municipal Jail, amid recent protests by local immigrant rights advocates over the arrangement.

The council is expected to vote Monday on proposed changes to the Springfield Police Department's contract, or statement of work, with ICE. Some of the proposals make minor changes to the contract's language, but one would bar the housing of ICE detainees whose only accused crime is entering the United States illegally.

That would mark a significant policy shift for the city, which since 2012 has rented up to five of its 100 municipal jail beds at a time for inmates transferred there from other ICE detention centers, including those who were accused of violating federal immigration law. ICE inmates are housed in the Springfield jail for up to 72 hours.

"The proposed Statement of Work adds a requirement that ICE detainees lodged at Springfield Municipal Jail must have current criminal activity or a criminal history that adheres to requirements identified in the Proposed Statement of Work," a memo attached to Springfield city councilors' Monday meeting agenda states. "Springfield Municipal Jail would not be holding persons whose only violation of law is that they are persons of foreign citizenship present in the United States in violation of federal immigration laws."

The Springfield Police Department hasn't held inmates it detained on ICE hold requests since 2014, when a federal judge ruled that a Clackamas County woman's rights were violated when she was held past her sentence based on suspicions about her immigration status.

ICE agents can request that a local law enforcement agency hold an inmate in custody past his or her sentence if the inmate is suspected of being in the country illegally.

But Oregon's sanctuary law bars police and sheriff's departments from using local resources to arrest someone whose only suspected crime is being in the country illegally. And since the 2014 ruling, most police and sheriff's offices in Oregon have stopped cooperating with ICE detainment requests, including in Springfield.

City officials have said housing inmates already detained by ICE doesn't violate state law or the court ruling, however. That's because local resources aren't being used to apprehend suspected undocumented immigrants, only to house inmates already in ICE custody.

Local advocates have been writing city councilors and Mayor Christine Lundberg in recent months, urging them to cancel the ICE contract and packing City Council chambers to decry any cooperation between the city and ICE agents.

The jail housed 92 ICE detainees last year, according to the City Council memo. In previous fiscal years it held 40 to 50.

The vote comes as nationwide tensions have ratcheted up over the Trump administration's "zero-tolerance" policy toward undocumented immigrants detained at the U.S. border with Mexico.

City officials say the ICE agreement is just one of several contracts with other jurisdictions to house inmates in the Springfield Municipal Jail. The city rents beds for $80 per day, which has raised nearly $500,000 for jail operations during the past three years. The ICE contract has accounted for about $14,000 of that total.

Follow Elon Glucklich on Twitter @EGlucklich. Email elon.glucklich@registerguard.com.

The council is expected to vote on the city's temporary services agreement with ICE

Where: Springfield City Hall, Council Meeting Room, 225 Fifth St.

When: Monday; council meeting starts at 7 p.m.