FRESNO, California — The Fresno City Council voted 6-1 on Thursday, November 12, to bar U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) from staging and conducting immigration enforcement operations on city-owned property, turning a proposal first reported before the vote into adopted city policy. The measure passed on the council's consent calendar, with Councilmember Nick Richardson casting the lone vote against it, Fresnoland reported.
What the adopted policy does
Under the resolution, the city will not voluntarily offer city-owned property for staging, processing, surveillance or logistics in federal immigration enforcement operations. The council also approved establishing procedures for implementation, accountability and reporting of any unauthorized use of city facilities for enforcement. The policy was sponsored by Councilmembers Annalisa Perea and Nelson Esparza.
The resolution applies to city-owned public property including parking lots, parks, recreation facilities and vacant land, Sukaina Hussain, deputy executive director of the California Immigrant Policy Center, told Fresnoland. “When there is trust between the community and our local government, our communities are safer, healthier and are more productive,” Hussain said. “Local resources are for local communities. City places are paid for by public tax dollars, and should be utilized for the community that funds them.”
Why supporters pushed for the ban
Supporters pointed to staging — federal agents preparing for operations — seen at Roeding Park and at various parking lots in downtown Fresno, and to the arrest of an individual by ICE at the Fresno airport in August, as reasons the policy was needed. Legal observers with the Valley Watch Network have also reported seeing staging in downtown Fresno, and immigrant-rights advocates held a news conference outside City Hall early Thursday to press for the resolution.
“Fear is crippling, and emotional fear is real, and nobody should have to fear whether or not it's safe for them to walk out of their home,” Perea said at the news conference. She said the city has jurisdiction to oversee what types of operations stage on its sites and that the resolution “establishes reasonable boundaries” for the voluntary use of city property, adding: “We can uphold the law while making decisions that reflect our responsibility as Fresno leaders to our residents.”
Mayor Jerry Dyer agreed with the resolution that ICE is not welcome on city property, as long as, in his words, “there's not an expectation that we're going to have armed police officers going out and confronting armed ICE agents. Because I can't see any good come from that.”
What the policy does not do
Esparza stressed the limits of the measure. City employees and paid security “will be expected to document and report attempts to use city property” in enforcement actions, with the city attorney being notified, he said. “I also want to be clear that this resolution, what it does not do, does not close public spaces to federal officers, and it does not interfere with legitimate criminal law enforcement,” Esparza said. Independent reporting on the resolution text noted that federal officers may still enter areas of city property generally open to the public and may operate with a valid warrant or court order.
Background: a state law and a growing list of cities
Supporters said they were inspired by AB 1807, a California law that takes effect in January and bans staging and enforcement by ICE on state-owned property. Fremont, Santa Rosa and Alameda County have also recently passed similar ordinances, according to Fresnoland. Thursday's vote also follows the council's recent decision to re-establish a $1 million Immigrant Legal Defense Fund to assist immigrants facing deportation.
For Fresno's large immigrant communities — including the Punjabi and Sikh families who live and work across the Central Valley, many of them in trucking, farming and small business — the practical question is how the policy will work on the ground. Reporting on the vote noted that who will enforce the policy, and how, is not yet fully spelled out, and the resolution as reported does not list penalties. The city must now build the implementation, accountability and reporting procedures the council approved alongside the ban.
What happens next
The next steps sit with city staff, who must put the documentation and reporting system in place, and with events themselves: any attempt to stage an operation on city property will be the first real test of the policy. Perea, the resolution's lead sponsor, is also leaving the council soon — she won the Assembly District 31 seat on November 3 and is set to leave for Sacramento on December 7, making this one of her final major acts on the council. Awaaz Punjab will follow how Fresno implements the ban and whether federal agencies challenge or comply with it.