City of San Elizario moves to block resources for proposed ICE detention centers

SAN ELIZARIO, Texas (KVIA) -- The City of San Elizario held its council meeting on Tuesday and unanimously approved the following two items:

"14. Discussion and Action: Regarding a Resolution supporting Emergency Services District #2 decision to protect our health and resources and to limit or deny permits to detention facilities that would create mass strain on personnel or resources."

"15. Discussion and Action: Regarding approving a Resolution supporting Lower Valley Water District denial of services to the proposed Department of Homeland Security proposed detention facility."

Both items were proposed by San Elizario Alderperson Place 5 Thomas Black.

ABC-7 spoke with the Mayor of San Elizario, Miguel Chacon, who said the council anonymously passed those two items because they wanted to join efforts with the cities of Socorro, El Paso, and the County of El Paso to raise their voices to the federal government over future detention facilities.

San Elizario Mayor Chacon says he supports this item for the following reasons:

• The resources these detention centers are going to be taking from the region
• The proposed new facility in Socorro, Texas, is set to be opened in warehouses not designed to accommodate a detention center.
• The water resources that it will need.

"We live in a desert, so right now we are going through one of our worst dry seasons ever recorded and I believe it's time for the city of San Elizario to fight for the water, not just for the water from our city, but for the region; so those are the main reasons why we are opposed to these detention centers from opening here," Mayor Chacon said. "We hear, we see what is happening at other detention centers across the nation, and we know there's a violation of human rights; we have women, we have children detained in these facilities, and this is not what the City of San Elizario represents."

"The City of San Elizario, not just us, but the County of El Paso, is built by immigrants; we are a welcoming immigrant community, so we need to be with them and support this because there's a lot of violation of human rights in these detention centers, and we cannot afford to continue supporting this from happening," Mayor Chacon added.

For the City of San Elizario and Mayor Chacon, it feels great to find a common ground in something and have the support from former Mayors, from other cities, and from other organizations that have also raised their voices against ICE facilities. "It feels great to find common ground and to unify the community against something that is happening across the nation."

ABC-7 also spoke with Fire Chief and Marshal of El Paso County Emergency Services District #2, Roger Esparza, whose district covers every city in the county, but El Paso and Horizon cities.

Chief Esparza says they have evaluated how many emergency calls they are planning to have at the detention center in Socorro, since it is unknown for now, but the ambulance thing is a concern for them, since his department does not manage them; it's managed through the county.

"When you look at manufacturing warehouses, it's very few people; they're manufacturing, you're not living there, you're not showering there, you're not using that, you can have a couple of hundred people working there, and it's very minimal water usage," Chief Esparza said. "Versus now that they're looking to have 8,000 or 9,000 people living there per se, and showering, restroom usage, everything that goes with somebody being detained."

ESD #2 has discussed with the Lower Valley Water District before this new detention center was announced, and the problems the area was having with some of the hydrants, as the utility has been trying to resolve some of those issues, according to Chief Esparza.

"Now this is going to possibly hinder, I don't know how they're going to handle, that's on their side, on the water side, but I think it's going to be a burden for us as the fire department," Chief Esparza said. "I did have a meeting with the ICE people here locally, and they were half and half receptive, or maybe not receptive, they may come to us, but you know, they're the federal government, they think they can do whatever it is they want, right?"

ABC-7 also reached out to the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) and Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) for comment and for interviews.

A spokesperson with DHS sent us the following written statement they have previously sent to us for other stories relating to the ICE detention center in Socorro:

“As with any transition, we are reviewing agency policies and proposals. As Secretary Mullin said in his confirmation hearing: ‘I will work with the community leaders and make sure that we are delivering for the American people what the President set out… We want to work with community leaders. We want to be good partners.’”

San Elizario Chacon also raised concerns over the fact that if something happens at the detention center, ESD #2 will have to cover it, not the federal government, and local taxpayers will eventually have to pay for that.

"As an immigrant myself, it makes me feel great that I represent a city where the majority of my council members are in agreement on this very controversial topic across the nation, but at the end, I feel happy that we have not only the support of my council members, but the full support of my community on this," Mayor Chacon also said. "I hope that at the end, the federal government realizes that we're not welcoming the detention centers in our community."

He is aware that the Mayor of Socorro, Rudy Cruz Jr., is also doing everything he can to raise his voice and his community's voice out in Washington D.C. to prevent this from happening, along with El Paso County Commissioner for District 3, Iliana Holguin, and Congresswoman Veronica Escobar (D-Texas).

"I think we're coming together more as a community more than ever, from the west side to the east side, we're all different, but I think now that we see these issues coming into El Paso, we're starting to pull more together, and we put aside whatever their political views are, and we're working more together, ESD #2 Chief Esparza added. "But I think it is going to be a very stressful situation, a taxing situation, more for the fire department than anything, because when they call, we will have to respond.

"I know that when I did have the conversations with ICE, they did mention that there could be some funding available to us to augment our operations, but from what I've heard in other locations, they've (ICE) said the same thing, but there's been no augmentation of it, so I'm not even going to worry about that," Chief Esparza added. "Our sole purpose here is to respond to every call that we get, and we'll figure that out later."

ESD #2 did a quick preview of what could happen once this proposed detention center starts operating in Socorro, but Chief Esparza says one of the things that caught everybody's attention was the possible tax increase situation for the county.

"Nobody thinks about this, but every taxpayer for the El Paso County area that pays into ESD #2 knows that they're paying into the fire department, right? Unfortunately, this big facility will not be contributing to that because they are the federal government, so they're tax-exempt," Chief Esparza said. "So the county residents will have to foot the burden for that facility, and that was made very clear to me by the individuals at ICE, that that's just the way that they see it, it's our burden to pay for it because that's what they do."

ESD #2 currently has only around 34 firefighters ready to respond to Clint, Fabens, Montana Vista, San Elizario, Socorro, and West Valley, among others.

"Do we have the manpower right now to do it? No, in this year's budget, I'm hoping to put an additional 20 firefighters on staff, and maybe they'll get approved. Still, maybe they will not get approved and that's what we're looking at to be able to accomplish everything that we're going to have to do right now to get going for these tasks," Chief Esparza added. "So in other words, that if we needed funding, the federal government would have to subsidize for us to get more staffing, but like I said, a lot of cities that have been told that they haven't seen any of the funding come available."