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courier-journal.com
Organizations gather to
oppose immigration bill
By Martha Elson * melson@courierjournal.com+
January 8, 2011
About 80 people gathered Saturday to talk about
how to stop controversial immigration legislation
passed Friday by the state Senate.
“It should have us all angry,” said Ron Russell, an
immigration attorney in Louisville and a
participant in the Kentucky May Day Coalition,
which helped organize the meeting at the
Americana Community Center on Southside
Drive.
Russell said the bill “is against every person in
Kentucky's interests.”
Senate Bill 6, which passed 24-14, with all
Republicans voting yes and all Democrats except
Sen. Ray Jones of Pikeville voting no, was sent on
to the House.
Participants at the meeting discussed how to
prevent it from passing the House and becoming
law.
One of those attending was Rep. Reginald
Meeks, D-Louisville, who said he would rather
people be “smart” than “angry” and urged
everyone “to work together intelligently.”
The legislature is on a break and will reconvene
Feb. 1. Meeks said opponents should focus on
influencing members of the House Judiciary
Committee, which will take up the bill next.
The bill would expand the state's authority to
enforce federal immigration law. It includes
provisions that authorize police to attempt to
determine a person's immigration status if he or
she is stopped for another reason, such as a
traffic violation, and is suspected of being an
illegal immigrant.
Critics say the bill is unfair to immigrants and
could be too expensive for state and local
governments to enforce..
However, the bill's sponsor, Sen. John Schickel, R-
Union, said Friday that illegal immigration is a
threat to the safety of Kentuckians and citizens
must be protected “even if it's inconvenient,
uncomfortable or too costly to do so.”
Strategies for opposing the bill suggested during
the meeting included writing to public officials,
rallying in Frankfort, posting videos about the
legislation on YouTube and lobbying legislators.
The bill is “creating a stir,” said Carla Wallace of
the Fairness Campaign, which advocates for gay
rights. “People are upset.”
Visibility of opponents is “really, really key,” she
said.
Groups represented at the meeting included the
Kentucky Alliance against Racist and Political
Oppression, Kentuckians for the Commonwealth,
Kentucky Commission on Human Rights,
Fellowship of Reconciliation, Sisters of Charity of
Nazareth and Central Presbyterian Church.
“Many of my Latino friends don't know what's
going on,” said Tony Aja, the coordinator of
Hispanic and Latino Ministries with the
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Format Dynamics :: CleanPrint :: http://www.courier-journal.convarticle... http://www.courier-journal.com/fdep/? 1294575045 106
Church U.S.A. “We need some kind of meeting in posing the Senate bill and supporting
Spanish.” mprehensive immigration reform, will held a meeting
It the Americana Community Center. (Kylene Lloyd,
| 7 ‘The Courier-Journal) January 8, 2010
The Senate bill would also ban communities from
adopting ordinances to limit immigration
enforcement, create the offense of trespassing
for those in the state without legal status and
make it a crime for anyone to assist such a
person in coming to live in the state.
Ben Ruiz, an organizer of the meeting who co-
owns an advertising agency in Louisville, said
beforehand that he was born in Mexico and
“came to the U.S. to experience true freedom.”
“This robs a lot of us” of freedom, he said. “It
seems to be very un-American.”
The bill is modeled on a controversial Arizona
law, the enforcement of which was blocked last
summer by a federal judge.
Noelle Tennis Golden of Old Louisville, who came
to the meeting with her family, said she had
been “doing what | could to block the law in
Arizona,” including participating in an online
campaign against it, and wanted to join the
effort here, too.
The debate about the bill could be an occasion to
promote a “climate change” in peoples' attitudes,
said Homer White, a Georgetown College
teacher.
He suggested looking at ways to make Kentucky
more welcoming to immigrant labor and to help
bring people together — however they came to
this country.
“We do share a common future,” he said.
Reporter Martha Elson can be reached at (502)
582-7061.
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