Oak Park is poised to follow in the footsteps of Chicago and Evanston in adopting an ordinance or executive order prohibiting federal agents from using village property to help conduct immigration related law enforcement activity.
Village officials have already been monitoring the Village Hall parking lot to make sure federal agents are not using it to gather as they were reported to have done one morning last month. The Village Board also wants to work with other units of local government to inform Oak Park residents of what they can do to protect people who might be targeted by federal immigration officers.
“Resistance is necessary,” Oak Park village President Vicki Scaman said Oct. 21 at a Village Board meeting when the issue was discussed.
“We have a very caring community,” Scaman said. “It is capable of mobilizing and being leaders in very challenging times.”
Scaman and some members of the board referred to Oak Park lawyer Scott Sakiyama being arrested and briefly detained on Oct. 20 after he was in his car following an Immigration and Customs Enforcement van and honking his horn and whistling to let those in the vicinity of the van know that ICE agents were around.
“Really when you see somebody yanked out of a car in a street in Oak Park we are in an authoritarian society right now,” Scaman said. “It’s here and, you know, history is going to be on our side for acting and responding and taking care of each other. And when we look back at history where we have seen this before, very, very tragically, history will tell that it is community that protects each other.”
The proposal to prohibit the use of village property for federal immigration operations came from board members Jenna Leving Jacobson and Derek Eder. They also proposed establishing a villagewide communication plan to inform everyone in Oak Park of what they can do when observing federal immigration agents and developing “know your rights” signage for businesses and homes.
The proposal had strong support from the Village Board, and over the next few weeks village staff will work on the details of the plan.
Only one member of the village board, Jim Taglia, expressed any hesitation. While Taglia said that he recognizes and accepts the will of the board he urged caution in implementing the plan.
“The village is like an ant and the federal government is like an elephant, so it’s not a fair fight, if you want to use that word,” Taglia said. “I will say, for what it’s worth, that I am concerned, to some decree, about retaliation. We have to be mindful that the (federal) government is not just going to allow things to always happen. They take action. I don’t want to see National Guard marching down Lake Street. I think that would be devastating. That would make matters far worse.”
Trustee Brian Straw was strongly in favor of taking action even as he wondered if the village was the best messenger for telling people how to respond to immigration enforcement. Straw and other Village Board members emphasized the need for a coordinated response from all units of local government.
Straw said Oak Park homeowners have a responsibility to protect people working at their homes. He encouraged signage that stated that federal agents could not enter private property without a signed warrant from a judge, adding residents should develop a safety plan for themselves and for those who might be working on their property.
“I’m not sure that the village as a body is the right body to deliver that message, but we should be finding out who is,” Straw said. “We should be, each of us individually and each of the residents who are listening, should be thinking about what they are going to do to protect the people who they are considering putting at risk because these ICE agents have forced roofers to jump off roofs in Naperville. They’ve apprehended people who were just on the side of the street selling tamales and have been doing so for years and years.”
Straw decried “federal agents driving around looking for people who have brown skin and asking them for their papers.”
“If they cannot produce papers they are implementing what’s called a Kavanaugh stop where they apprehend them, they abduct them for a period of hours while they attempt to confirm what their immigration status is,” he said. “In some cases they are released with a citation for failing to have their papers on them because we now live in a country where you have to prove your legal residency.
“If you’re not a citizen or if they can’t identify legal residency for the individuals, they remain detained for days on end in a situation where long term detention was never the design of the facility. The conditions are unspeakable and they are consistently being asked to sign papers which often time they do not understand, without legal representation, to be voluntarily deported.”
The Village Board will likely next take up the issue at its Nov. 4 meeting.
Bob Skolnik is a freelance reporter for Pioneer Press.