Good evening, everyone.

Before we begin tonight's work session, I want to thank everybody for taking their time to attend, both in person and virtually.

During this work session, uh Council will receive an update and discuss the impacts of ICE in our community and what we've been doing and plan to do to address our community's concerns.

The public comments we received at our last meeting were extremely powerful, and it is helping shape how we're responding in areas where we can respond.

Public comment will take place at 7 p.m.

when we move from this room over to the auditorium for a regular meeting.

So during work session, we don't take public comment, but in the council meeting and auditorium, we will take public comment.

During this work session, uh, well, there is no public comment, as I mentioned.

And if you're here in person and would like to speak in the city council session, please fill out a yellow card and give it to Amber.

Amber's right over there.

And yellow cards can be found in the lobby.

Is that right, Amber?

Great.

Um, I'll turn the time over to Robbie Hammond, our city manager, to begin the work session.

Thank you, Mayor.

Good evening, council.

Um we can pull up the PowerPoint.

As he's doing that, I'll kind of go through the agenda for tonight's uh work session.

As Mayor mentioned, we uh are planning to meet both before and after the regular meeting since there's a lot of information to cover.

Um, our first item we're gonna go over.

I'm gonna talk quickly about our shared values and goals.

We're then going to provide uh some updates uh specific to the emergency declaration that the council asks us to look into, uh, community focused funding, community needs, talking about accurate information, and then Chief Coleman is here also to talk about um the actions from our Hillsborough Police Department.

Uh, we have uh proposals from the city council uh that we'll be reviewing.

Our hope is to get at least through the updates, and then we'll start into the uh proposals from council and get as far as we can uh before the meeting, and then we'll pick that back up after the meeting when we get back.

Uh and then afterwards there'll be plenty of time for council discussion.

Uh next slide.

So I shared this slide last week or two weeks ago as well.

And I just wanted to read um let's see just one area.

I talk about how there's shared values and goals that we're uh working through right now.

And uh the council has what we call guiding principles.

And one of those guiding principles I thought I would read is says we build inclusive systems by exemplifying diversity, equity, and inclusion and policy making and service delivery.

We seek to engage the broader Hillsborough community, removing barriers and creating accessible opportunities for all.

By fostering accessibility and honoring our community's unique identity, we create a welcoming and uh innovative and thriving environment for all.

That's just one example of the ways that we are united in what we're trying to do right now.

Um next slide.

With that, I'm gonna turn it over.

Oh, excuse me.

There's a few things that um are gonna guide us as we go through this presentation tonight.

Uh, first, uh that this is kind of our pathway to action.

So, first, our goal is to listen and seek to understand.

That started a couple of weeks ago, as mayor mentioned.

We had a significant amount of public comments that were powerful comments that were important for us to hear.

Uh, we plan to review all of the council's proposals.

The council has a lot of great ideas that we're going through, and we'll talk about those tonight.

Our goal is to create actionable steps as we go through this, aligned with council goals.

Um, everything is changing on a daily basis right now.

So we will continue to evolve as we adapt uh to new information.

We will continue to listen.

Uh, we plan to work with our CBOs, our community-based organizations, um, and then continue our partnerships with them, with the school district and others uh as we trust strive to figure out what's best for our community.

So, with that, I'm gonna turn it over to uh Chad, who's gonna talk about the emergency declaration.

Good evening, council.

Um, so just to sort of follow up on what Robbie was just talking about.

Uh last week or two weeks ago, um, from both you and members of the public, we heard a lot of uh requests and um pleas for an emergency declaration.

Uh we uh it's obviously up to you all as we talked about at the work session whether and to what extent you want to do an emergency declaration.

But in order to give you the opportunity to do that tonight, if you wanted to, we went ahead and drafted an emergency declaration.

And so what we try to do with this emergency declaration is really focus on some of the things that Robbie was just talking about about the values and ideals of the Hillsborough community.

And so you'll see in the resolution that we're we're really trying to do two things.

One in the recital portion, just really lay out various reasons, not only why there's an emergency situation going on in Hillsborough, but also outlining the values that we have for our community.

And so that language talks about the diversity of our community, regardless of immigration status, the uh benefits and role that immigrants have played within our community and how vital it has been to our community, um the negative impacts that ICE is having.

Um we talk about the um council and staff's desire to address these negative impacts.

We recognize that the uh federal government has really let us down in multiple ways by not passing immigration reform to not put us in this kind of situation.

So there's a lot of information, several pages of information to sort of go through and outline the need for the emergency declaration and setting forth these values of the community that support the need for uh declaring this emergency.

I mean, if you can go to the next slide.

And then what we do is after sort of outlining that framework, we come up with some calls for action for the council to focus on.

Um, and so those are sort of the the after uh the we resolve portion of the uh resolution, and that goes through various different things in trying to um get the city to take action and recommendations for the city to take action.

And a lot of these things are things that are already happening, and some of the things are the things that we're continuing to work on, and some of the things are just statements, public statements, um, asking members of Congress, for example, to pass that immigration reform I was just talking about, calling on the state legislature to take action when they go into session that early next year to address some of these problems.

And so there's both sort of twofold, you know, specific concrete actions for the city to take, as well as um just actions of statements of policy that the city desires, you know, others such as members of Congress and the legislature to take.

Um, what we want to do as well is um take some of the information from some of your proposals that we know that we can implement tonight that are consistent with things that we're already implementing.

So, for example, putting signage up throughout the city about public areas versus non-public areas.

That's something that the city is already working on and already doing, and so having that information in the resolution itself already, you know, requesting that the city manager take those actions to so it can be done immediately, and showing the council support for those kinds of actions.

So those are the types of things that we're doing.

We also um, you know, consistent with some of the things we've talked about, we're we're really trying to do this through the some of those actions through the resolution process to maintain that distinction between the administrative and sort of legislative roles of the council and of the city manager, and so those things where we know that you know the city manager can take these actions, the city manager's already taking those actions and just showing your support for those and having that in a formal statement from the council that we can already have that in place through this resolution.

So that was the last aspect of what we're trying to do.

Um, one of the things that I wanted to mention is um councillor Harris, who is not here tonight, suggested some amendments to the resolution, which are in your agenda packet.

And those res those that those amendments are really uh strengthening the language, asking for congressional delegation action on immigration reform.

Um, it's uh the the language is stronger than what we originally drafted.

Uh, as staff, we don't have any problems with that language.

It is absolutely your call about whether you're comfortable with that language and whether you want to include that or not.

You know, this is your resolution, uh, but we wanted to have it here for you tonight to be able to take action if you wanted to.

So that's the emergency declaration in a nutshell.

The last thing I'll just point out is as we talked about last time, this is an emergency declaration that recognizes the state of emergency that we're in right now.

It is not meant to um invoke the emergency powers that come through the city's emergency ordinance.

And the reason for that is twofold.

One is that the city doesn't need to invoke those powers right now.

We have the full authority to do everything that we want to do without needing to uh invoke those powers.

Uh, for example, with the 200,000 that we're giving to the community, we didn't need an emergency declaration to free up that money.

That money was already available to do so.

Um, and and more importantly, the second reason why we didn't do that is because as we've talked about, there's a very specific process that we have to follow for an emergency declaration where we're invoking those powers, which includes um, you know, the city manager making a declaration which can last for two weeks, then the council passing a resolution that can only last for 30 days, so it expires after 30 days.

Whereas with this resolution, it can stay in effect in perpetuity.

We don't have to worry about it expiring.

Um it'll just stay in effect in perpetuity.

So, you know, given the strong feelings about this resolution and the strong impact that we wanted to make with it, we thought having it stay in effect forever was much more meaningful than having to have it expire after 30 days.

So that was the second reason why we did that.

Without I'll answer any questions, but I know you've got a lot to cover tonight, so um I'll stop talking.

Any questions for Chad?

Councilor Rawlcare.

Thank you.

Um, just to understand how this was created, this was decided.

Um so just to understand how this was created, this was this site, and then reflecting back because we had conversation I've asked about this, and Robbie, and you said that we didn't have to do it.

So I just have a few questions.

Um, the city didn't want to.

We had the November 4th meeting, we had public outcry.

Um why now and what changed, and who decided that?

And then I just have a few more.

Um, wrote a resolution for council to approve.

I um appreciate that, but I feel like I've been behind on some things that um staff have created lately that I have had to answer for.

So I'm curious about that.

Um, and the declaration, as I said, wasn't necessary, and those and the reasoning was because city funding was already available, and I just want to clarify that my request for that, as much as we can do to protect community with a state of emergency, um beyond funding.

This is about building trust with people, letting them know we care, we recognize that maybe some of your family members or your workers have been disappeared, taken off the streets, that there has been reckless breaking of laws, etc.

And so to me, that's what the um declaration was going to mean.

So I'm just curious why this went through this process, and it took a while to get here to do that.

And I'm just curious about why.

Certainly.

So uh two weeks ago when this came up at the council.

Um, it wasn't that we didn't want to do one, we were just trying to clarify that it wasn't necessary in order to do the things that the council was asking us to explore, like the funding, like Jad mentioned.

We already have the authority and the ability to do that, and so uh that that still holds true today.

Um, what this is, what's before you tonight is is as Chad mentioned, it's an opportunity for the council to make a statement really with this resolution.

It doesn't necessarily impact anything procedural-wise or logistics-wise within the city because we already have that ability.

This is more of a statement.

Um, the second part to your question, uh, this was um Chad can maybe help me out with this as well, but there were several people that were involved in drafting this.

Uh, we looked at other cities that have also done this.

We looked at Les Chad mentioned some of the things that the council um wanted us to explore doing that made its way in here, like um uh some of the things we're already doing, like additional staff training, uh, what else we can do about signage.

We tried to incorporate incorporate that into here.

So it was a group effort by a lot of people to put this together.

Um, and we wanted to get this in front of the council now so you can consider it.

Uh we could have done this two weeks ago.

Uh, we talked about it at the end of the work session a little bit, but the there was a lot of other discussions going on, and so we tried to make it over the last two weeks to put something together that the count the council could consider this evening in order to adopt.

So the only thing I'll add to to Robbie's comments is I I think if you compare this resolution with some of the other resolutions that have been passed in other jurisdictions, this one seeks to have a much more meaningful impact along the lines of those things you were just talking about, consularal care, you know, really addressing some of those issues that you were just mentioning and trying to recognize those things, whereas the other resolutions and some of the other communities were really more focused on invoking those emergency powers so they could free up money money, and they don't have some of that same depth of language that we try to incorporate in here for you all to really recognize some of those things you were just talking about.

Thanks.

I am so grateful that community showed up and spoke and gave public comment and shared ideas of what you want and what should we change, and then um waited, staff waited to write this declaration.

So I can appreciate that.

I want to just say that um somehow council needs to get in front of some of this and not be on the receiving end of why are we doing this and why did we choose whatever?

I I would like I would like to be involved.

I would like to be more engaged in that rather than just receiving something that is drafted for us to approve.

Um, I'm assuming that we can also make changes tonight to the resolution if we want to have that option too, right?

That's correct.

Council can make any changes they want.

And our effort um just council or all care is really to try to streamline this process.

It's it but when there's seven individuals, what we try to do as staff is is consolidate the ideas that we've heard from the council as a whole to put them in.

So we do that to try to facilitate this process.

Um, but yes, the council has every opportunity to make any changes, and that's up to the whole council.

That sounds good because I want to avoid any perception that a narrative is being created without public input of what we do.

We work for the public, we work for these people.

And city organization works for council.

And I just want to point that out.

I don't know if the public recognizes that, but I certainly believe that I work for people.

So thanks for showing up.

Councilor Sinclair.

Thank you, Mary.

Um tonight's resolution, uh Chad, you had mentioned that this could live in perpetuity.

And I want to be clear that I while I appreciate the different aspects of all of our proposals are in this.

Mine specifically that we'll talk about later tonight, um, has many aspects inside of this resolution.

And this is still not binding in law.

And my goal tonight is to codify jurisdictions.

I want to make that clear that this is not replacement of my proposal tonight for council to further discuss.

Yeah, and this does not preclude that type of action moving forward.

This is just something you could do immediately to sort of get the ball rolling.

It doesn't preclude an ordinance in the future, it doesn't include any preclude any other action.

And just to be clear, the council doesn't have to adopt this tonight.

If you want to take time and edit it and do it in two weeks, that's fine as well.

We just want to make sure that you had the opportunity, if you wanted to act tonight, that you could do so.

That we had something more substantive for you all to review and actually adopt if you wanted to.

But this is your statement.

This is you speaking on behalf of the city to say, here's what we believe, and here's what we would like the city to do.

And so this is your opportunity to either do that tonight or wait two weeks, make your edits as counselor Harrison's proposed edits.

You all have the opportunity to do that.

And so this also doesn't preclude taking other action in the future.

This is a very public statement about the city's position.

And it's up to you all whether you want to adopt it or not.

Thank you.

Any other questions?

Counselor Case.

Um back to kind of what Councilor Alcare was saying, both of you actually.

Um, if we wanted to make, if we wanted to um uh approve this resolution tonight, would we be able to make an addendum to it like in two weeks or yeah, you can amend the resolution, you can uh adopt a new resolution and repeal this one.

There's lots of ways that you could update it and make changes to it.

Make sure we could move forward with it, but if we needed to add, we can or of course thank you.

Any other questions?

Okay.

What else you have for us?

Uh I think it's now over to Simone.

Robbie, um, before we move forward, just wanted to get some clarification just to emerge in in the interest of time.

Um the council will need to decide whether you want to adopt it uh as is with counselor Harris's comments or revisit this in two weeks.

Uh it'd be nice to know that before the end of the work session, uh the the pre-council portion of the work session.

So that's something you just need to let us know because it's on the agenda for the meeting.

So just wanted to flag that.

So we can discuss this now.

Yep.

I would encourage you to make that decision now so that we know what to do when we're going to the council meeting.

Okay.

So we have options of adopting it as is, adopting it as is with counselor Harris's suggestions or other suggestions.

So counselor case.

I'll start.

I liked I like the stronger language in Councilor Harris's suggestions.

Um, so I would prefer that.

I I would prefer that option of the two.

To be added.

Okay.

Any other conditions?

Knowing that if we approve, we can still add addendums.

So it's not set in stone.

But counselor Solgato.

I was just gonna say I agree with Councilor Case on the language.

Okay.

Counselor Alcare, Counselor Sinclair.

Any thoughts?

Counselor Alcare.

I think that um that I don't know if I'd be ready to vote on this because this does not allow us to talk about our proposals to have discussion on whether or not we're gonna vote on this to approve it.

And I'd like to have opportunity for us to talk about our proposals if we're voting on that.

Um the proposals will be disc covered in the work session in the second half of the work session.

So did you want to answer that?

You're are we being asked to vote on this tonight?

Uh yes, so it's on the agenda in the council meeting.

But just to clarify, uh, going back to uh councillor sinclair's uh question, it doesn't preclude anything else either.

So it's a starting point as as an emergency declaration, but it doesn't mean we can't take any other action on other proposals that are that are going to be discussed later tonight as well.

So we could vote on it and then also talk, we will be talking about the other uh suggestions made by other counselors, and we can add them if we feel we can add them as an addendum.

So and um when the conversation about codifying sanctuary city, where will that happen?

Does that happen here in the resolution or would that happen in a separate conversation?

Uh no, that's part of a couple of individual uh counselors' uh proposals that we'll talk about afterwards.

And so that's one where if the council decided to adopt the emergency declaration this evening during the regular meeting, and then later during the work session, the council decided, yep, we want to move forward with codifying this, then that's that's direction that staff would take and start that process.

You could make a decision to later add that to this emergency declaration or not.

It's not necessarily necessary to I would just need that um that direction from the council in order to do that.

Um can you clarify require staff training annually?

What kind of training is the expectation there annually?

So there's several ways that we're training our staff.

There's specific training to what to do in case of an ice encounter in a city facility.

Um there is uh we already do uh different types of equity training.

So that's where we're actually working on that training right now, Simon.

If you wanted to add anything, but we're working through what that training could look like.

We want to make sure and provide that to our employees annually.

But there's not like a set training yet that's uh everything combined.

We just have pieces of different types of training we're giving, and we would consolidate and give that on an annual basis to employees.

And if I could just jump in real quick, if you look at section 13 of the draft resolution, it also contains language from uh counselor sinclair's proposal for codifying it that mirrors that language as far as the scope of the training.

So that's sort of the the training that the resolution is recommending.

Again, you can amend that, but you know, as that's what's taken from counselor sinclair's codifying proposal, so it's the same language.

And um, I know that I've asked for um sanctuary city training.

So is that something that is being considered or thought of or addressed in the trainings that people will get?

Yeah, so one of the things is training on Sanctuary Promise Act and how to report to the violations hotline, um, how to report to appropriate immigrant right uh coalitions and other agencies, role-playing scenarios for different federal immigration authority interactions, so all those types of things relate to sanctuary are in there.

Okay.

And if I could just add as well, a lot of that are there are things that um our employees have already been made aware of, and so we we send out pretty routinely a lot of new guidance for employees about um we have websites dedicated to this internally for supervisors what to do in these cases for employees.

So we already do a lot of this, but we would want to consolidate it and make sure this is an annual training for our employees.

Um with consideration of public safety, will that training be a little different in relation to sanctuary city than what all staff would get?

It it it I yes it would, and it kind of already is.

Our police officers um deal with this more than any employee.

They already receive a substantial amount of that training, so um, it would be different uh for for officers and others that are involved in different ways uh with the sanctuary act.

All right, thanks.

And counselor all care, what are your thoughts on um to Rahim's question about moving forward with the emergency declaration this evening?

Is everybody done asking questions right now?

Yeah, so we have two counselors that are in favor of moving forward with the emergency declaration with counselor Harris's stronger language around congressional support around immigration reform.

And so I was wondering where you stood, and I was also gonna ask Counselor Ambry and Counselor Sinclair.

I think I want to reframe for a moment.

Okay, fair.

Counselor Sinclair.

Um I also support the stronger language language from President Harris in the resolution.

Okay, so you support moving forward with the state of emergency and including counselor Harris's suggestions on strengthening the congressional delegation action.

Yes, and knowing that uh if we choose as body to move forward in the future to them in, we can do so at a later time.

Exactly right.

Okay, counselor Ambry, you just came in.

I was trying to give you a minute.

Um we're talking about um moving forward or not, moving forward with the state of emergency that is on our agenda for the city council meeting that starts at seven.

Yeah.

So your thoughts on moving forward with the um state of emergency as is the state of emergency with counselor Harris's um comments or suggestions or something else.

Yeah, uh definitely uh moving forward and yes, with Councilor Harris's follow suggestions.

Yes.

Okay, thank you very much.

Um, Counselor Elkara, I want to circle back to you.

So I can agree, providing the what Kerberlin just asked that we were able to update and amend as needed.

Yes, we are.

Yes, we're able to do that.

Okay, great.

Raheem, do you have what you need?

Yeah, we'll just switch out the version that's posted with the language that is more uh that counselor Harris proposed, and we already have that draft ready.

So it should be easy to do.

Thank you very much.

Do you need anything else?

I don't think so.

Okay, great.

Simone.

Good evening, council.

So Simone Brooks, Assistant City Manager for the record.

So we're gonna pivot a little bit now and discuss something that came up during the meeting on November 4th, which was advancing 200,000 towards community-based organizations to focus on services for our community members who are impacted negatively impacted by increased activity of immigration and customs enforcement within our community.

As far as we know, we're the first city to release this type of funding and release it in this way.

And so I do want to just address up front that there we quickly heard after we posted the notice, the request for community focused funding, that there was, if not offensive language, there was certainly some language that was seen as a barrier for people being able, community-based organizations being able to receive funding.

And so we immediately issued an addendum we posted on social media and we also advised council.

Um but we do recognize that this uh the timeline was very aggressive and we were trying to move very quickly.

So we wanted to make sure that people understood and our community-based organizations in particular who were choosing to either apply or not apply, um, that when the language uh stated that the funding may not be used to support anyone who is undocumented per federal regulations.

What we clarified is that the funding is awarded, the funding that's awarded should free up how other community-based organization funding can be used, which may include direct funding to those who are undocumented, that the city is not directing CBOs on how to specifically allocate their funding, and really we're just directing what general service category they are supporting, which I'll talk about a little bit later, and that the city is not requesting and does not want personally identifiable information.

So if a CBO expends funding on any specific individual, we don't want that information.

Um, and so really it's in the hand we don't are not seeking to direct community-based organizations on how they go about doing their business.

We are trying to get this money out the door as quickly as possible to impact community in a positive way.

Um, and so we tried to clarify that as quickly as possible, but we do not move as fast as social media does, unfortunately.

Um, and again, we recognize that uh in moving fast, sometimes you make errors, and sometimes even when you move slow, you make errors.

And this is a continuous learning process for us as staff, and I assume even as council as we move through this process in this really challenging time.

So, in terms of uh so I've talked about the scope in terms of the timeline.

Um the applications opened on uh no November 12th.

So you'll remember the council meeting was on the fourth.

Um, we did a lot of work.

We met with community-based organizations on the 10th and had conversations with them about the application process and what services they wanted to prioritize.

So they were really the driver behind uh what service categories actually appeared.

They also talked to us about the preferred preferred grant size range, the funding term, which ended up being six months.

So they really had some asks that we tried to incorporate into the application process.

Um proposals are currently being reviewed.

Um, I so I'm not in a position yet to report back on number or those who are eligible, but I'll be able to bring that information back to you.

Um you'll probably see it posted or in your email before uh before the next council meeting, um, since we're hoping to disperse those funds the first week of December, which is hopefully before our next council meeting.

Um, so that's in terms of so this actual scoring.

So we were really focused on making sure that we had a balance of a technical review as well as council really driving the priorities.

Um, and I'll talk a little bit more later about how the council priorities are reflected.

In terms of the awards, we're taking a tiered approach.

Um, and this is again trying to reflect on what we heard from community-based organizations, which is they didn't want um large amounts of funding only going to a few organizations, and that really to best meet the needs of our diverse community, that sometimes smaller organizations are positioned to provide services in a different way than perhaps a larger organization or organization who receives a large bulk of funding.

And so we're trying to balance that out where have you wanna be able to have impact with a larger number, but you also want to make sure that some of that funding spreads through other organizations.

Um, and then I already touched on ongoing learning.

There will be future funding opportunities, and we continue to learn um and be thoughtful about how we approach these things.

Simone may ask a question.

Absolutely.

Are we requiring if an organization receives funding from us?

Are we requiring that they only spend that money on people in Hillsborough?

Uh yes.

Thank you.

Okay, next slide, please.

Okay, so uh this is addressing the funding usage.

So the all of these um categories that you see up here on this slide were identified by the community-based organizations as areas they saw as priorities for funding.

Um, the number that you will see next to those are the council waiting.

So I received um because we could not have a meeting and we wanted to avoid a serial meeting.

I requested from each of you waiting for um on all of those.

And so this is the order of operation from top to bottom in terms of priorities.

So food and legal services um uh scored equally, service navigation and case management scored the same as rent mortgage assistance, and essentially that weighting plus that might multiplied by the technical score is how the awards will be ranked, and so you'll see you'll learn more and uh at the next meeting.

So next slide.

Can I ask another question?

Absolutely.

I should make sure I give you guys an opportunity for that.

Um of the things that we've heard as uh on council is um Latino businesses being significantly impacted because their clientele are understandably staying home.

So do we have any grants that will be going to businesses?

There, so there are two things there.

There is the potential the rental, the rental assistance could be a CBO could propose to use rental assistance for a business.

For a business, great, but that did not come up as a priority during that particular meeting.

However, we did hear from community and we've heard in our community-based organization convenings as well as from our meeting November 4th, that small business grants and assistance is a priority, and so the city will be looking at how to go about funding those as well, and again, trying to make them as low barrier as we possibly can.

Thank you.

Yes, if I could add to that as well.

Um, I know we mentioned this a little bit two weeks ago, but this is kind of on our our initial um attempt to do this, and as we come up with other ideas and ways or hear from council about other ways that we can bring those back.

One of the things that I know a couple of individual uh counselors have talked about is small business grants, for example.

Um, last night I was at a meeting where the Hillsborough School District superintendent was speaking, and he gave me some great ideas.

We talked more today about ways we could maybe help Hillsborough School District.

So we continue to try to identify ways that we can step in as a city and help.

When we have those, we'll bring those to council for consideration as well.

This is just kind of our first attempt uh to do this and do it quickly.

And uh counselor Sinclair.

Thank you.

Um, two quick questions.

One was the five-day period long enough to connect with our smaller-based uh organizations, community-based organizations because they're a capacity right now, as so many are.

And then two, uh can you help me differentiate on November 4th when we were in our second work session?

We talked about there being two 200,000 grant increments.

Isn't the second 200,000 uh grant opportunity for business?

And as for this 200 um grant opportunity is for services for rental assistance, food assistance, whatnot, of what we waited in on.

Thank you for the questions.

And I uh jump back in if I miss one.

So I'll take the second one first because that's how my brain works.

Um, so in terms of the two 200,000, the first 200,000 was from the community services grant program award.

So that was the first set of 200,000.

That those grants had already been scored, and the finance committee had already made a recommendation to city council.

So essentially that money was already spent for lack of a better word.

And they do that annually.

Yes, that is their normal annual absolutely.

So this is an additional 200,000 dollars with the intent to go to CEOs and find out what their priorities are.

That did not negate any opportunity to provide additional funding rounds.

I believe that was the intent.

And we were just we were starting and trying to get something very quickly out the door, and then we'll continue to examine where the opportunities are.

And I think the small business support is obviously a key one that's come up multiple times.

And I already forgot the first question.

Okay.

Uh the smaller community-based organizations enough time for them to do what they need to do to apply.

So I I'm I'm hedging my bets a little bit here because we haven't double-checked eligibility and that all the questions are answered and all of those things, but we had over 30 organizations propose.

Organizations were allowed to propose multiple times, up to three times, and we had application over 50 applications.

So while we may not have gotten every organization, we certainly touched quite a few.

Counselor Solgato.

Can you remind me when these awards will be disbursed?

First week of December.

Great.

Thank you, Simone.

Thank you for the question.

Um, can you give me just the ballpark of what's the high highest request you received and what's been the lowest request that you've received?

Oh, I might be wrong on the low.

Um, the highest the highest amount an organization could request in one proposal was 40,000.

The maximum that organization could receive, presuming they applied for more, submitted more than one application is $50,000.

So one organization, the maximum they can receive is 50.

My recollection, and please don't hold me to this, is that the lowest was a $10,000.

There's more than one that was at $10,000.

There could have been something lower, but I I really just kind of skimmed to get the number of applications so that I could at least kind of deliver that.

But I don't want to not be accurate when I speak.

And how long do you think that that $200,000 is going to be sustainable in this first round?

And that's a big question.

My mind's thinking about rents and other costs.

Thank you.

Thank you for clarifying.

Um, yes, it's a good question.

And I think so, in the applications, we ask for the amount of funding requested and the amount of folks that can be served, households or individuals or businesses that can be served.

So I think we'll have a better idea once we see the applications.

And that was part of the intent of getting this out so quickly and to have those conversations in the pre-application meeting, was really to have CBOs telling us things and for us to learn from this process and have that help inform future processes as we see gaps and what the just the sheer volume of the ask is.

So this is a real learning process for us.

Councilor Sogato.

Sorry, one more question.

And sorry if you cover this already.

Are these funds going directly to people that are impacted or organizations able to pay some admin costs with these ones?

We are not making that determination.

They are allowed to use that funding once it's received, and however they do, as long as they're using it for Hillsborough community.

You're welcome.

Keep an eye on time, so we'll keep moving.

Okay, so I'll move on.

So community-based organization convening.

So we are definitely hearing um consistent messages, much as you are around safety concerns regarding the increase in ICE activity and the need for alignment amongst the various levels of government.

So that's including cities, county, regional, and state.

Um, and those convenings that we've attended include Central Culturals, um, the immigrant solidarity collaborative, Washington County Chamber of Commerce, and there are obviously other opportunities that we will continue to have our ear to the ground.

Um and if you hear of convenings that we need to be aware of, there is some overlap.

And so we are trying to understand the purpose of each and how we can what tables do we need to be seated at to really make sure that we have access to good information that we can bring back to you as council to make sure that we're informed that we're making good decisions as staff and that we're able to support you properly.

And I see you wanting to unmute.

Yeah.

Um I'm curious about the businesses that aren't connected with the chamber of commerce.

Are we assuming that they're connected to Central Cold?

Or how would they be representing themselves as a body?

Um so to the first question, no, we are not assuming that they would be represented by the chamber.

Um, also uh not making the assumption that Synthro is the place that is the keeper of all of the businesses that are impacted.

We certainly know that even beyond the Latino businesses, we have other immigrant and refugee communities that may not center it, that may not be where they're going.

And so I think going back to these the idea of having these conversations with community-based organizations and having this pre-application meeting is also just creating relationships with these other organizations that we didn't know about.

And it kind of opens the door for that two-way conversation.

And so some of those do serve businesses, others don't.

We have our obviously our economic and community development department, which does a lot of work.

We have the Hillsborough Downtown Partnership.

This isn't a one-time effort.

Thank you.

Yes.

My slide is not done.

I should probably finish that.

So in addition to going to the tables that have been set, we're trying to understand what tables we need to set, but also being aware, and I think this has been mentioned by a counselor, I can't remember.

It might have been you, Councilor I'll care, just the capacity of or counselor Sinclair of smaller organizations, and do they have time to come to the Civic Center to have a meeting with us to tell us the strain that they're under?

That may not be the best way to do that.

And so we're trying to understand what community-based organizations' capacity is and how to meet their needs, and that we'll continue to learn.

This is a continuous learning.

When we had ARPA enabled funding, we had a multi-jurisdictional community engagement project, which brought to us some best practices, which are available on our website.

That final report, we're also hoping to bring that information to other cities and the county who can contributed to that project so that we're we're not separately reaching out to organizations, but how again do we align so that we can maximize the efforts that CBOs are putting in?

And so I just wanted to make sure that it was clear here that not only is it happening, um, we're trying to be very cognizant of the of the strain that we put on because the community is already going through enough.

Next slide, please.

Um, so I'm gonna dig in a little bit here.

So um internal communications, I'll go there first.

So when I know that there has been um some conversation about the guidance that was sent out to employees.

So when the city developed its initial guidance for interactions with immigration enforcement officers in February of this year, we did not contemplate the level or the violence of enforcement this community has been experiencing.

Our guidance presumed that officers would make requests, and by officers, I mean important immigration enforcement officers would make requests, we would request documentation, and if presented a judicial warrant, we would comply.

And otherwise, we would not comply because we would not cooperate as is required by state law and as we have committed to as a city with our sanctuary city resolution.

Um while we have received no reports that city staff have interacted with ICE while they're conducting their official duties, concerns were certainly raised.

Um since releasing the initial guidance, we have received questions, concerns, and feedback that in some cases the guidance was unclear, and in one specific area, it prohibited action that some staff wanted to take.

So that area that was the area that action was desired by some staff, not all staff, but some staff involved recording ICE activities.

So this may sound familiar to some of you.

Um the initial guidance specifically prohibited filming ICE activity, and I just want to be transparent that unlike what you may read, um, the intent of that was guidance was to re it really was to keep our staff out of harm's way.

So for some who are not aware, the US Department of Homeland has experienced has expanded its definition of threats to include filming ICE operations and publicly posting those videos, and has described these actions as harassment and violence.

And I know mayor, you're going to address that a little bit before the council meeting in case people can't be here at the work session to hear this.

But um, the city has to be careful about what positions we put our employees in terms of both personal liability as well as personal safety.

So um, but we also want to be cognizant that based on the feedback we receive from employees who wanted to film ICE activity, that we we needed to adjust our guidance and really be thoughtful about that.

And again, we I keep talking about being a continuously learn a continuous learning um opportunity and an organization.

And so then we have updated that guidance to remove the prohibition.

But we do continue to be concerned about the safety of our employees and to have advised caution.

And that is present in the guidance as well.

So the updated guidance as well as an updated frequently asked questions, because I'm trying to avoid acronyms like FAQ.

The documents have been prominently posted on our intranet.

So Hillsboro at work is what we call it.

And then I just will note for some for some individuals who are more concerned about the delay in the having the FAQ and the guidance posted is that we wanted to ensure that English and Spanish postings went out at the same time rather than being staggered.

So that's any questions about that.

I know there was some concern.

Counselor Sinclair.

Yeah.

This is more of a comment.

Thank you for quickly addressing the concern.

Do you think that's a good question?

Do you mind moving the mic a little bit closer to you?

Thank you.

Thank you for addressing the concern.

Very appreciated.

Thanks.

It is a team effort.

And I for any staff who happen to be on the call, we continue to ask that they, if they have questions, if they need clarification, that they talk to their supervisors, their directors, or to HR directly.

And we will continue to gather those questions and to give responses.

And for some who don't know, the responses are often given to directors or to staff specific for very specific questions.

We just don't release the FAQs constantly because it can also be confusing to some.

So when there's a timely response that's needed, we do provide timely responses.

Thank you, Chad, for your assistance and providing those many times.

So I'll move on to external communications.

I just want to comment on one thing.

Yes.

That's always been something that I've appreciated very much.

I um feel though that when they came out, I had no idea that that even existed until I saw it on social media.

So here again is something that I believe I would have appreciated getting some kind of a heads up.

Hey, we're sending this out to staff.

We want you to know how staff, you know, what they're um what they can and cannot do.

And I'd rather hear that from the city manager rather than finding out about it on Facebook.

That's not how I want to be informed as a counselor.

And so I just want to say that it's important in the way that you communicate because if I don't know about it, how am I supposed to support that?

Right?

As a counselor.

Um, the other thing, and I know that we're running on time, but we have public comment coming up, but I just want to say something because we mentioned at the application process, no identifiable info.

I just want to point out that we're having public comment and people are you know surrendering their names to be able to be part of public comment.

They do it online and they're doing it in person.

And we've had um people speak up in really vulnerable spaces.

And um and the potential for exploitation of people is super high.

And I don't know how to control how people and their stories, I don't know how to prevent that from getting exploited, but I do think we need to talk about what we're requiring people to give as far as information, especially in relation to um immigration and the potential that they may not be documented when they're speaking to us.

And that's who we need to hear from.

If I could uh dress the second one first.

So two weeks ago before the last meeting, we actually changed our public comment cards, so it just requires a name.

Uh and frankly, that's for logistical purposes.

When the mayor, you know, calls someone up, we have to know who to call.

And so we don't ask anymore for any kind of address or telephone number um previously when we did that.

I do want to clarify during COVID, it was actually really important because we were having issues with like Zoom bombing.

If anybody remembers what that was, we would have people that would log on that were um there for nefarious reasons.

And so it we had to figure out how to make sure that the people that were logging on um were actual people, right?

We have changed that and we've tried to make it as minimal as possible so that when people sign their name, they don't even if they write down the wrong name, we won't know that, right?

That's okay to do.

It's just that the mayor needs to know how to call people up.

Last week, last week we had 40 or 50 people, and so that's why we do that.

On the first thing on those frequently asked questions, counselor, I I will always strive to make sure that uh the council is updated on those.

That's a an example of an internal personnel policy.

So internal personnel policies, we have dozens, hundreds of personnel policies that we do, and I don't usually send those out to council because it's my responsibility to make sure we're managing, you know, and being within the law.

Um in this case, we've tried to make sure that the council's updated on what we're doing, but if if you felt like we missed it, then my apologies.

We'll try to make sure that we're more clear uh when we send those things out for employees.

I think just that it's integration related to this right now because it's so different, and we don't know everything about how we're gonna deal with this.

So I think that that can be an exception.

Yeah, it and as Robbie said, you could they can use a fake name or just use their first name.

Totally fine.

Um it's 650 51, so we go to break.

Simone, are you done with your your part?

I am I am not, but we might want to break.

Yep.

Okay.

Do you have quite a bit more to go?

I do not.

I I can fly through it.

Okay, let's try.

Let's do it.

Well, oh, we want to do we could do that part after, and I'll just wrap at this.

So we are gonna walk you through after on the beginning of the next sess part of the session on the immigration uh resource page, because there's some information there.

But I did want to talk a little bit about external communication, and I really appreciate what you said, counselors um Alcara about just social media, right?

And being cognizant of that because I wanted to provide some focus because there are a lot of positives about social media.

Um, for instance, we were able to get word out of the funding out to community um really quickly since the grant funding was announced on November 6th.

Until yesterday afternoon, our post was viewed 72,000 times, and it was interacted with 1,500 times.

And on our Spanish Facebook page, it was viewed 21 21,000 times and interacted with more than 200 times, which is a new record for us.

So we're it does have reach and and it's really important tool for us.

Um but this challenge is that we're not the only ones posting, and if we stumble or if we someone else posts something that is inaccurate, whether intentionally or unintentionally, it is incredibly difficult to pivot and have our communications kind of get ahead.

You're you're already behind when trying to get ahead, and it's first virtually impossible.

Um, and we have a really talented staff.

Um, but we're faux that's why we're so focused on providing accurate information and why this continuous learning is so important, so that when we do stumble, we learn from that so we don't make those mistakes again because clearly it impacts community because social media uh moves so quickly.

It's a crowded field.

Um, so in terms of the FAQs, um we are working on the best way to post those.

So we obviously have community questions that come up during the meetings, questions you have that you have heard.

Um, so we're looking at our web page, news articles, newsletters like happening in Hillsborough, or our engagement page, and we're we just need to apply our equity toolkit and really try to think about that holistically, what's gonna work for our community um in a way that's really accessible.

So that's what we're working on.

And then in terms of the community resources fair, um, I want to thank um Beatrice Medell and Marcus Ford as well as Raheem and other many others for putting that together.

Um, it was delivered as a direct outcome of the Avenida Diaz community engagement process.

It brought together 20 community serving organizations, five partner organizations provided live presentations, and despite despite a modest in-person turnout engagement was steady.

So if you weren't able to make it that day, it was um really good to see.

So and this is probably a good time to wrap.

Thank you, Simone.

I appreciate it.

It's uh 6:54, and we need to begin our regular session in the auditorium.

Amber, is the auditorium full?

You don't believe so.

Okay.

So uh you can move from this room into the auditorium uh for the regular session.

If you want to make a comment, you can do so in the lobby.

We'll adjourn the work session and continue this discussion after the regular session.

The recording has welcome everyone to the November 18th, 2025 City Council meeting.

Thank you for joining us this evening.

For translation services, please use the QR code on the poster on the left side of the room or in the front page of your agenda.

If you would like headphones for translation or need assistance accessing translation services, please see the uh table in the lobby and staff are happy to help.

To ensure all audience members can hear council discussion, we ask that bullhorns and other sound amplification devices that disrupt the meeting not be used.

They are not allowed.

And to ensure all audience members can see the council discussion and see others speaking, signage with sticks or poles attached to them will also not be allowed.

Anyone who disrupts the meeting, including cheers or booze or chants or physical disturbances, will be asked to stop their activity, mainly because we want to hear everybody speak.

We want to hear everybody's voice.

In the event of continuing continuous disruptions, we will be asked, you will be asked to leave the meeting.

To begin this meeting, I invite you to join me in the Pledge of Allegiance.

I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the Republic for which it stands one nation, under God, indivisible liberty and justice.

Amber, may we have a roll call, please?

Yes.

Mayor Pace?

Here.

Councilor Alcair.

Here.

Councillor Sinclair?

Here.

Councillor Case?

Here.

Councillor Anvery?

Here.

Councillor Sagato?

Here.

And Councillor Harris is excused this evening.

Yes.

For a first time on the item on the agenda, I'd like to invite Councillor Amvery to read the Native American Heritage Month Proclamation.

Thank you, Mayor.

Whereas Native Americans have inhabited the land now known as the State of Oregon since time immemorial, and whereas the City of Hillsboro recognizes the unique and enduring relationship that exists between indigenous peoples and their traditional territories, and the area currently known as Washington County, Oregon, rests on land that was first inhabited by the Atvalati Kalapuyans, also called the Twalicheton people, who flourished here for thousands of years.

And whereas Oregon is home to nine federally recognized tribal nations, including the Burns Payute, the Confederate Confederated Tribes of Cooth, Lower Amqua and Sicila Indians, Confederated Tribes of Grand Ron, Confederated Tribes of Silets, Confederated Tribes of Umtela Reservation, Confederated Tribes of Warm Springs, Cow Creek Band of Umqua Indians, Kukil Indian Tribe and the Klamath Tribes.

And whereas, Native Americans in Oregon disproportionately experience education, school discipline, mortality, and health disparities, and 23% of Native Americans live below the poverty line pre-pandemic compared to 16% of white counterparts and face barriers to economic mobility.

Whereas racial equity is a priority for the City of Hillsboro and ensuring that Native Americans are front and center in our efforts to improve the opportunities and outcomes for Native American peoples, communities, and businesses.

And whereas meaningful engagement elevates the lived experiences of Native Americans in Oregon to provide equitable benefits of the city's services and development infrastructure and program investments.

And whereas the City of Holesboro is committed to engaging with tribal nations and tribal communities to build relationships and address issues affecting their well-being.

And whereas during the month of November, we honor the Native peoples in this, their ancestral homes, and recognize their continued contribution to all areas of community and family life, arts and culture.

Now, therefore, be it resolved that I, Saba Anbury, on behalf of Beach Pace, Mayor of the City of Hillsboro, Oregon, do hereby proclaim November as Native American Heritage Month.

And I call this observation to the attention of all our community members.

Thank you.

Thank you, Councillor Amory.

Usually we go into public comment.

But first, today we're going to lead with a consideration of a resolution declaring a state of emergency.

At our last city council meeting, we heard a lot of testimony from many members of the community on the negative impacts they are experiencing because of ICE in our community.

Please know that we heard you loud and clear.

And please know that we're in this with you, and always, and we know you want action.

We just received an update from staff in our work session previous to this meeting about an action plan we're going to continue, and we will continue those discussions after this regular meeting, and I encourage you to join us after this regular meeting to go back into the work session.

We are in this together, and we felt it important to public publicly acknowledge the challenging time we're in via the resolution we're about to consider.

So the resolution we're about to consider is a state of emergency with the addition of Councillor Harris's wording regarding working with our congressional delegate congressional delegation for immigration reform.

That is now uploaded online.

It was amended during the work session as we spoke after we decided that we would do that.

And it's already online, so thank you, Amber, for doing that.

So moving to item three, and then we will go back to public comment.

Um moving to item three new business.

So moved case.

Thank you.

Do I have a second?

Second, Sinclair.

Is there any discussion?

May I have a roll call.

Councillors Alcair.

Can I say that I want to have discussion?

Can I change my mind?

Oh, yeah, sure.

So um I just want to say that it's because of people showed up last meeting.

Why we are having this consideration tonight.

And so I just want to tell you how important it is for you to show up and speak up and to let us know and to represent your community.

And I know that there are people here who can't be here tonight because they're afraid to be here.

So thank you to those people who are showing up on behalf of them.

I really appreciate that.

So thank you very much.

Thank you.

Thank you, Councillor Alcair.

Is there any other discussion?

Okay.

May I please have a roll call.

Councilor Alcair.

Hi.

Case?

Hi.

Ann Vary.

Hi.

Sinclair.

Hi.

Salgato.

Hi.

Thank you.

Thank you very much.

Um the state of emergency declaration passes.

Resolution number two nine zero six is adopted.

Um before we get into public comment, I'd like to provide an update regarding city policy on recording ICE activity.

The city has received questions and concerns regarding the city's initial guidance to its employees to not film ICE activity while working in their official capacity.

This excluded Hillsborough Police Department's sworn officers who wear who utilize body worn cameras.

The city initially advised employees not to film ICE activity while on duty to avoid exposing them to unsafe situations.

This was given to Homeland Security's broadened definition of threats, which now includes recording and posting ICE operations.

So we were worried about the safety of our employees.

Safety does remain the priority, and the guidance outlines precautions for employees who choose to record while working.

Moving to item four.

Okay.

So I want to start off by just saying thank you to people that showed up last time and tonight and for speaking up and sharing your concerns.

Without the fear and knowing that you belong and you deserve to live freely in Hillsborough.

He says, I want you to know that God is with us and don't lose the faith.

So Manny, thank you very much for providing us that quote.

And I want to repeat it in Spanish.

So gracias a todos for Star Presentes y por Altara Voz for su preocupation.

Les pido que no dejen que el miedo les consuma llama la mente y el spiritual.

If you are here in person and wish to speak, please fill out a yellow card and hand it to Amber, the city recorder, to my right, your left.

When I call on you, please join us here at the table in front and speak into the microphone so those on Zoom and in the room can hear your comments.

Because we have a translation tool, community members can speak in their native language of choice, and the city recorder can display the translation on the screen so all city councilors can understand what you are saying.

However, again, if you want to comment tonight, fill out a card and bring it over to Amber.

If you weren't able to sign up uh to speak prior to the deadline to speak virtually, you are always welcome to email your comments to City Council at any time of day.

We also received several pieces of written testimony from community members who were not available to attend this evening.

So just so you know we've received those and and have them available to read if we haven't already read them.

I also know that this is called public comment because it's a time dedicated to you to inform the city council about your views.

There won't be a debate or a discussion.

We simply listen to you.

Please know that all comments are limited to three minutes, and there will be a giant timer above my head so you understand how much time you have left.

Before we begin, on behalf of City Council, I again want to thank everybody who has taken the time to attend, to sign up for public comment, or submit written testimony.

And to be clear, all of us on City Councillor on City Council are just as upset as you are regarding ICE activity in our city.

We are actively searching for ways to respond.

Okay, can you hear me?

We can hear you, Blaine.

You have three minutes.

I think we would all agree that an informed and involved citizens are at the heart of good government.

And the city of Hillsborough has and is promoting initiatives to involve people in the city's governance.

However, involving people in the planning department, I think needs improvement.

Because I walk past this location daily, and because the intersection at the century is so dangerous with so many so much traffic and without any pedestrian crossing, I have a vested interest in knowing what is happening to this property.

When I inquired about the future development of this property, I was told that because I was outside the 200 foot radius around the property, I was not on the notification list about future development for the property.

I asked to be placed on the list, but I was told that city policy restricts the notification to those homeowners within the 200 feet.

I was further told I could stay informed by using the planning department website.

But they could not inform me on what day or of the week updates might be posted.

I tried this, the website is confusing.

I could not find that information about the property or any other properties.

As a taxpayer and a 35-year resident of the city, I cannot understand why I have to check daily on the city's confusing website for public information since the planning department is unwilling to share the date with me.

And even more critical is why has the city chosen uh to limit accessibility?

Why does the city find it impossible to add my name to the list of residents?

Why couldn't they expand the radius?

Uh the minimum is 200 feet that's required by the state.

That's what I understand.

But you can expand it.

You can add my name, whatever happened to government by the people, for the people.

I know the mayor and the council are very committed to openness and transparency.

So let's be open and transparent by adding names of concerned citizens to the notification list for changes in property use or development.

Thank you for your time and consideration.

Thank you, Mr.

Ackley.

Thank you, Mr.

Ackley.

Uh, our next speaker is Senator State Senator Janine Salman.

Hello, good evening.

Can you hear me okay?

We can hear you just fine.

You have three minutes.

Thank you.

Thank you, Mayor Pace, Council President, and members of the Hillsborough City Council for this opportunity to provide comments at tonight's important meeting.

I am Janine Solomon, the state senator for Senate District 15, and that includes areas of Force Grove, Cornelius, Hillsborough, and the Rock Creek area.

We are experiencing an economic and humanitarian crisis.

In our community, we have heard from so many people that are afraid to leave their homes, go to work, do errands like grocery shopping.

They're afraid to take their children to school, and they are fearful for friends and loved ones being disappeared by ice.

When I hear the when I hear they only detain the worst of the worst, I cry foul.

They are taking mothers, fathers, children, landscapers, construction workers.

They are taking residents based on the color of their skin, and this is wrong.

I was here listening to all the tests.

I was there with you, listening to all the testimony in the city council meeting two weeks ago, and it was heartbreaking.

The escalation of violence and terror that ice is spreading is abhorrent and should be illegal in any setting.

And it is not just isolated to Hillsborough, and this is happening in cities across our state.

I recognize this is a burden too large for our cities, local law enforcement, our schools, and our community-based organizations to bear alone.

And I believe it is elevated to a need for the urgent response from Governor Kotak.

I have called for the governor to urgently bring together a group of people that can create a unified plan for a response.

A table that includes our Department of Justice, our counties, our cities, law enforcement, community-based organizations, and school districts to collectively respond and figure out what can be our legal response, not just what can't.

I have been impressed that this matter is of the utmost urgency as our as our community's friends and neighbors are traumatized by fear every day.

I am also exploring within our legislative council solutions to making identification and badge information of federal agents available to local law enforcement.

To me, what is happening is equivalent to human trafficking and kidnapping.

When a masked unidentified person takes someone off the street or from their home or a place of work and disappears them, this is unacceptable, and we must find a way, and we must use all levers that we can push back legally.

In absence of a unified plan, violence will escalate, and I believe that is the ultimate goal of the president.

We cannot live in a society that normalizes the sidewalk disappearing of Oregonians.

How far will this go?

We cannot be desensitized to witnessing abductions.

Human and sexual trafficking is real, and this is a real threat to uh to increase.

I cannot help but think of our friend and community member Alter Wiener, a Holocaust survivor that worked hard to not have history repeat itself.

I want to thank you and the hundreds of people that have come forward to and continue to come forward to speak out and advocate for our friends and our neighbors.

I also want to thank the city of Hillsborough and Senator Council for their diligent and continued attention to this matter.

Thank you.

Thank you, Senator Solomon.

Okay, now we're moving to comment uh for folks that are in the room.

So I will call you in sets of two.

You'll come up to the two desks up front, press the middle button on the console, and when the light turns green, just like it is here, you are on and you have three minutes.

So the first two people I will call are Nicole A and Josefina Flores.

Nicole A and Josefina Flores, please come up, and then the person on deck after Josefina is William S.

So the first person, Nicole A.

And Josefina come on up, and you could sit at the other desk, please.

Thank you for being here.

You are welcome here, and we want to hear from you.

Nicole press that middle button when the light turns green, you should be good.

Thank you.

And you have three minutes.

A country that prides itself on being free, a country that prides itself on being for everyone, and that is why I am here.

Um just to remind you all of the people that you are serving.

You are serving Oregonians, you are serving people who live in Hillsborough, and that includes Hispanic people, that includes Asian people, that includes African Americans, that includes every single person that is here in the room and those beyond that are not able to be here in person.

And I want to thank you for all that you've done thus far to maintain our city aligned with the purposes of being a diverse city, of being a city that is um to protect its citizens, to protect those that are maybe undocumented, and to protect the safety and the well-being of everyone who calls Hillsborough a home.

So thank you for that.

Thank you for maintaining our city to be a sanctuary city.

However, we can continue to always push those because it is it is obvious that those that there are other groups of people who are pushing against us.

And I didn't really come with a plan, but just with the idea that I want to represent my people, I want to represent my voice.

But the sus voces de ustedes y de nuestras voces de la communidad.

But hold up one second.

William S.

Please come up.

So William S is coming up, Josefina.

Welcome.

You have three minutes.

Oh, uh Josefina, do you mind pressing the middle button on the console?

And when it turns green, you are on.

Do you mind restarting the three minutes?

Yes.

Thank you very much.

Okay, go ahead.

Thank you so much for uh listening to me, listen for everybody.

So I live in here for more than three years in Washington County.

The niños están passando ya ser the joven standards, agarrando responsabilidades de los stand tratando de ayudar as suspens.

Entonces, como podemos hacer para ayudar a nuestra communidad, those estamos uh estressados, estamos mal, estamos mal.

Ustedes están ahí prometieron ayudar a nuestra gente.

Piensan que manera van a venir, pero no vienen.

Pero como communos duele a que están sufriendo tanto anders para representarnos para ayudarnos.

Ayude nos sirve todo esto.

Nosotros estamos trabajando ayudando nuestra community como acaba de decir la muchacha.

Ayuda.

Solo yo vine a pedirles para nuestra community.

Les estoy diciendo lo que yo estoy sentando, lo que yo estoy mirando.

William, you're next, but please hold on for a moment.

The next person after William is Phil Pelkin.

Phil Pelkin is next.

Come on up.

And after Phil Pelkin is Michael Peterson.

Michael, you're on deck.

William, you have the mic is already on, and you have three minutes.

Oh, cool.

Okay, hey everyone.

Uh my name is William.

I live on second Jackson, pretty close by.

I'm a school bus driver for Hillsborough Hillsborough School District and a member of the Hillsborough Classified Union.

But I'm speaking for myself today.

I moved here about a few months ago, but already feel at home and have been welcomed by my neighbors, the schools, and the co-workers.

So this is the third meeting I've been to that a lot of public comments.

At this point, I don't think there's anything else we can tell you between our public comments, the news and social media.

You're all aware that the masked agents are kidnapping people off the street.

And as far as I can tell, you've opened up some money to help Latino businesses and offered thoughts and prayers.

And I missed the work section earlier today, but was able to take a look at the PowerPoint.

And I'm not impressed, and it's frustrating that you're asking us to lower our expectations, telling us to wait when we really can't.

A little bit of background on ISIS was formed in 2003 and expanded under Republican and Democratic presidents.

And we can absolutely and should hate this current administration.

If we replaced every city councillor today, the results will be the same.

Which means I need to talk to the people who have the power to stop ice, which is everyone out here, everyone watching.

Because they've stopped ICE detentions.

You haven't stopped ICE detentions.

And if I came through those doors right now, I don't trust you to stop them.

I would rely on everyone out here with the signs making noise with the whistles.

They would know what phone numbers to call.

They know the friends, they know how to get food to each other's houses.

They're doing the work.

And when I was driving my school bus, we passed a cop car.

And then all the kids said migra migra and then went quiet.

And that no, like the silence broke my heart.

And I can't thank you.

I can't look at you and thank you because you haven't done enough.

You haven't started doing anything.

And I don't know what else there is to say.

Like there's a line in Hillsborough.

On one side is the city council, the police, their lawyers, and ICE, and on the other side are the people.

And I'm standing on the side of the people, the teachers, the construction workers, the previous speakers.

I'm standing with them.

And so that's the question we have to ask.

Which side are we on?

Thank you, William.

Phil Pelkin, you're next.

Michael Peterson, you can come up uh to the podium.

Uh Phil, you have three minutes.

Thank you for introducing uh this resolution.

Oh, please press the button so we can hear you.

Thank you.

Thank you for introducing uh this resolution.

Uh my name's Phil Pelkey.

Uh I've lived here.

Uh also uh just moved here uh in May.

Um other speakers at this meeting have described uh people being disappeared off the street.

Uh I can say from my own experience, uh just taking a walk around the park uh within a block of where I lived.

I've seen that myself.

Uh this emergency is here.

Um so uh thank you for uh doing what we can right now.

Uh the emergency is here, and so thank you for acknowledging that.

Uh I expect many others in this room have seen that uh as well.

Uh the status quo is hurting our community.

Uh this resolution at least helps mitigate that damage.

Um so thank you.

Thank you, Phil.

Uh Michael, you're next.

Uh next person up is Adrian Smith.

Adrian Smith, you can come up to the podium to the desk here.

And then after Adrian Smith is Laney.

Laney, you're on deck.

Okay, Michael, you have three minutes.

Thank you, Mayor uh Beech and uh the city council.

Um I come here today as a concerned citizen.

I see a government that has gotten out of control.

They're not respecting uh the rights that we have as uh Americans, whether we are citizens or not.

Um those rights extend to everybody as as well they should.

If uh if they are able to if they are able to violate the rights of our Fourth Amendment, they were able to violate it for everybody if they from the least of us to the to the greatest of us.

It doesn't matter if if they can violate it for one, they can violate it for all for it all.

Um I've seen um them operate, ICE personally in several instances.

They operate with extreme violence.

Um in large numbers with assault rifles.

Um every single abduction that I've seen, they've been able to do it in under two minutes.

Um and at that point in time, there's there's just those of us who are who are observing it, we're just left to pick up the pieces.

And one of the things that I would ask is that we start thinking creatively about how do we connect those those families to their loved one and legal counsel so that way they can have a fighting chance because today there's just a car left in the middle of the road, and sometimes there's not a name attached to it.

Sometimes it's locked, and we can't we can't get in and see what the registration is and at least try that.

And so and we're dealing with a population who is very fearful of the police right now and can't diff we can't differentiate between uh police number one and police number two.

And so I ask that uh one that uh we look at ways to work with community-based organizations to help them quickly reconnect and notify families that um ICE has taken their loved ones, so it's not just somebody who's just been disappeared.

Um secondly, um in this time of fear, we need to be very careful about our words and our communication.

And as you've become aware, um uh memo that was sent out under one context was read in our current context, where we are now seeing how violent and how out of control this agency is.

And so I fear that um all the work that um our police department has done um after the Black Lives Matter movement in terms of reaching out to community members and working on ways to better integrate themselves with the community.

I fear that all that work has been lost, and so I ask that we redouble that those efforts now in in today's environment.

Thank you.

Thank you, Mike.

Adrian, uh, you're next.

Um, but Laney can come up to the desk here, and then the next person on deck is Kimberly Fabian Martinez.

Adrian, welcome, you have three minutes.

My name is Adrian Smith.

I am a school counselor at an elementary school in the Hillsborough School District.

Speaking in front of all these people is terrifying, but I see the brave folks of this community get up and go to work, drop off and pick up their children at school, leave their homes to get food for their families, all while knowing that masked racist secret police could be lurking down the street to racially profile and ultimately kidnap them without cause, ripping them from their loved ones.

Daily I see the fear in our children's faces, the fear in the their families' faces, all while knowing that I can't tell them everything will be okay.

We as educators are transporting our students to and from schools in various ways, as taking the risk of being at their children's school has gotten multiple Hillsboro parents snatched right from their cars while their children watch.

We as educators are creating safe spaces for folks to get groceries and doing grocery shopping for families as ICE is hiding in grocery store store parking lots.

We are as educators are lining streets at arrival and dismissal, surveilling alleyways at dead end streets, as this is where ICE lies in wait.

We as educators are helping families to write plans for their children's care.

If they are kidnapped kidnapped while their babies are at school, what are you as our community leaders doing?

Currently we are a sanctuary city in name only.

This title did not protect our community members, and it does not erase the last six weeks of nonstop terror that our community members have and are experiencing at the behest of a racist administration where a Gestapo is taking orders from a 34-time convicted felon.

Continuing to allow these domestic terrorists free reign in our community must stop.

And I implore you to get creative in implementing measures to protect the immigrants in our community.

Unprecedented times call for innovative thinking, not complicity.

You have the power to make it harder for these goons to kidnap our community members by requiring them to identify themselves, prohibiting them from having their faces covered, and by ensuring that our local police department is not working with them.

Sending memos to Hillsborough city employees restricting them from using their position to warn community members or deterring them from filming these kidnappings for six weeks was a mistake.

These Gestapo members need to be on record as there will be a day of reckoning.

Hillsboro can create policies to ensure that we are on the right side of history.

Without meaningful action, this leadership body is nothing but a bystander to these atrocities against humanity happening in our diverse community.

All will be held accountable for their actions and time.

Do not commingle passively with this Gestapo organization.

Your complicity is dangerous.

And Laney, is that you?

Yes.

Great.

Just hold on one second.

On deck, we have Melina Meglothan.

Melina Meglothan, you're on deck.

Uh Laney, please go ahead.

You have three minutes.

Hi, I'm Laney, and I'm a resident of Hillsborough for the last 25 years.

And I'm an immigrant.

But I have one special power that most immigrants around here don't have.

I'm white, so I don't fear ICE.

I'm out on those streets patrolling my kids' schools.

I've watched six abductions.

I've watched the Hillsborough PD stand by and do nothing.

As a woman was screaming from her car, I'm a citizen.

I was born in Portland.

And he, you know what he did?

He went like this.

He shrugged his shoulders.

He could have stopped that because that ICE car, you guys wanted solutions, that ICE car had only one plate.

It had no registration tags.

And I've personally photographed that vehicle more than once on the license plate on different vehicles.

He could have stopped that right then and there.

That vehicle was breaking state law.

Oregon has laws.

Hillsboro has laws.

What are you guys doing?

Um except putting out memos telling staff not to record.

Oh, and you only retracted the do not record.

You did not retract, don't tell people information.

So what information about ice are you guys withholding?

Um what are you guys doing?

That's what I would like to know.

And you want solutions, but you guys aren't enforcing the solutions.

Like police need to police.

And you guys need to stop withholding information.

Thank you.

Thank you, Laney.

Uh Kimberly, you're next.

Um, Melina McMclothan.

Thanks for coming up.

And Anastasia Hernandez Vasquez, you're on deck.

Kimberly.

Uh you have three minutes.

Go right ahead.

Okay.

My name is Kimberly, and as a family, as my parents as immigrants, it's very hard to go out because if we can't go out because it's very dangerous to go out.

We can't even go get our groceries or go shopping.

It's very hard for us to go out.

And it's very hard for my mom to take me to school because she is nervous that ICE is gonna pull us over because I has been on at our school and on the street at the school we go to I go to.

It's just very dangerous, and I don't like how it's so unsafe outside, and I want to go outside, but I can't.

I want to go hang out with my friends, but I can't because I don't have a ride there because my parents are too scared.

I'm very nervous that my parents are taken away, but at least I still have them.

I don't want my parents to be taken away because I am still a child.

I still want to have a family with them.

And it's very scary because every day my parents have been coming home, been all been so scared and crying, and I hadn't been crying as much, but lately I have, because this morning, like at 1 40, one of my family members had been deported.

They have been detained, and we don't know where they're at right now, but they have been detained.

And like a few weeks before, another family member has been detained because of ice, because they were working, but one of them literally said that they were a US citizen, but they still take them.

Either way, they're a US citizen, they still take them, they don't care.

They racially profile you that I can like I can get deported because my hair is skin color and if I speak Spanish, because I am a Latina, and they don't care if like you're a US citizen, like I can still take be taken away because I was born here in Oregon, but they don't care.

They still take you, and like it's very just dangerous.

And every time I want to go out, like I have to go to school.

My parents always have to check the ice app because it's very dangerous to go out.

Thank you for your time.

Thank you, Kimberly.

Uh Melina, you're next.

Uh, Anastasia Hernandez Vasquez, you can come up.

And the person on deck is Erica Villa.

Um, Melina, go right ahead.

You have three minutes.

Thank you.

Good evening.

So I have lived in Hillsborough all of my life, and I went to school here, and I also work in Hillsborough.

I am not here speaking for myself.

I'm here speaking for my family.

My family who is not able to come and speak for themselves.

The fear that they have day in and day out is a is I it's just so overwhelming overwhelming.

I have I had a family member tell me this weekend that they are done, that they they want to leave.

They don't want to be here anymore, that the stress is too much, and they're crying to me.

Thing of just that they don't want to be here.

They are done with this.

I also talked to somebody that their spouse was taken, and they were taken to Tacoma, and they were in a facility for two weeks.

Those two weeks, they had no water, no food that was given to them, no food that was warmed up for them, no clean clothes, no shower.

Imagine not taking a shower, being able to clean yourself for two weeks.

Can you imagine that?

Their spouse could not take it anymore, and they signed papers to self-deport.

And when they signed those papers to self-deport, they got an applause.

An applause because of how they they just couldn't take it anymore to be in just being treated like an animal.

This is not us these stories that we're hearing, these are not stories that are of hero stories or stories that are like, wow, they're so they're so brave and this and that.

This is a result of a government that is taking away rights and putting people in horrendous situations.

That these that this is not, oh wow, our community is so strong, and this and that, yes, we are strong, but we should not be having to go through this at all.

Nobody.

And I'm done.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Erica Via, uh, you can come up to the desk on the left-hand side of the room.

Barry Johnson Smith, you're on deck.

And Anastasia, you have three minutes.

Thank you, Mayor Price, counselors and community of Hillsborough for the opportunity to speak my truths.

I want to start by saying Hitler didn't start with camps.

He started with Make America or Make Germany Great Again slogans, banning books, bullying the press, blaming immigrants, turning neighbors into enemies, getting the arts, fear mongering about outsiders, and demonizing teachers.

Sounds like what we're going through now in this country.

I am the wife of an immigrant, the mother of biracial children, the mother of an army soldier who served four years in the Marines prior to going to the army.

My children are young adults in this community who live in fear every day for their father's well-being, their families' well-being, and their community's well-being.

But we're still here.

America includes Canada, Mexico, numerous other countries in Central America, the Caribbean, Costa Rica, Cuba, Haiti, and Jamaica.

So these are American people.

The government sponsored domestic terrorism is real.

We deserve better for our children, for our families.

We don't need these goons breaking windows, pulling family members out of cars in front of children, and sometimes leaving children orphaned and having to figure out what's next with no parents.

The last time that this man was in power, how many children disappeared under his watch?

How many parents lost children and still haven't figured out what happened to them after all these years?

Might I say that I heard that ICE is the third highest funded in the world, only under the United States military and Chinese military.

That's terrifying.

They're not the military.

What would it mean if Hillsboro could support our community and withdraw from federal funding?

Could we do it?

Would our citizens be able to survive without having the feds in here?

Would our citizens be better off without having these goons in our streets, taking our people?

So I just want to go ahead and say that I've read the Constitution.

I'm I love history, and what's happening is not constitutional and should not be happening in this country under the Constitution.

We need to do something.

We need to be that city who stands up and Erica, you are next, but hold up.

Sean Thomas, you are on deck.

Sean Thomas.

Okay, Erica, you have three minutes.

Hello, I am Erica.

I was uh born in Salem, Oregon.

So I came from Salem and I wanted to do my uh testimony.

I was one of the incident or victims that happened last week on Tuesday around nine in the morning, where I was uh following what I believe was an ICE agent car, and my thoughts now are that they were about bouncy hunters, they never show their batch or identifications.

I was following for about 20 uh 10 minutes, and I was asking them if they could uh roll down their window, if they could show an ID or batch, if they could identify themselves.

I just wanted to know why they were in town, why are they there arresting people that are not criminals, people that have no records?

I know that coming from another country is only a civil offense, it's not a criminal crime.

So my my day on Tuesday happened that a lot of people were saying, you know, hey, do the meeting I watch.

There's a lot of uh ice things happening, you know.

So I started following them.

Um I guess for some people call it persecution.

For me, it was I was doing the right thing for my people for my community.

And when we stopped at a red light, I basically pulled on the window and I asked them, you know, if you are one of them, could you identify yourself?

Could you show me your um you know your cover your cover face, your arm, your rifle, and um eventually the guy did come out, you know.

We were at a stoplight.

He comes out, he brings out his rifle, his R 15, and he does not identify himself.

At this time, my car was already in park, it had the emergency lights on, and I left the keys inside just in case I had a you know uh fly the scene or anything.

Um their response at the statement was that my car wasn't drive the whole time, that the reason why they put the rifle or pointed the rifle on me was for self-defense, because they feel uh they felt intimidated.

And I am uh, you know, five three girl waiting 150.

There was two guys.

How did I intimidate two guys that I was only recording and asking them questions?

So I at this point I don't know who they are, what they want.

And I checked their plates.

Their plates don't have any record, they have no DMB record.

So my my question is to Oregon is why are they letting bounty hunters for me that's what they are?

Why are they letting them stay here in town doing all this criminal activity for me?

Because for me, a federal agent shouldn't have a rifle, and they shouldn't be pointing a rifle at me.

Um I feel that we as people have to advocate and talk to our people.

Thank you, Erica.

Uh Barry, you have three minutes but hold tight.

Sean Thomas, you are up next.

Come on up to the table, the desk on the left-hand side of the room.

And then Alex Seditanio.

Alex Cedatano is on deck.

Barry, you have three minutes.

All right.

Good evening, council.

I have a couple of items to share with you in our community members tonight.

Yesterday I organized an event with other concerned residents from Portland, Salem, Hillsborough, and Forest Grove to visit the state capital.

Uh, our goal was to share our experience with the harm ICE is causing in our communities and to ask the state to work on legislation to address this issue.

For everyone who came with me yesterday, they took time out of their busy schedule to attend.

It was their first time visiting the Capitol and the first time engaging directly with legislators.

Some of them are here in the room today.

I want to congratulate them and recognize their courage and taking that step.

From our conversations, we learned that the state is already working on several bills related to the concerns we raised about ICE activity.

One proposal will acquire law enforcement officers to unmask and identify themselves so community members can clearly recognize what agency is present at a scene.

Another, uh the one I have a copyright here called Protect Your Door Act, which is a draft of from uh Les representative Leslie Munio's office, uh, would allow private uh citizens to uh sue federal agents who enter their prop their property without proper identification or a warrant, including for any damage caused during such actions.

Um I plan to get a list of immigrant related bills that will be on the session for next year, so if anyone interested in them, just let me know.

I spoke with one legislator who's working on these bills, and he told me he is trying to stretch the boundaries of the law to address the situation.

That's exactly what we are asking from you as well.

We need you to stretch the boundaries of what's possible to protect and support community members impacted by ice.

Historically, we have seen how loopholes and policy creativity have been used to circumvent civil rights laws, enable people to be oppressed and exploited.

So why can't we apply the same level of creativity, protect our people and our rights?

The resolution is a good first step in that direction.

Before I close, I want to offer some feedback on the grant you posted last week for the CBOs to support immigrants.

Several people came to me expressing concern about the language use, and some CBOs were discouraged from applying because of it.

This highlights a broader issue of community engagement, specifically the need to improve how you communicate with the public so people can better understand the decisions you make and why you write a documentation for what you do.

I am more than willing to help you in with that work if you like my support.

Most of y'all know me, so you so feel free to reach out.

Thank you.

Are you Alex?

Come on up.

You can come up on the right hand side desk.

And then Aaron Palmer, you're on deck.

Sean, you have three minutes.

Hello.

Council members, thank you for the time to share my thoughts, commentary, and perspective with our wider community.

Regarding the calls for action outlined in the recent emergency declaration, uh, thank you for adopting, by the way.

Uh I do want to believe that something positive will manifest from it.

Uh hearing the options presented intend to follow all applicable laws, uh, strongly contrasts with these uh external forces operating here that do not follow the law themselves.

Makes me ask, why are we burdened with remaining the responsible adults in the room?

So we're clear on this, we're expected to legally combat these forces when our opposition openly disregards our laws and our rights with seemingly relished disdain.

Hearing that the council recognizes the abuse, our community members are enduring, and seeing the wording that condemns it, I find myself asking, what is the action that can actually be taken here?

Will any action uh will any action be taken?

How is this going to be enforced and how will we feel protected?

If these uh massed gangs of violent abductors hunting our friends and family will continue to be a presence in our community, then it makes me wonder what our options are.

We're told not to engage.

In fact, we're very likely to be labeled terrorists for documenting the illegal actions of ICE.

So what can we as a community do?

Can we call the police?

Well, we're actually told that the police forces will not respond to those calls.

So now what?

Uh make a decision to attend a council meeting for the first time in my life and voice my opinion.

And now the abductions continue.

And the fear persists.

We need to see strength and courage from our leaders.

We need to see significant advancements of proactive policies that defend and protect our citizens when we're feeling powerless as individuals.

And a final thought and echoing a suggestion that some have shared here.

Since these guys are out here in our neighborhoods acting in an illegal capacity, in coordinated efforts to terrorize and kidnap our neighbors, our police should probably act accordingly and enforce all applicable laws and treat them as the criminal gangs they are and start actively arresting them to immediately get them off of our streets.

It's not a perfect fix, but it is better than doing nothing.

Thank you to everyone here for your time.

Thank you, Sean.

Uh Aaron Palmer, you can come up.

And I'll just put a reminder at the last meeting.

Uh, if you agreed with what somebody was saying, um, I encourage you to snap so we can still hear what they're saying.

If you clap, then we can't hear what they're saying.

So uh encourage if you want to support, that's great.

But if you snap, then we can still hear the testimony.

Okay.

Alex, uh, you have three minutes.

Yeah.

Um everyone, my name is Alex Saritaño, and first of all, thank you, uh Mayor Pace for pronouncing that right.

Um because as someone with that last name, I do come here.

Uh most of you can tell that that name isn't of uh a white or European descent.

Um I just want to start off first by saying I was here years ago when I was a kid, um, when the city of Hillsboro did agree and put into place that this would be a sanctuary city, and at that time I did believe that that would help us.

I do think it has that some uh capacity.

But as I'm seeing today in our community, I don't believe that that's being acknowledged.

I don't think that's being upheld because the truth is that our community, members of our community, people we see every day are being taken, are being their rights are being violated.

So I think what I was in the uh work session, I believe what you uh all mentioned are great first steps, but I believe that's what they are first steps, and that more needs to be done.

Um I think working with other communities and cities, such as the ones that are around us, such as Forest Grove, Cornelius Beaverton, needs to be done because as you can see, when our community shows up, things happen.

People make things happen.

And so if we uh have more people within our state of Oregon working together, then that's when real change is seen.

And one other thing that I want to touch on is that the people here who are speaking up for the people who are not here, that is something that you should also see is that people with skin like mine people who have our darker shades, they're afraid to step out of their house.

They're afraid to show up here to advocate for themselves.

That's why we have all these people advocating for them.

And I also think that another point to be made is that the keeping the community informed.

I have where I work, we have the know your rights cards, the red cards.

When they come in, people say, I didn't, I don't I didn't know you guys had these.

I didn't know like my rights, basically, they don't know their rights.

People need to know their rights, and I believe that you as the council and the city should also, you know, let people know that you're standing with them.

Um and I'll use these last 10 seconds to say that I'll say this in Spanish.

Estoy orguloso de miseraises, todos aquí, son mi gente son mi comunidad.

And I need you guys to stand up for us.

Thank you.

Erin, you're up next.

Hold tight.

Simone Campbell, if you could come up to the desk on the right hand side of the room.

Simone Campbell and then Emily Cordo, you are on deck.

Aaron, you have three minutes.

Thank you.

Um, good evening.

My name is Aaron Palmer, and I am a Hillsborough resident and a business owner.

And I'm here tonight because the city is failing to turn words into action when it comes to protecting our community.

My dear friend Victor Cruz was illegally and wrongfully detained by ICE for 25 days.

And do you know who was doing the work to save him?

His daughter at Siri, myself, and Counselor Sinclair, every day for 25 days.

We are not lawyers and we are not crisis professionals, and yet we were sent out like lambs to the slaughter as we fought against a federal agency for Victor's freedom and for the safety of all of Hillsborough.

And it was our relentless effort, not the city's.

It was our efforts that engaged Congresswoman Bonamici that brought media attention and that finally helped free Victor.

We did the heavy lifting and we protected Victor, but the city did not protect us, and you are not protecting the rest of the community.

Our Latino neighbors are being terrorized and families are being dismantled.

Meanwhile, our local businesses are collapsing.

Many are down by half or more.

The joy of the life, the spirit of Hillsborough, it's draining out of our town.

And let me ask you this.

Any parents here?

Any parents here tonight?

I have received phone calls from three different women that I have never met.

Who saw me on the news and asked me if, in the event that ICE detains them, if I would take their children.

How dare we be in this situation?

Think about that.

Really think about that.

Mothers in this city are so terrified of being separated from their children that they are looking for backup plans with strangers because their friends and family look like them and therefore they don't feel safe there either.

Here's another devastating part.

All of these mothers have legal status.

One is a naturalized citizen, another has protected status, but we know that is not enough to guarantee their safety.

It didn't protect Victor.

And when we think about when else in history mothers have sent their children to live with with the strangers to keep them safe.

You know when that was?

It was in Nazi Germany with the kinder transport in the 1930s.

And that's the level of fear we have in Hillsborough in 2025.

You cannot continue to call yourselves leaders while the residents of the city are doing the work that you are unwilling to do.

We are fighting for each other.

We are protecting our community, and what I see too many people doing is having an unwillingness to be uncomfortable.

Silence is not neutrality.

Science is complicity.

And when you do nothing, you are choosing harm.

Get brave, get uncomfortable, and get to work for Victor, for our families, and for all of Hillsboro.

Thank you.

Thank you, Erin.

Simon, you are next.

Emily Cordo, is that you?

All right, thank you.

And then Jodi Artaga.

You are on deck.

Jody Ortega.

Simone, you have three minutes.

Thank you, Mayor.

My name is Simone Campbell, and I'm a resident here in Hillsborough for the last five years.

My partner and I own a home in old Arranco.

I'm almost dumbfounded.

I don't know what to say because the last person that was speaking.

I just kind of want to say, yeah, which that lady said.

You know, my family goes back in this country to the early colonizers.

Okay.

I'm from New York originally.

My father helped build the trade towers.

My brother watched them come down.

His nephew, I mean his son, my nephew built them back up.

To say I'm an American patriot is an understatement.

But I am no more American than any brown person that is in this room.

Any brown person that is afraid to be in this room for every empty seat that is in this room.

Thank you.

I did a bunch of shopping.

Uh walked around looking for someone to help me know what to buy.

Um looking to make contact with people.

So you can say, you see me, right?

You see me wanting to help you, want you see me wanting to be an ally.

I'm trying.

And then look at me like they, yeah, get get to buying stuff, lady.

Your white privilege demands that you be here and stand for me, stand next to me, stand in front of me if I need you to.

So then I took all of that stuff and I went down to one of the little free pantry fridges that one of our community members, who's very well known, puts out in front of her house, and I stuffed it in there for the people that can't get out to the stores.

And now I'm worried about well, what about the people going to that refrigerator?

What are they gonna do if they know that someone's watching them?

So now I go, okay, I bet I can deliver some groceries.

I'm from New Jersey originally, and you know, I gotta say, we would not be taking some of the shit that we are seeing happening here.

We would not be.

My ancestors demand more of me.

Your ancestors demand more of you.

I do the things I should do.

I put a free library out in front of my house.

I now convert it to a pantry.

I do the things that I can do to help out.

I vote the way I need to vote.

So when I lay my head down at night, I can feel better about myself.

Bullshit.

I demand more of myself and everyone else, because it is the least I can do as an American.

This dream we've promised people.

This this fantasy that we've promised people.

We will stand you up, but we will not stand next to you or behind you when it doesn't.

Where is the good trouble that we are supposed to get into?

I'm calling you to the line, all of you up here.

Stand to the line and get in some good trouble.

You want to be safe?

No one's safe.

That's the truth.

Thank you, Simon.

All right.

Jodi Ortega.

Jodi, are you coming up?

Great.

Okay.

And then Val Bokma, Val Bachma, you are on deck.

And Emily, you have three minutes.

Um, thank you.

My name is Emily Cordo, and I work and uh live in Hillsboro.

And um I uh come from a family uh that includes um immigrants.

Um my family came from Italy.

Um and I happen to look like the Italian side of my family.

Um and one of the consequences of that is that my entire life I've been mistaken for being Latina.

Uh and um that has uh just as often Latino and Latino folks who've been mistaking me, so I take it as a compliment.

Uh, but uh it is now something that causes me a great deal of fear.

I'm afraid to be in my own community because I could be mistaken uh for uh being Latino and therefore a a vic a target um by a bunch of state-sponsored terrorist thugs uh who um don't really care uh who I actually am or who who any of these people that they're attacking actually are.

Um a couple of weeks ago, my neighbor's uh uh son um came to my front door and said um I uh my lift didn't show up to get to work, and um you know if I'm late for work one more time, I'm gonna get fired.

He's he's Latino.

And obviously I wanted to help him out.

He, you know, I want him to succeed, he's my neighbor.

Um, but I was afraid.

Uh I don't, you know, I don't know what his immigration status is.

I don't know what's gonna happen to me if I'm driving down the road with somebody in my car who may or may not be a U.S.

citizen.

Um, but of course I gave him the ride because we have to take risks um when we're faced with this kind of danger.

And um I'm really happy to see this resolution.

I'm happy to hear about the other changes that are being made in terms of allowing him the uh employees to film ice.

Um but uh it's not enough.

This is this is defense, um, and we need to play offense.

The people who are doing this, uh, you know, they they don't care what the laws are, they're very happy to act now in defense of evil and to you know face the legal legal ramifications later if those ever come about.

And um it is time for Hillsborough to look at um what it would mean to um take strong, powerful action in defense of our community, um, and then face the legal consequences later if that's what we have to do.

I spent uh 10 years practicing law.

I'm no longer a lawyer.

Um, but you know, in that time, what I saw is that people get away with a lot that's illegal.

And maybe it's time that the people who are on the side of good start pushing the boundaries a little bit and being willing to defend those actions in court if necessary.

Um, because what's happening right now is tearing our community apart, it's dividing neighbor from neighbor, and it's unacceptable.

And so I I thank you for what you've done so far, but I would strongly encourage you to um have the moral courage that it requires um to do what is necessary at this time.

Thank you.

Thank you, Emily.

Uh Val Bachma, you can come up to the desk on the left-hand side.

And Jody, you have oh, sorry.

Selene McKetty is on deck.

And Jody, you have three minutes.

Hi, good evening.

Um, my name is Jody Arteaga, and I have had the pleasure of getting to be involved with our immigrant and refugee community for the past several years.

Um, and I am married to an immigrant, and I have children that I share with him.

And I said to him the other day, I never thought that I would wake up every morning afraid for my family because of our government.

Um I just wanted to remind the law enforcement in Hillsborough in Washington County and in Oregon of the law um US Code 18, section 242 that says this law prohibits any person, including federal, state, and local law enforcement officers from willfully depriving a person of their constitutional or legal rights while acting under the color of the law.

This covers a range of misconduct, such as excessive force, intentional false arrests, or sexual assault, and can be applied even if the officer acts beyond their lawful authority.

Beyond that, um I have another thing I wanted to read.

It is the it is the legal uh duty for law local law enforcement to intervene when federal officers use excessive force.

This is because of all law enforcement officers have an affert of affirmative duty to intervene and stop misconduct, including constitutional violations like excessive force, especially when they have a realistic opportunity to do so without creating a greater risk.

All law enforcement officers, whether local or federal, have an affirmative duty to intervene when they witness another officer using excessive force or violating constitutional rights to the duty to intervene exists when an officer observes or has reason to know that a constitutional right has been violated.

Local officers are expected to protect individuals from harm.

And this duty extends to protecting them from the misconduct of other officers, including federal agents.

I think it's sad that we have to remind the police and the law enforcement in this state what their job is.

But we're all standing together as a community trying to take care of each other, and we just need you all to do your jobs.

Thank you.

Thank you, Jody.

Uh Val, is that you?

Val?

Say you, right here.

Okay, so one second.

Uh Celine or Selene McKetty.

Okay, thank you.

And then Dirk Kenutsen, you are on deck.

Uh Val, you have three minutes.

My name is Val Bachma, and I've lived in Hillsborough for 35 years.

Our community is under assault.

U.S.

Customs and Border Protection reports that their agents have made more than 560 arrests across the Portland area in the month of October.

These agents are heavily armed.

In some cases, they display no badges.

They usually wear masks and refuse to identify themselves or show any warrants.

They have quotas to meet, and they don't care whether the people they take are documented, undocumented, or U.S.

citizens.

In many cases, they are treating people brutally and cruelly.

And many of their actions are not, to be clear, legal detainments.

No warrant is presented.

There's no due process, no access to attorneys, and our legislators with oversight responsibilities are being denied access to the facilities.

Residents are trying in every way we can to keep our friends, neighbors, family members from being dragged away.

And we are being told that our city leaders and our police cannot, will not keep us safe, will not warn, will not interfere, will not document because federal officers have deemed these activities to be illegal.

As you know, laws change.

Temporary protected status has been stripped from hundreds of thousands of immigrants changing their status to illegal based on the government's whim.

Attempts have been made to end birthright citizenship.

The Supreme Court has lifted the ban on racial profiling, placing a target on every Latino in our community.

People who dissent are being labeled as terrorists.

But remember, there was also a time in this country when it was illegal to teach black people to read and write.

There was a time when it was illegal to help a slave escape from the person whom the law deemed as recognized as their owner.

In 1943, Anne Frank wrote in her diary, terrible things are happening outside.

At any time of night and day, poor helpless people are being dragged out of their homes.

Families are torn apart.

Men, women, and children are separated, children come home from school to find their parents have disappeared.

No one that I know excuses the horrors that were perpetrated on vulnerable people throughout history because they were at the time legal, and none of these laws changed because people were compliant.

We want our leaders to have integrity, but also courage and compassion and a moral compass that is independent of the administration's whims.

And so I am urging the city to reconsider what it can do to protect our communities.

In addition to providing grant funding and posting resources on its webpage, the city needs to do more at the very least.

Police need to record every immigrant immigration interaction that they possibly can and maintain a comprehensive database, and they need to reconsider the way they interact with community members who are impacted by ICE because their demeanor is raising the question of whether they are not just compliant with ICE but also complicit.

Thank you, Val.

Uh Celine or Selene.

Selene.

Selene, you have three minutes.

Thank you.

I am a city resident, a mother, and I am part of the educational community within Washington County.

I am here tonight to speak on behalf of children.

I work with children every day.

Children full of potential who wake up eager to learn and grow, whose parents work tirelessly to give them a better life.

They are now losing focus.

Their innocence is being shattered by the constant fear that their parents or loved ones might be taken away due to the ICE activity tearing through our city.

How can they learn hope or dream when all they feel is fear?

They are experiencing trauma.

Have you heard of ACES?

Adverse childhood experiences.

ACEs are potentially traumatic events that occur in childhood.

These experiences can trigger toxic stress, which negatively affects brain development and increases the risk of health and mental health problems in adulthood.

These traumatic events involving eyes threaten to mold their entire lives, impacting their health, their happiness, their future.

Our children deserve better.

They deserve a future filled with love, safety, and opportunity, not fear.

As families prepared to face an unthinkable family separation, it is important to bring resources directly to the community.

Ensure these services are accessible and affordable, including financial assistance.

Some suggestions are collaboration with consulates from other countries within our state to facilitate easier access to legal documents.

Offer legal services, offer notarization of documents and assistance completing legal forms.

To Chief Coleman, I would like to say, as a graduate of the HPD Citizen Academy, I left with the understanding that HBD takes seriously its duty to protect and serve its community.

But we all know that no department is perfect.

Make it clear how your department will follow through on citizen complaints and how you will hold officers accountable.

Accountability is non-negotiable.

Trust begins with honesty.

Our children, our future generations, they are watching.

They will look back in generations to come.

They will see what we did during this moment in history.

This moment demands our voice, our courage, our commitment, and that we stay united, stay loud, stay strong, remain peaceful, but remain remain peaceful, but determined with unwavering resolve for our community as a whole.

And part of that whole includes our immigrant community.

Thank you.

Thank you, Selena.

Good job.

Myra Contreras.

You can come up and go on the right-hand side.

And on deck is Michael.

No last name.

You have three minutes.

Thank you, Mayor.

My heart is full of gratitude.

My soul is full of fear, like the fear in this room.

And I'm grateful for the emergency proclamation.

I'm grateful for the response to what you heard two weeks ago.

Um, I'm grateful for our staff.

I'm grateful for the journalists that are working here.

I'm mostly grateful for our young people who are coming to us in their time of need, in our time of need, and their voices are being heard, voices like Manny's, who got manifold pushed out unwillingly, it happened, and he's had a change on our community.

I'm grateful for Ignacio, his teammate, who he came here to speak on behalf of, and I'm grateful for young Kimberly that sat here and poured her heart out.

I'd like to ask, or I'd like to say that I'm very grateful for those counselors that brought forward additional uh ideas.

I thought the codification of our codes, which is a complex issue, but knowing that city buildings are covered by strict laws of behavior of who does what in those buildings, and that's accountability we need.

I'm very grateful for Christian Salgado, uh, not only for being on national television, doing a great job to speak for his heritage and his community, um, but also his idea about a civilian humanitarian body that would exist as a city uh construct that could go out to these stops.

People like me or these people and all of these great moms and teachers and everyone coming forward could go and document.

I I urge you to make that a next step, both of those steps.

Um as far as flock, as far as 911, as far as sharing DMV records, what are we doing?

I haven't heard answers.

I'm sure work session will cover it, but I'm still hearing that cities are sharing data amongst each other unwillingly.

We can't have that.

ICE is just grabbing these people like they know where they are.

People like Pablo Guzman Santoyov, who got grabbed right before this meeting started in front of our beautiful white rabbit TV Highway, as his son is crying, and one of our civilian citizens is running down the street filming, begging people for help.

Horrifying scene happened while we were just before we came in here.

I'm not convinced we cannot approach them through our HPD and C's.

Excuse me, gentlemen, officers, who are you?

Can we see badges?

We're not interfering.

We just want to know who you are so we can document this.

Once we do that, they are scared.

And they will back down.

I watched Kylie Delgado, an unknown hero to many follow ICE officers all day, and she escorted them right out of town, blurring her PA system, putting herself at fear of arrest.

I want to close by saying our community is a lot like a grove of trees, a beautiful grove of trees.

We stand together.

We're connected at the roots through the mycelium.

Our young people like Manny and Ignacio keep us healthy.

The taller ones, we have to give them shade and protection so that together we can live.

And we either are gonna rise and grow together or we're gonna fall.

And if we fall, we're not coming back ever the way we were.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Michael, who is on deck, you can come up to the podium on the or the desk on the left.

And Myra, you have three minutes.

Good evening, Honorable Mayor Beach and Council members.

My name is Myra Contreras.

And I am the proud owner of Myra's Cupcakes and more.

Tonight, I am here on behalf of many local small businesses, but specifically Latino-owned businesses.

Our community is facing a crisis, ladies and gentlemen.

And we need your help.

Many businesses have reported a decline of 50, 60, and some, including mine, have seen a drop as high as 80%.

As you can see in the information I have provided, each and one of you.

No small business can survive with numbers like that.

When small businesses hurt, our whole city feels it.

By helping us stay open, you protect local jobs, preserve our community's identity, and strengthen Hillsborough's economic future.

Future, ladies and gentlemen.

But right now, many of us are struggling to keep our doors open.

Tonight, I'm asking for your support in creating a parallel program, a small business recovery grant, or a limited forgivable loan fund to help cover essential operating expenses during this downturn.

With even a small bridge of support, we can step stabilize, recover, and continue to contribute to our city's economy.

I cannot emphasize enough.

Without your help, many of us will not only lose our business, but the dreams we built for our families and the community.

48 seconds on the clock.

On November 1st, 1987, I came into this world in Hillsborough, Oregon.

I'm a Hills Baronian by heart.

And I will be Hills Peronian until the day God comes and takes me.

You, as my representative, as community's representative, I beg you, I urge you, we need you because we give you guys color.

We give you guys flavor.

Come on, who doesn't like a good taco, right?

We have a lot of that.

But without us, there is no spice.

And unfortunately, you will be bland.

Thank you.

Thank you, Myra.

Uh Michael, hold up one second, please.

Um, I'd like to ask uh Saren Truer.

S-E-R-E-N Saren.

Uh, you can come right up there onto the desk on the right.

And then on deck is Fernando Gutierrez.

Uh Michael, you have three minutes.

Good evening.

It's funny.

I um Venezuelan.

It's very hard to see what's going on in this community.

I came to the States looking for opportunity, and I'm privileged by that.

I'm actually have papers.

I'm now a citizen.

I'm a father of one child.

And it's so hard to see what's going on.

I'm able to speak here on behalf of my community, my friends, my family, because I cannot.

And I hear everybody's concerned.

I'm grateful for this community for the people, the support, all they have put into it.

But coming from where I come from, I understand what it's like to lose faith in the government.

What it's like to see authoritarism rise.

Democracy is fragile.

And you guys are seeing it in real time.

And if we just sit idle and just take band aids and warm solutions, it will continue to rise and it will trample every single one of you.

It's not enough what we do, and it requires fast action.

I appreciate the steps that you guys are taking to fund the CBOs and to help the communities.

But you guys need to move faster.

This will continue to happen.

I like to focus on solutions and like I said, I came here just to bring a better life for me and my family to work to just build relationships and contribute.

We need to look into other methods on how to help.

As you hear from everybody here and the proposals you guys get.

A lot of these solutions are reactive of what's happening.

Might be too late to help the people who's being affected.

And by the time funds goes into these CBOs, it might be too late to bring them back.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you, Michael.

Uh Fernando Gutierrez, you can come up to the desk on the left-hand side of the room.

And Saren, you have three minutes.

Reading it, I could only think of how chilling it must feel for the most vulnerable employees of the city.

No firm support or guidance was given for the situations they must fear the most.

Family member detained?

Talk to your supervisor.

Docker recipient?

So far nothing bad has happened to any of them, so you're probably fine.

Afraid to come to work?

Talk to your supervisor to review your options, if available.

Detained by ICE, please make sure your family calls your supervisor so they can review your options.

Obviously, every situation is going to be a little different, but as that memo stands, there is no guidance given to those supervisors, which leaves the door open to wildly varying outcomes just depending on who your manager happens to be.

That whenever any form of government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the right of the people to alter or abolish it.

Prudence will dictate that governments long established should not be changed for light and transient causes.

Thank you, Saren.

It is our right, is our duty to throw off such a government.

Sandra Pireta, and then on deck is uh Yaslin Lopez.

Uh Fernando, you have three minutes.

Thank you, thank you.

Uh good evening, everyone.

And uh I appreciate the time for me to come up here and you know talk a little bit about what you know I've run into in my in my life.

I'm 74 years old, and I was born in the state of Texas.

And I was raised uh by the time I was nine and ten years old in the state of Texas, uh, we were out in the fields picking cotton alongside uh the African American brothers and sisters and the H2A workers from Mexico that were brought in to work in the fields.

I did that for a few years, and then we decided to come to Oregon to find a better life.

So we migrated to Oregon in 1964, and I we lived in the labor camps all around Washington County and Flaccamus County.

Uh but uh back in those times, you know, in 64, things were not as uh as clear as they are today.

There was there was a lot of uh hidden I I ran into a small wall of discrimination in my living in the area of the Washington County back then.

I I remember one afternoon that three young kids uh grabbed a hold of me and talked and told me because of the color of my skin, they gave me a beating that it lasted for quite a while.

And that was my welcome to Oregon.

Uh I'm not it's uh it's been a long, long, long road, you know, uh here living in Oregon, but uh I can't believe that we are living under these with these Gestapo, you know, tactics that are going on against all of us that are brown and stuff.

That we're putting up with that kind of stuff.

We we we cannot put up with that.

I I now have brought my passport with me, you know.

I I've had it put away, although I don't travel, I just have it for the heck of it.

But uh I I now my wife's my wife who is Anglo-Saxon, does did not want me to come to this event and has tried to talk me out of going to other events and trying to talk me out of going out and doing uh looking for ice events and stuff, because I've done some, I've gotten some training, but she's afraid that I won't come back because of the color of my skin.

That's the uh the reality of where we're all at, you know, and we want you folks to see if you can improve the system, or I've got an idea is that we need to all get together as a state instead of these.

We we have meetings here, we have one in Cornelis yesterday, Forrest Grove last week, but we need to come together and work as a group, otherwise, you know, we will be a lost cause, and we'll get things done.

Thank you.

Uh Yaslin Lopez, you can come up to the desk on the left-hand side.

Melody Furman, you're on deck.

And Sandra, you have three minutes.

Good evening, Councillor Seclair and uh Counselor Salvador, it's super nice to see you guys again.

Um, my name is Sandra Pereira, and I am also one of the organizers that went to the state yesterday with Barry, who's over there.

Um I spoke to legislators and they're working on laws to protect us, but that protection is not coming soon enough.

Um, it won't be until February until we see those bills, and it's just not soon enough.

We need local government to do the work to make sure we're protected before help comes from the state.

Um, do you know how disgusting it is to go to work and to hear that one of your students, one of your sixth grade students is left alone in this country because both of their parents have been abducted, taken, kidnapped.

Do you know how disgusting it is to hear of a sixth grade girl who had to hide her second grade brother because ICE was outside of their house and a man was screaming.

Do you know how scary that is to hear from children that they're scared and they're witnessing these traumas?

We need to make ICE as uncomfortable and as scared as my Latino community is to go outside, and we need your help for that.

Help us create those roadblocks.

It is your duty to protect the citizens of Hillsborough.

Every day that you do not do something is a day that my community suffers.

Gunning.

Melody Furman, you can take the desk on the right hand side of the room, and Yaslin, you have three minutes.

Uh hang on one second.

If you could press the button again to make sure the mic is on.

There you go, you're all set.

Hi, my name is Jocelyn Lopez.

I'm 15 years old.

I go to high school, and thank you for everybody here for coming.

I'm here to speak for the people who can't, and for my community.

Some of the things I've been seeing online of ICE harassing people, breaking out car windows, following people, and going around neighborhoods.

That's harassment.

I just hope you guys can side with us because I'm so scared to come home one day from school and not being able to see my parents ever again.

Does it matter the color of our skin?

We're still people.

Nothing's wrong with us.

We all breathe the same air.

I just want my community to be safe.

And not having to worry about anything.

We shouldn't be unsafe in our homes.

Some people aren't even working because they're so afraid of coming out.

These people with masks taking them with no ID shown.

We're not criminals.

We're just people who moved here so we could have a better life.

Me undocumented is not a crime.

I just want my family and friends and everybody in my community to be safe and return home to their loved ones waiting for them.

I just don't understand how I can just rip innocent families apart.

Thank you for everybody for showing up.

Thank you, y'all so Melody, you're next, but hold on, hold tight.

Uh Vern Parsley, you're up next.

And Ahmed, you're on deck.

Melody, you have three minutes.

Um I was born and raised here.

My family has been here for 35 years.

Um I deeply loved this city once, but I do not recognize this place anymore.

Um I find it interesting that the police response portion of your working sessions keeps being put at the end when you know that you won't get to it in your first hour when the most community members will be present.

I know that you know that that is why we are here.

We do not care about the intricacies of funding grants right now.

We want to hear about HPD's inaction.

I also find it shameful and frankly pathetic that Jim Coleman is not here to face us.

He was not here two weeks ago, he's not here tonight.

I'm here to demand that you hold him accountable for this department's inaction in the face of these terrorists in our community.

Inaction is complicity, inaction is cooperation.

You cannot tell us out of one side of your mouth that this is a sanctuary city, and then out of the other side, tell us all of the ways that you are doing nothing to protect our community and stop the illegal activity taking place here.

Two weeks ago, the very day that we were here, the FBI warned that people impersonating ICE are abducting, extorting, assaulting, and raping people under the cover of ICE's tactics.

And yet this department still refuses to do even the barest amount of due diligence to ensure that these terrorists are acting under the authority that they claim.

Last meeting, I heard you, Counselor Salgado, ask a community member if we expect our police department to stand between this community and ICE.

And quite frankly, I do.

We our taxes pay their salary.

ICE does not.

You also asked, you also said that ICE expects this police department to help them.

And quite frankly, I don't care.

If this police department was not cooperating with ICE, ICE would have no such expectation of them.

If this police department was holding ICE accountable to our state and federal laws, they would know not to expect anything but hassle when they enter our city limits.

Instead, they are allowed to act with impunity.

And to me, that is cooperating with ICE.

I'm here to demand action.

You have jurisdiction over our police department.

I demand that you stop with the mealy-mouthed excuses of what you cannot do.

Hold this department accountable for their inaction.

I demand that they respond to 911 calls.

Thank you very much.

May I have a question?

I know that we're not we're not supposed to comment after it.

But my name was called out, and there was an accuracy mentioned here.

I feel like there's an opportunity.

Okay.

Well, I just want to state that that quote was inaccurate from that person.

Uh next, uh, we have Vern and Ahmed.

You're on the desk on the right hand side.

And on deck is Brien Atalia.

Okay, thank you for allowing me to speak.

Uh I was born here in 1958.

This is my community.

Thank you, my community.

You guys are part of the community as well.

Thank you for listening to us tonight.

Mix it up a little.

I'm gonna start out with a quick short poem.

Laws as we read in ancient sages have been cobwebs in all ages.

Cobwebs, cobwebs for little flies are spread, and laws for little folks are made.

But if an insect of renown, hornet or beetle, wasp or drone, be caught in quest of sport or plunder, the flimsy feather flies in sunder.

So that was written in 1758 by James Beattie.

So I often think about what kind of problems did he have in the day back in 1758 that come up uh realizing that laws were written for little people, not insects of renowned.

And here we are today.

I often ponder, you know, uh, other than him spinning in his grave right now, uh thinking and seeing what he would uh how he would react to people being snatched off the streets for nothing more than their skin color in this country.

And it's uh it's approved of the highest court that you know that's uh perfectly acceptable uh cause to pull people off the street.

So uh in the um emergency declaration, uh one of the resolve statements is implementing legally defensible support programs.

That caught my ears and eyes, and I kept I started writing a bunch of comments down, and I'm on board with that.

I'd like to help vet that.

So, what is legally defensible support programs?

We need something with teeth in it, something that people can do, they can feel comfortable about taking a stand.

We need to go toe-to-toe against the federal government, like the state has done at the at the local level.

You know, I I want um the city attorney uh to go toe-to-toe and then be afraid of facing him in court.

I mean, that's what we need.

That is a kind of uh a level of activity uh we need here.

Uh lastly, um it's been widely reported that out of the 600 people that ICE detained in Chicago over a two-month period, only sixteen had records.

That's a three percent success rate.

So they were willing to uh you know, Chrissy Noam, Tom Homan, and Reich Vice Chancellor Stephen Smith were willing to, you know, go through a sorting exercise of people of human beings, living, breathing human beings pulling them off the street for nothing more than a three percent success rate.

When we were led to believe at the very beginning, they were going after known criminals.

Okay, so that's uh really uh really very sad.

Um they were willing to disrupt or destroy human lives to achieve that three percent.

And again, don't contone condone that.

The lady who spoke before me.

Uh she she said we need we need something bigger.

Uh we need to go toe-to-toe with people.

Thank you.

Thank you, Bern.

Yeah.

Uh Bree Natalia, you can come up.

And Ahmed, you have three minutes.

Hello, my name is Ahmed.

I've lived in Hillsborough for maybe 36 years.

First and foremost, I want to tell the Hispanic brothers and sisters that I am in solidarity with them 100%.

100%.

Second of all, I want to say quite clearly.

Elections have consequences.

We must vote out Donald Trump.

We must vote out the Republican Party.

ICE is a stick.

S T I C K.

Donald Trump is the hand that beats us over the head with that stick.

We must vote these people out.

We must do it.

We are continually talking about the reality of the color of the skin of the people who are being put upon.

Unfortunately, this is not new.

I was born in 1957 in New Orleans, Louisiana.

If you want me to tell you about racism, let's get together.

I'll tell you about it.

This is not new.

It's just different.

Have you ever heard of a slave patrol?

ICE is the new slave patrol of 2025.

We have to change things by voting out Donald Trump and the Republican Party.

We must do that.

I do believe that the city council, that the city manager, that the attorney, I think they're doing what they can do.

Think outside of the box.

Thank you for what you're doing, but think outside of the box.

Because guess what?

Donald Trump does not care about laws.

He does not.

We are a nation of laws, but he continuously finds a way to get around following the law.

He does what he wants to whomever he wants, and let's just see what a chips fall.

That's Donald Trump.

If you want to change things, continue on the road that you are.

But vote this guy out, vote out the Republican Party if you want to make changes in this country.

We find these tools to be self-evident that all men are created equal.

But they meant all white men were created equal.

That's what they meant.

We've got to get past the color of our skin thing.

We are human beings.

We are one race of people.

We all contribute to this country.

I've served in the military.

Hispanic people have served in the military.

Hispanic people have died in the military.

Black people have died in the military.

We must stand together as human beings.

Not as damn races of colors.

We are one race.

Human race.

Thank you.

Thank you.

You can come and take a seat at the desk on the right-hand side.

Andrea C.

And then Manny Chavez, you are on deck.

Is it Bree or Bri?

Bree.

Bree.

Thank you.

You have three minutes.

Thank you.

And thank you, Sinclair, for your work with Victor Cruz.

I'm here to request a call to action to put pressure on David Kuhnhausen.

He's the interim director of Portland permitting development.

Everyone, David Kuhnhausman, email him, call his cell phone.

Under their own planning and zoning codes on Portland, 33.700.040 there have power for the reconsideration of land use approvals.

So situations when land use approvals may be reconsidered when there's one or more conditions of the land use approval, such as the holding detainees over 12 hours, or if there's been substantially increase in intensity from what was approved.

And they have 60 days after the first violation to reconsider the permit.

That 60 days was yesterday.

So put pressure on David to reconsider the land use permit and essentially revoke it.

I know people in like the ACLU are saying we need to keep this processing center here, but there are other avenues to help immigrants with their routine check-ins.

We could uh increase virtual appointments in Tacoma detention facilities.

We can increase public transportation to and from Portland to Tacoma.

We can add daycare subsidies for folks who can't who need to watch their kids while they travel for these appointments.

And we can also add subsidies for folks who need to take time off to attend these appointments three hours away.

Okay, this facility, I've been protesting it for six months.

It's not humane.

I've been to Tacoma too.

It's a scary place.

And if your kids close your ears, two men have died at the Tacoma facility.

Jose Sanchez and Charles Leo Daniel.

We are potentially sending people to their death sentence.

Okay.

The convenience of a processing center is not worth the death of our people.

In the Trump administration, there's been nearly as many deaths in these ICE facilities as the entire Biden administration, and we have three more years of this.

Okay.

Please put pressure on David Kuhnhausen to revoke the ICE permit.

It's not worth it.

And hearing these testimonies, I'm I'm tired of this, and I want this to end as well.

And I think you all do too.

And one last remark.

I I know you might be scared of legal prosecution.

MLK was arrested over 30 times.

Okay, sometimes as leaders, you gotta do what you gotta do.

And this might be that time.

Okay.

Thank you, Bruce.

Uh Manny Chavez, you can take a seat at the desk on the left.

And Andrea, oh sorry.

Chuck Gonzalez, you're on deck.

And Andrea, you have three minutes.

Can I just push this?

Actually, you're live now, so you know.

Okay, I'm like it sounded different.

You're so good.

Yeah, thank you.

All right.

Hello.

I just wanted to start out and say that I was born and raised here and have lived here for most of my life.

I'm concerned about the recent ICE activity in my city.

This is my town, my community.

These are my neighbors, and yet I am scared to go out to Sukhasa Imports ten minutes away from me.

I think I speak for a lot of us when I say we are tired of terrorists leeching off of our taxpayers' money.

Criminals who are ignoring the law, terrorizing our home.

Strangers from out of state, kidnapping my neighbors.

I, a United States citizen, am scared in my own home.

I'm scared right now.

I'm paranoid of every single car around me.

I take different routes to make sure I'm not being followed because I know my own police who are living off of our taxes will not help me, as they've made their stance very clear.

There's many times I wanted to leave to be with my father, who was deported from here years ago in this town, but this is my city, my home.

I'm not leaving.

I've been advocating for immigrant rights since I was a child.

My mother was advocating for immigrant rights.

I'm now an adult, and I am tired.

I am tired of seeing posts of people putting together ice watch groups to protect our students.

I am tired of mass criminals kidnapping the very people who built this town.

I am tired.

I understand that you offer your condolences and support us.

I voted I voted for you because I believe in you.

But when the history books are written, when everything is said and done, we will all remember the action you took.

Because I know I and many of us here will say we did everything we could.

Because when everything is over, and there will be a day when all of this is over.

What will you be able to say that you did?

What will you say that you did during this time?

I've said it my whole life.

The government works for us, not the other way around, and we as a city need to start acting like it.

Thank you.

Thank you, Andrea.

Chuck Gonzalez, you can take a seat at the desk on the right hand side.

Norma Ramirez, you are on deck.

And Manny, uh, you have three minutes.

Uh hello.

Um I don't know if anyone here really knows me that much.

I spoke in the last council meeting.

Um first of all, I just want to say thank you to Dirk because he helped so much with the situation I'm going through right now.

I also want to thank um Council Sinclair and Counter Christian because they personally came up to me and they spoke with me over the weekends, and they were the ones who gave me some more information about stuff.

I just want to say that I'm a little disappointed that it took this long to set the emergency state.

And I just want so much more to change in such little time.

I know a lot of us want so much to change.

And I don't know if people know I've started a GoFundMe for people in this community that don't have much, and people who've lost their families to immigration.

And I'm really trying my best to support everyone.

And it's hard as a student, as an athlete.

Uh so much people have messaged me and asked for my help, which as the human I am, I want to give as much money as I possibly could to everyone.

But I know the world that we live in is that's not gonna happen.

I'm not gonna be able to help everyone.

I do want to say to you, Mayor Pace.

Help the community that helped you sit in office, the community that helped you get there, helped you get in power.

I want you to have their backs now because they were the ones that helped you sit up there, helped everyone there sitting up there as a council, helped the community that helped you guys because without them you guys wouldn't be there.

And now they're begging for you guys, which they shouldn't have to.

They're begging for you guys to do something and actually help all of them.

So please help the community that helped you guys.

I also want to say that I didn't speak for myself.

I spoke for my friends, I spoke for my family, and I spoke for my community.

So when people say, How do you feel being famous?

I don't I guess I wouldn't say I like it because that's not the reason I did it.

I didn't speak for myself.

I didn't speak for me to get famous.

I spoke to let everyone know how I want all the kids to speak up with me.

I want everyone that is my age to sit up here and speak up.

But thank you guys for your time.

Thank you, Benny.

Uh Norma Ramirez, you can come and take a seat at the desk on the left-hand side.

Pedro Garcia, you're on deck.

And Chuck Gonzalez, you have three minutes.

I have to follow him.

Are you kidding?

He's like the most one of the most famous kids in the nation now.

Thank you.

No pressure or anything.

Great work.

Um Chuck Gonzalez.

And uh my father was a grandpicker, was a cotton picker in uh Texas, Fernando.

He was um he came here, he lives in Robbstown.

And uh to this day I still have a piece of Texas cotton in my truck outside that I carry around.

So I come from a family of immigrants.

I'm a former business owner here uh in the city of Hillsborough.

I ran a gym, I had to close it down in 2020 because of COVID.

It was just too difficult.

Um, but I moved here from Alaska and I came down to get on with the Portland Police Board or any police department that would hire me because I have a degree in criminal justice.

And I've had these books out for a long time now.

I have three sons in the Hillsborough School District, and these books have been uh in hiding for about 30 years, and I just pulled them out, and um I have not seen this article for about 30 years.

This is an article that I clipped out in 1996.

And this was a court decision from the US Supreme Court, and with this ruling, all cops are free to harass any and all black people as long as they have in hand a complaint that a black person has committed a crime.

This occurred in New York City in um in the mid 90s.

So this is nothing new.

So first of all, I back the badge.

I back the blue, I back our military, I'm very pro-America, I'm incredibly conservative, and I'm also Latino, I'm also Hispanic or whatever you call us these days.

I understand that right now Border Patrol and ICE have an incredibly impossibly difficult job on their hands because I left this state in 2020 in part because of a conversation with you, Mayor Pace.

We met and I was gonna run for Hillsborough City Council and I changed my mind to move to Texas and I was there for two years, where I saw 10,000 people illegally cross the border and destroy Texas border towns and destroy so many places in Texas.

And I lived there for two years and I saw this, and I had to move back here for personal reasons, and I came back to a sanctuary city, and right now I'm so torn because I have a massive Hispanic family, and I'm also very pro-police, and I know that the Hillsborough police are doing everything that they can, and I know that it takes time, and you guys are doing what you can, but this is not gonna happen overnight.

And yes, we need to protect our borders, we need to protect our citizens.

We need to be America first, but we also need to be compassionate for what is going on here.

I just saw the ICE pull guns on two kids in Dutch boroughs for God's sakes.

And I know it feels like Nazi, but this is not Nazi.

This is Nazi, my friend Alter Wiener who wrote this book who died and was killed.

Thank you, Chuck.

That was Nazi.

This is not.

Thanks, you guys.

Uh maybe Norma.

Okay, uh one second.

Uh Pedro Garcia, you can take a seat on the desk on the right.

And then on deck we have Cecilia Giron or Hiron.

Cecilia Hiron is on deck.

Uh Norma, you have three minutes.

Um, my name is Norma Ramirez.

Uh sperm could lay me.

But his bana is muy important tant.

Uh uh, traveling in the campus con unas conditions horribles, con una paga muy baja.

Son muy importantes porque son los que nos traen nuestra comida anda gracias a ellos.

No es cierto.

Este país está tomando ventaja de ellos.

Gracias.

Thank you, Norma.

Uh Cecilia, you can take a seat at the desk on the left-hand side.

On deck we have Alexandra Perez and Pedro Garcia.

You have three minutes.

So I wanted to start by saying that I don't believe in any of you.

Uh y'all have failed.

The truth is we as a community need to be united because we need to resist.

Resistance only comes from unity.

Unity only comes from education.

That is about at its current state about 75 billion.

The Marines, part of the military, right?

They're at 53 billion.

So ICE has a bigger budget than the Marines.

We are, because the power lies in the people.

When my house burned down, it was not them that helped rebuild.

It was not them that provided any support materially or financially.

It was my community.

It was our community.

They want us to be living in fear.

We are not fearful of them.

They need to fear us.

We are the ones that give all of these people here power.

We give them power, power to the people, not the government.

It's always been like that.

They want us to believe that there's no money for our education because education is knowledge, knowledge is power.

They don't want us to be aware of how to bring change, of how to organize.

But we are more than workers.

We are poets.

We are writers.

We are everything you could imagine.

And our legal status does not matter in the slightest.

There is strength in diversity.

I know a lot of you have probably seen bugs life, but the ant or sorry, the grasshopper in it says it's not about the food, it's about power.

If one ant rises against us and realizes that there's a hundred of them for every one of us, there goes our way of life because they know we are the ones giving them power.

Nosotros has peleado por la justicia cada paso.

Nosotros participamos in los disturbios de los Zootsuits.

Participamos in los disturbios de baño when los estaban bagnando con chemicos.

Tiene que haber un cambio.

We have to change.

We cannot continue things as they are.

Police is useless.

If you want change, give money to education.

The police doesn't prevent education does.

Thank you.

You can take a seat on the right hand side.

Thank you.

And Cecilia, you have three minutes.

Good evening, Mayor and Counselors.

Thank you for giving me that opportunity to speak.

My name is Cecilia Giron.

I am a resident of Hillsborough, and I've been a resident of Washington County for over 30 years.

First, I want to thank you all for your time and also for taking action by com by committing some funds and resources to support our community.

That commitment matters.

Dating back to the foundation of this great nation to not forget.

Today I'm here.

Respectfully urge you.

Not only the city of Hillsborough, but as leaders that you can influence your colleagues, the county in the state of Oregon.

Not only to declare a state of emergency, but also to develop a comprehensive emergency plan to protect the constitutional human rights of every individual, regardless of their legal status.

Our communities cannot wait.

And we also need to have transparency and strategies to protect.

And safeguard our future generations.

We're not going nowhere.

We've been here.

We are here.

The economic stability of our city and our state.

And the safety and well-being of all residents in our beautiful city of Hillsboro.

Needs you more than ever.

Cecilia, thank you very much.

Thank you for standing today with us.

Alexandra, you have three minutes.

All right.

Good evening, Council members.

My name is Alexandra Sinai Perez.

I'm here to speak about the impact of ice in our community, and I'm a proud Mexican American, a first generation student, and the daughter of two immigrants.

My grandparents worked the fields to feed your family, to feed America for the longest time.

I originally didn't think I was going to speak tonight.

I came here alongside one of my close friends to hear and just to listen to my community and to see who showed up.

And quite honestly, I'm terrified and I am nervous.

And in a weird way, today, it's almost like an epiphany, a realization of so many the fact that my community has come together, and not just my community, but community as a whole, as Hillsboro, Oregon, the United States.

There's people rioting, protesting.

My ancestors fought for dignity and justice during the Mexican Revolution.

They stood beside leaders like Pancho Villa because they believed ordinary people deserve to live without fear.

I'm here tonight because the fear consuming my community is not theoretical, it is lived, it is daily, it is exhausting.

I have had to sit down with my own siblings, my own cousins, and explain to them what our plan is if our parents don't come home one day.

No child, no family has to rehearse that moment of their family being torn apart.

No community should have to live with that terror.

I'm here because silence is not protection, compliance is not safety.

My ancestors did not survive colonization, fight a revolution, and cross borders so their descendants would accept injustice quietly.

We should not be living in fear of authority or intimidated our own neighborhoods.

We all deserve to feel safe regardless of where we come from, what language you speak of, or what religion we choose to practice, or what creed we follow.

Sorry, I'm a bit nervous.

Seeking help, reporting crimes, and participating in daily life without shadow of ice hanging over them.

I will leave you with a simple message.

El Pueblo Unido jamás será vencido, which means the people united will never be defeated.

Now more than ever, we must stand together with our families, our community, and our home.

Oregon is our home.

It's been the home of immigrants since the beginning of time, since the beginning of humanity, quite literally.

I'm sorry, I'm I'm just nervous.

You're doing great.

Thank you.

It's I'm proud as a Mexican American to be from here and to be from there.

I grew up with the idea of niraquineda, yeah, not from here, not from there.

And now more than ever, it feels it's us against them when it should be us together.

I've lost my track of thought and I'm close to things, so thank you for your time.

Thank you, Alexandra.

That is all the public comment we have for this evening.

We're going to move on to item five, the consent agenda, but we're going to take a quick five-minute recess.

Thank you very much.

It's being recorded.

Thanks for coming, Olga.

Thanks for coming.

Uh City Council, if we could reconvene.

One, two.

Thank you, Councilor Gonzalez.

Salgado.

Yep, there.

Okay.

And then there we go.

Great.

Oh, great.

Okay.

What?

Yes.

Okay, we're going to get started and uh or actually continue on to our consent agenda.

So we'll reconvene.

Moving to item five, the consent agenda.

The items on the consent agenda are normally considered in a single motion.

Any item may be removed for separate consideration upon request by any member of council.

Is there a request to remove any items for separate consideration?

No requests, just a comment.

I just want I appreciate I just want to show my appreciation for the staff that came up with the name Hillsborough Shelter.

You know, sometimes people want to make things complicated on big projects, and I just want to thank them for centering equity in that.

And understanding that when somebody's going to look for a shelter, they're going to look for the most simple words.

So I just want to say thank you for thinking of that simple adjustment to the name.

Thank you, Counselor Salgato.

Do any members of council have any lingering questions for staff on any of the items in the consent agenda?

Okay.

Do I have a motion to approve the consent agenda?

So moved case.

Thank you.

Do I have a second?

Salgato seconds.

Thank you.

Is there any discussion?

May I please have a roll call?

Counselors Alcair.

Hi.

Case?

Aye.

Anvary?

Aye.

Sinclair?

Aye.

Salgato.

Aye.

Thank you.

The motion passes.

Moving to moving forward.

Um item six.

There's no public hearings.

There's no unfinished business, and there's no ordinances.

Moving to item nine, new business, planned unit development 001-25 Riverside at Butternut Woods.

Consider the recommendation from Planning Commission to approve an order for a planned unit development with consolidated subdivision preliminary plat, significant natural resources, permit, and major adjustments for an 82-lot subdivision on three lots, approximately 18.4 acres in size, and zoned R6 and R7.

Order number 29 is available.

Do I have a motion to adopt order number 29?

So moved.

Thank you.

Do I have a second?

Salgato seconds.

Thank you.

Is there any discussion?

May I please have a roll call?

Counselor Zalker.

Aye.

Case?

Aye.

Anvary?

Aye.

Sinclair?

Aye.

Salgado.

Aye.

Thank you.

Order number 29 is adopted.

Moving to item 9.2, consider a finance committee's recommendation to adopt a resolution approving an interfund loan between Transportation Depreciation Fund 204 and the Transportation System Development Charge, SoHigh Fund 214, in an amount not to exceed $710,000, which will provide sufficient cash flow to meet infrastructure needs in South Hillsboro until enough revenue is collected in the fund to repay the loan.

Resolution number 2905 is available.

Do I have a motion to adopt resolution number two nine zero five?

So move to case.

Thank you.

Do I have a second?

Salgato seconds.

Okay, great.

So Councillor Anne Vary was the second.

Is there any discussion?

May I please have a roll call?

Councillors Alcare.

Case?

Aye.

Anvary?

Aye.

Sinclair.

Aye.

Salgado.

Aye.

Thank you, number uh resolution number two nine zero five is adopted.

Um we will not have a city manager report, and we will skip the city manager report for this evening to resume the work session.

Back in conference room 113 B and C.

If you would prefer to sit in the auditorium and listen, you're welcome to do so, but there should be plenty of space over in 113B and C.

Please note following the work session, the city council will may meet an executive session under ORS 192.6602 H and F to consult with council concerning the legal rights and duties of a public body with regard to current litigation or litigation likely to be filed and to consider information or records that are exempt from law for public inspection.

Executive sessions are not open to the subject, but again, you're welcome to join us for the work session, the remainder of the work session, and then the executive session will commence after that.

Council, please join me in conference room 113 113 B and C, and we will start at 9.45.

Thank you very much.

We have a lot to cover that will take us a while to do so.

I've talked to the counselors to understand their opinions on how long they want to go.

My concern is that it's tough to make good decisions after 11 o'clock.

So what we'll do is we'll check in at 11 and just see how we're doing.

That's what I'm hearing.

The consensus is check in at 11 and maybe we continue on from there, or maybe we stop, depending on where we are.

So I'll turn it over to Robbie.

Thank you, Mayor.

So SEMOWA, I think was going to finish up her section, and after Simone, we'll turn it over to Chief Coleman.

Thank you.

Okay, so Raheem is bringing up the presentation.

I'm gonna go as quickly as I can, but I think there are a couple of key points that might be helpful for you and for community to be aware of.

Um this link that you see there, it is a link on the immigration resources page.

You see underlined there, that's a link.

Um there are a couple of good resources that we have on our website.

So the immigration resources page.

Um switching.

Hold that thought.

Just a moment, please.

Oh, thank you for going to that one first, actually.

Um, so we were a lot of our focus before we went into the council meeting was about providing um accurate information.

And I recognize that there's a lot of material that we cover, and I know you all generally know that this is a resource, but in case you you didn't know that, if you go to our city council web page, there is a city count, there's a council meetings um tab that you can press there that will take you to the recordings of all of the meetings.

So I just wanted to make sure that in case you didn't know that you can go back and watch this in case you have any questions about something I said or any of the other presenters that's readily available to you and the community can use that as well.

So in case there are questions.

Um terms of our immigration resources page, there are a couple things that I want to point out.

Um if you go down just a little bit.

Uh first of all, we have three main tabs: emergency reporting, family preparedness, and leak legal resources.

Um, so those all have different pieces of information.

The one I want to draw attention to for tonight because you have plenty of time to explore it at your will, is under emergency reporting.

Go down just a little bit.

So um the Oregon Department of Justice has two online reporting portals that are relevant to our conversations.

Um, one which I am discovering not many um people know much about, which is the first one, the federal oversight and accountability reporting form.

This was established by um the Oregon Department of Justice Attorney General Dan Rayfield.

Um this was established so that individuals can online report um any suspected violations of the constitution.

It's designed to promote transparency, accountability, and protect the rights of Oregon.

So anyone can go on here.

It can be done anonymously.

So if you observe ICE activity, if you think something has happened that's against the Constitution, you can go directly there and report.

So in case people many people don't yet know that that's available to them, and we'll start identifying ways to promote that.

Um the next link is for um the sanctuary promise violation report.

If there is a jurisdiction or uh um uh anyone in their official capacity, so like any employee of this of the city, for instance, was to violate the sanctuary promise law, which also would be our sanctuary resolution because it just reaffirms um the sanctuary promise.

Um, they can report that on this website as well.

So um just know that there are two tools that you can that you or the community members can utilize if they believe that there is a violation.

So I just want to point out those two.

There are lots of other resources that are available, including the PER COTLING, their website, ACLU's website, but I know you have a long night ahead of you, and there's plenty of time for you to explore that on your own, but I wanted to call out particularly um the council videos and those two online reporting portals.

And with that, I will hand it over to Chief.

Can I question Simone?

Oh, yes, sorry, yes.

Um recent meetings, VNSR meetings.

Yes, for um board and committees.

That there's a need for public notaries who speak Spanish.

Yes, uh shoot park library as well as Brookwood Library, both have notaries.

So we have that those notary services for free, and we do have bilingual staff, bilingual and Spanish staff.

Is it possible that we can increase the number of bilingual notaries that we have?

Um I I would I can look into that.

I'm not sure how many.

I can certainly come back to you and even let you know.

Are people having trouble accessing and I can remember when I needed to get a public notary through the library?

Yeah, and that person was going to be on vacation and they weren't gonna be there.

So can you find out?

Yes, that they're available and that they're there.

And I would like to see more funding for more public notaries who speak Spanish on our library staff.

As soon as possible.

Okay.

Um, I know that there's a number of proposals that'll be discussed, and I'm sure that's probably part of one of them.

And just making sure we're allocating resources to your priorities, but I will make sure that I find out what resources we already have.

And it may be also a matter of us making sure that community, including the NSTAR is aware of when people are available so that they can, if they need them, they can have access to them.

So I can follow up with you on that.

Find out how many and find out how many are bilingual and please check in to possibly allowing more library staff to be bilingual notaries for access.

Thanks.

Good evening, council members.

I'm Jim Coleman.

I'm the chief of police tonight.

Uh, I have with me Deputy Chief Mike Leader from the Hillsborough Police Department.

Deputy Chief Leader is our primary um executive over daily operations of the police uh department.

So I just want to make sure that if we have some very detailed questions about what daily happens out in the field, if he can in any way uh be of assistance to me.

I want to we want to get you the most accurate information that we possibly can.

We, as you heard uh earlier in in this session and in the testimony tonight, there is still significant federal immigration activity in our community.

It does vary day to day.

Some days are very intense and other days are uh quieter, although we do not know every single undertaking that occurs every day by immigration enforcement.

We uh continue to follow state law and department policy, and we uh monitor those incidences that we go to by uh either dispatch or what we call on viewing them, which means we see them happen.

I I just want to clarify for the council we still find it to be a rare circumstance where we are at the same place and time as immigration agents are enforcing immigration law.

That's still a relatively rare occurrence uh compared to all the uh immigration enforcement that we're hearing about and seeing uh afterwards.

So uh tonight I just wanted to circle back around to some of the questions from two weeks ago, and also start tonight with one of the more important questions, or at least one of the more frequently asked questions, and that's in regard to what we call automatic license plate readers, and I want to offer as much clarity as possible on that.

The Hillsborough Police Department has maintained an automated license plate reader program or what is commonly referred to as ALPR for over 15 years.

HPD has only two ARLPR systems capable of capturing license plate data.

Both are standalone, meaning they're not connected to a larger network of ALPRs.

They're overt trailers, meaning they're we don't try to conceal them, they're marked as uh police department assets when they're in the field uh that are deployed only for specific events and targeted operations.

They're marked as uh police department assets when they're in the field that are deployed only for specific events and targeted operations.

HPD does not supply data to private third party systems that integrate both government and non-government subscribers.

So some of the more uh frequently mentioned ALPR systems that are concerned to some of our community members, those are not the type that we use.

We are not integrated into any larger government slash non-government systems.

ALPR systems, like most technology devices, there are multiple ALPR vendors who offer various features, including individual agency control, which we do over the use of their own data.

It is our own data.

Hillsborough Police Department, ALPREN, our vendor is Motoroda Motorola Vigilant, and the system also allows HBD to control which entities share that data with us.

So we we focus uh for the sake of your knowledge on local Washington County entities that would be other law enforcement agencies in Washington County.

Approximately five years ago, HPD updated our process to require a data sharing memorandum of understanding with every agency who has access to HPD data.

Part of the reason for implementing the MOU process was to ensure that HPD maintains compliance with Oregon sanctuary promise laws.

HPD does not share data with any agency using the system for the purpose of immigration enforcement.

HPD also does not share data with any agency unwilling to enter into the memorandum of understanding with us.

And if we had a situation like this, I don't want to falsely uh give an impression to you that we've used it for all these things, but we have it on hand, so we can.

And we deem these mission critical to providing public safety to the community.

They they have been used in investigations into serious state level crimes.

They are part of layered security for public events to combat organized retail theft, to combat residential crimes, such as package thefts, catalytic converter thefts, and burglary, to recover stolen vehicles, and a note on stolen vehicles.

Stolen vehicles are disproportionately negatively negatively affect persons in low-income strata because uh motor vehicles are typically their most valuable asset, and the loss of a motor vehicle in a one-vehicle family keeps that family from being able to take children to school, go to work, go shopping.

Locating missing and abducted children and adults, locating cognitively impaired people.

Uh any questions about ALPR before I move on to the next bullet.

Yes.

So when you said it's they're independent, what to do is the database, where is the database coming from?

It's essentially self-contained to the to the unit.

Uh, so it's not networked with uh other units.

Uh, and that's kind of uh the selling point of some of these bigger ALPR operations is that it's a vast um a vast collection of data, and that's the appeal of it, but you can share it across.

It doesn't necessarily even have to be law enforcement related, it could be um something that uh private business chooses to use.

We have been approached many many times to join into a networked uh type of ALPR system, and we've always rejected it based not we're not passing judgment on it.

We are just well informed by this council and past councils that that's just not the type of system that this community feels comfortable with.

And the way that it would the way that it works is that it would automatically um like it's image recognition, and then it's gonna look up that number in the database in your local database and who who that vehicle belongs to.

Yeah, they they essentially collect data that you can either then go backwards and look at.

Um, that's some of the application for it.

Um, you know, I I have to be careful about some law enforcement sensitive uh ways we use it, but for instance, I talked about layered security at a public event.

But for instance, I talked about layered security at a public event.

If you had a criminal act at a public event, I mean a serious one, not a shoplift or something like that, but you had violence visited upon a public event, you would then have a record of um all the vehicles, at least that the ALPR captured, so you can then have a launch point for an investigation.

Yeah.

Okay.

Counselor Sogata.

What type of agency do we have an MOU with on data sharing?

Uh most of the they're uh they're mostly well, they are Washington County agencies, and uh most of them are the smaller agencies.

We um asked them to support us in a letter um as we sought a grant to get ours, and part of that support was an agreement that if they um wanted to make use of them, get trained on them that they could that we would um do so without cost to that to them.

So it's just other police departments that we're sharing?

Yeah, um non-law enforcement kind of entity.

And so what do what does HPD get in return for sharing because if I'm understanding it correctly, the share the data that you're collecting through these systems?

You're sharing them out with other police departments.

What does HDP get in return?

So it Washington County is a very closely knit law enforcement community because we have to pool resources to accomplish a lot of the things that we do.

Essentially, the the county sheriff is the main anchor for most of our interagency teams.

Uh Hillsborough is probably second anchor.

We anchor some important teams, and that you know, really a lot of these crimes don't know jurisdictions.

So our uh organized retail theft, for instance, they um when you go to Tannisborne, you are right on the border of Beaverton and Hillsboro.

And so um, and we also we have we don't have every asset.

Some agencies have assets that we don't have, and there's that kind of um mutual uh assistance to one another to to do some of the primarily investigative things, um, but uh be able to afford some of the investigative technologies and that that are out there.

Yeah, and I'm just trying to understand what the tradeoff because an MOU is like you're going into a partnership and there's a trade-off, right?

So you're sharing we're sharing data as Hillsborough Police Department, and what are they sharing with Pillsborough Police Department in return?

Yeah, uh uh the deputy chief wants to chime in.

Okay.

Yeah, the the idea is that we exchange data freely um with other agencies, but I would say it's important to keep in mind back in 2020 when we put out a series of MOUs to everybody that had access to the data, and we said, look, if you don't sign this MOU, which in part said you're attesting that you won't use this for any immigration or share it with a third party that would the vast majority of those MOUs were not signed.

That we had agencies that said, hey, we're just for a variety of reasons, we're not gonna enter into that.

So in 2020, that was really scoped down heavily.

So to kind of to your question, I mean, the the idea is that if they do have license plate sharing or license plate reader info, they would share that data with us as well.

Yeah, that's the hope.

Okay, that makes sense.

Yeah, but it's not a commercial, we're not like we're not, you know, tow truck companies and things like that.

That's yeah.

Yeah, I mean, there's a lot of things about data is like there's a lot of money in data, right?

That's why I asked.

So it sounds like it's just a mutual sharing of information.

There is no financial or um return of service in kind related to the data exchange.

Okay, thanks.

Counselor Alcair.

Um for us, um we don't use license plate readers.

We don't have agreements with our agencies to use Flock or anything like that.

Uh no, counselor.

Um so what are we doing?

I'm just stuck on license plates.

What are we doing about IS vehicles that don't have license plates that don't have to coordinate anything with HPD that they don't even have to notify you of when they're coming into town?

They can be all over our city and they can um break laws.

They can um be on private property and destroy private property people.

Um a lot of people that we heard again tonight are making or are adapting their way of life around ice activity.

So why I mean, would you do anything to me if I drove around in a car and didn't have license plates?

Would your officers pull me over and ask me why I don't have anything detailing about who I am as a driver, my license plate, for you to be able to look me up.

Would I be illegally driving around this city if I was allowed if I did that, just made that choice?

I I'm not trying to avoid your question, but I think I need to start by saying I think any vehicle would get pulled over, but the enforcement action we could take after that stop may be different if it's a federal, if it's federal officers in a vehicle.

That may be different.

Yeah, we we really think everybody knows ICE vehicles are well, they could be any vehicle.

Uh we think some of them may be owned by the federal government, but also we're pretty sure that a lot of them are rented.

So if we if we saw violate a traffic violation, we're not gonna uh we don't really have any way of going, oh, that's ICE, we're not doing a vehicle stop.

We we would probably do it now.

When we got to the window, if it's ICE agents and they're like we're on duty and they flash us credentials, we probably are not taking any kind of uh we're not issuing a violation for that.

And we don't have any way of knowing if any of these agents have warrants for arrest or have committed any felonies or have done things wrong.

We we don't have any knowledge of that when they're pulling people over.

If an agent was off duty and we stopped them for a traffic violation, we may have cause to run them through the system.

Perhaps they don't have their license with them, or perhaps we check them anyway based on the violation to see if they might have traffic warrants or something like that on duty, no, we wouldn't.

Okay, but license plate, would we care if they had a license plate?

We I would love it if they if all their vehicles were properly you know displaying uh according to Oregon state law, but what I could do um after pulling them over may be limited if they're on duty.

So you can pull them over and just say it would be really good if you could have your license plate on your vehicle, we'd appreciate it.

Uh yeah, it would probably be more like do you know why I pulled you over?

Okay.

Yeah.

Okay.

And then we would get to that.

Yeah.

Okay.

So they are held to a different standard than the rest of everybody else that's in Hillsborough.

Uh no, ma'am, I don't think that's that's the case.

Uh there are limitations to what we can do when they're in Hillsborough.

So if you say that that's not true, what can we do?

What what is it that we can do if we can't enforce license plate on their vehicle?

If we can't enforce um, I don't know, brandishing a white uh rifle in at a you know business.

Um I guess it would be helpful to know what we can do.

And I know that you know, I would imagine that this phone is going to be ICE and Supremacy Act, and we just can't get through it or go underneath it or anything like that.

But I guess we've heard three hours last week, we heard two hours today.

What can HPD do?

And I guess I'm gonna ask this council what do we want HPD to do to protect people in our city?

Because we haven't really discussed that, but I want to know like what can we do?

What can you do?

It is limited.

Uh we when we are at the same place as ICE, uh, even when we're there afterwards, if uh we have to do those things that I laid out last week, like help re night reunite people with their property, try and figure out what happened, where those people currently are, are they the victim of a crime?

I know that people feel that these are crimes, but they don't they are not statutorily uh in the state of Oregon.

Uh you know, the ones uh the ones that involve uh apprehending and placing people in custody.

We we document those both uh usually with video, we document those uh in a police report, and um there's usually dispatch logs attached to that.

If you know if there is a need for medical assistance, we do that, but we are not in a position currently to take any law enforcement action, which would mean arrest or detention with a federal law enforcement agent.

Counselor St.

Clair.

Thank you, Mary.

Thank you, Mary.

Um, and I am in no way trying to do a cross shoot question.

I really am here to learn and to see right solutions.

Um so these aren't exact numbers, but ACLU and PERC have reported that we're halfway through the month, and that in Washington County, there's a 96 um addition.

Last month was 169 for the whole month.

Um obviously we're quasing and additions of our refugee refugee communities, and some have no criminal record and have proper status and issue status.

And we're hearing from those entities, perk and ACLU that it's licensed paid readings that is how ICE is tracking our people that they're objecting.

How is that happening if we don't have this type of technology?

Uh I really can't.

I I really can't um articulate how they how they decide or how they um vector in to who they're looking to uh arrest.

Uh it may be ALPR, it's not our ALBR.

So um because Hillsborough and VI are considered a hot sauce, and we're increasingly gaining on those numbers, sadly.

And what can we look further into white air governmental agreements we have to understand what their systems are and if they're coming in through a back entry?

And I'm not even a tech person.

I'm just trying to understand how can we control our systems and protect our people because that is a clear aspect of how they're monitoring our residents.

Yeah, I just want to be careful.

I I'm not saying yes or no to that.

I really have no idea how they decide who they are going to arrest and then how they locate that person.

Um I'm not sure, but I I think most agencies are like us, they're very careful about who they share their information with, uh, particularly now.

Um I think you are doing a lot of the things that that we can do to do this.

You're asking us questions, you're asking us to look back at how we use systems and and inform the public as to how we use them.

I think a lot of you know one of the things I hear is um there are it's you know, very it's uh scary uh what can happen to somebody if they're apprehended by ice, but I also know there's an enormous amount of anxiety being felt by everybody, even if the odds are very low.

So if we can tell people we're you know you can drive the streets of Hillsborough, and you're if your car happens to pass one of our police cars, or we're engaged in another operation to try and prevent perhaps a stolen vehicle in a hot spot somewhere in the city that we're not that you can uh the police department can do those things, you can drive our streets, and your information will not be passed on to the federal government.

I really appreciate that the conversation and the open dialogue to understand more.

But the questions are very helpful because we we are open-minded to if we have to make adjustments and and that and you know, we don't want to work in a closed system.

Can we look more into intergovernmental agreements that we have so that council can have a comprehensive list of what that is and verify?

We can do that, yeah.

We'll work with uh we'll sit the MOU that was originally looking at that.

We can share that with the city council as well so you can see what entities are on there.

I don't think it would be anything confidential about that.

We'd have to check with their attorneys, but happy to share as much as we can.

I don't believe I don't believe there is.

Um I was gonna follow up on two things uh kind of to your point, Councillor Sinkler, and then to yours, uh Counselor Signado.

Yeah, data data is obviously a big business, right?

As you essentially said, and so it would not surprise me in the least to learn that there are private entities and private companies that have license plate monitors uh spread out across the metro area.

We just don't know.

I don't know personally where those are what they consist of.

But I do want to make sure we're not mixing up terms RN that we we do have data sharing outside of Washington County.

We can get you a list of who we do share with we've carefully scoped that using the MOU.

Um so I don't I just don't want to give you the impression that it's only contained within the county.

We just had a number of agencies outside of the county that uh back in 2020 said, Yeah, we're not gonna sign this with you.

We can get that data for you all.

Yeah, we will do that.

I apologize.

I I wasn't aware uh that it went outside, but that's why he's here tonight.

Counselor Sargato?

Yeah, excuse me, my lack of knowledge of the Cop talk, but what's I think it's standard issue weapon?

What's the standard issue weapon for the Hillsborough Police Department?

Uh we have a couple.

Ours is uh a Glock nine millimeter handgun, and it comes in a couple couple different uh models, and then we also have uh Colt um and four rifles.

Okay, and then what's the standard issue ice with I mean they have a pretty good guns, right?

So uh yeah, uh I imagine they have multiple ones, but I don't uh I don't know what their standard issue weapons are.

Yeah, I know I just know that it would be unfair, right?

If we were to ask you to confront them, like a lot of people were asking us and I to have you do more than you're doing right now.

So I just want to call that out that it would just be really unfair for us to expect anything more than what you're doing to confront what ICU's I mean I think a lot of us disagree that you know the the girl that was pepper straight in the parking lot, like that shouldn't have happened, right?

Like she was no threat to the ice agent, and that's clearly you know uh a lawyer that wants to make money could interpret that as assault if they really wanted to, right?

And so yeah, you know, there is an expectation, but I just want people to realize that there is you know a real difference in what you're allowed to do, and then also you know what what you actually have at your look like that.

That would just be really unfair for us to ask you to confront somebody with yeah, I um I appreciate the spirit of what you're saying, counselor, and um yeah, I don't I don't think we're um it's in our mind like what how they're equipped versus how we're equipped.

It's more of like where uh does the law you know where is our jurisdictional authority begin and end, and how does that uh bump up against and overlap with theirs?

And it yeah, it would be a really bad day if there was a physical confrontation between um our officers and federal law enforcement that that would have all kinds of ramifications beyond just whatever transpired in that in that spot.

I think Councillor Alcair and then Councillor Andre.

Um just a quick comment on that.

Um I appreciate what you're saying because I don't want to think that I have to go get a bigger gun for my house because ice has a big gun.

I don't think it's about gun size, and I appreciate what you're saying.

Um so the perception though that people have when they see officers either present, not present, engaging, not engaging.

Um social media it comes up a lot.

Officer Gancy was yeah, was present and there were ICE officers.

There were no uh there was no detainment at that moment, but he called out a protester by name.

What would be the purpose of Officer Gancy to call out a protester who was angry because ICE is present in the neighborhood?

What was Gancy's motivation for that?

And why would he do that?

Why wouldn't he want to um be neutral, say nothing?

Why would he make that choice?

I think that people in the community are really questioning why are the police showing up and acting in such a way that it appears like they are colluding.

It looks like that.

But when there's comments like that, if Nancy's calling out a protester saying that they're aware telling her to go home, that's not his role.

He's supposed to be there for de-escalation, not telling one of our citizens who's there trying to protect people that that's the person who needs to go home.

He doesn't say that to the ice agents who are terrorizing in that neighborhood.

There wasn't a detainment, but that's what they were there for.

So I guess I don't understand.

I don't understand, and people aren't gonna understand, and why should they?

You know, taking and choosing when you want to be chums and colleagues, or when you want to be you know enemies with each other and not work together, but the perception of this is just not good, and on top of all of that, um the way that people are getting detained is a violent aggressive action, and we don't do anything about that.

We don't we have heard, right, since January since this administration has come in how we just can't do anything about that.

Um I really am pushing you to figure out how can we do more because you're in the role of public safety.

So what else can we do other than putting on our citizens to start defending themselves and getting a bigger gun?

There's Bimart, you can buy guns at Biomart if you really need to do that.

I really don't want people to resort to that.

So I'm, you know, I'm sorry.

You're the one who's in charge of public safety.

I need you to come up with some answers about what can we do.

Yeah, uh counselor is a lot to cover there.

Um, in no way am I suggesting anybody should start buying firearms because of this issue.

Absolutely not.

Uh I didn't suggest that, I believe, and I would never suggest that.

That's not the answer.

Um, I I cannot control how things were portrayed over social media.

We do our best to put out our message and to try and clarify circumstances where we believe our officers were acting professionally in the situation you referenced.

Our officers were called to a traffic accident between a uh private citizen and an ICE vehicle.

I have not watched hours or even several minutes of tapes.

I've watched a couple of social media clips.

Um I believe the officers acted professionally.

If it comes across as chummy, I I guess it's a difference of opinion.

But our officers are expected to act professionally with everybody.

Um, I'm I want to be careful that I'm not assuming what calling out means.

But yes, uh, our officer did address a person by name.

I don't know how they know each other.

I don't know if she knows him.

I do know that she's calling, she was calling out the officers by their names, and perhaps that's why Sergeant Gancy addressed her with her name.

He obviously knew her from somewhere.

I didn't see the video where uh he might have said go home.

I'm I'm sorry, I didn't see that.

Um so I but I I have watched I believe all the videos.

I I wouldn't say every second of every video, but I've seen the circumstances where officers come in contact with ICE agents.

I believe they've acted professionally under all those circumstances.

I've never um I have not seen like shaking of hands, even I haven't seen the slap on the back, I haven't seen a chuckle, I haven't seen anything like that.

So if you do, and you can point me to it, I would be happy to look into it.

But that's my interpretation of being overly familiar and non-neutral.

Um I am very concerned that this community uh does not feel that we are collaborating with uh immigration.

All I can do is say that we are uh watching it like a hawk.

Uh I think our officers, I know our officers know what our expectations are very clearly in both their day-to-day operations across the gamut of what we deal with, but also with ice and what the expectations are.

So I I agree with you, it's a major concern if people feel like our officers are again overly familiar, or in some way that is some indicator of cooperation with ICE, but we we have not had a clear policy violation of the way we conduct business to this point.

And um, we you can call the police department if you feel that we're acting unprofessionally or any other situation, you can also contact uh the same state resources that uh Simone talked about, and uh um we're happy to share with people if they feel like the police department's not the right place to make a complaint to.

Um, but yeah, I um I agree some of the things we see are very distressing, but there I have no other way to explain it other than so far.

We have not our officers have not been on scene when a clearly criminal act has happened that would necessitate them to step in.

Um I appreciate your response.

I don't have to say either.

Watching what's happening, really bad.

And and uh Skipperly mentioned that there's gonna be an increase.

Uh yeah, yeah.

And then after detainment are doing the hard work of making sure the connections for families so they can get to the resources.

So the cars are just abandoned, get a place somewhere that people can get to it.

This can't be enough.

This can't be all that we got.

It can't be all that we have.

I was elected to come into this world, and people have expectations about what we're supposed to do, and we're not living up to what we're supposed to do.

We are not doing what we said that we were going to do.

And I'm putting this on you, it's not all you.

I don't know, but something needs to be different.

Because we're just running around and reacting.

We are doing exactly what this administration wants us to do.

But we can't, I don't want to sit here and wait for a child to be uh run over in a multifamily parking lot at the end of Star.

I don't want to see multiple people get hurt because the car is being pulled over on TV Highway in the middle, right?

And stop there, and and somebody's getting arrested.

Meanwhile, there's all kinds of other traffic stuff happening.

And they're gonna be yelling at people at protesters that I'm gonna arrest you if you come any closer.

They're able to do whatever they want, and we cannot allow that to continue.

And it's already now 10:30.

People were complaining here about how late we're gonna be.

We're not gonna get through all this agenda.

We're not gonna get through all of our proposals.

We have to figure something out for safety.

I am not the expert.

Yeah, uh, counselor, I don't feel put upon.

It's my this is my job is to keep you informed as to what the police department's doing.

So um, I'm happy to say as long or come back again, whatever the case may be.

Um I I there is a narrative or and perhaps I I've contributed to it, but I do not say we are not doing anything.

We are not just standing by, we're doing everything the law allows us to do.

Uh, but that does not include arresting immigration enforcement.

We can document, we can again reunite people with property, uh, pass along information as we learn it.

We can essentially clean up the messes that are left behind, but that is not a small task.

That takes several officers and it takes all a long time.

So, you know, we we go to every call for service, and we do something when we get there if it needs to be done.

So I just want to make sure people know that the order isn't go there and do nothing.

It's go there and do as much as you can, understanding through your training and experience what the limitations are.

Um, I just want to add that I want to be sure that every time something happens that there's a police report so that people who are left behind are able to do some follow-up.

Without a police report, people can't do anything, and it gets even harder to try to find that person.

So, what do we have to do to require that HPD file a police report when there are detainments or ICE activity in this city?

What do we have to do?

If I I don't mean to jump in, but yeah, that's part of our that's part of an adjustment to our policy that we we have different types of report, but we are now telling our officers to do the standard police report.

It's under it's got a reference to federal enforcement.

And uh we also in you know, I don't need to go through all my notes here.

As part of that, we also give uh our creating uh bilingual card and QR codes that will uh allow people to link to the state reporting systems as well if they if they want to file the report both places, and we will uh document in our police report that the things that we did uh to help that person, you know, uh kind of portray their story of what happened if we weren't there, which is what we do for any kind of police report, and then uh document in that report what resources we pointed them towards.

So uh thank you for that question.

We are doing that.

So um what do we do we have to codify our sanctuary city to make sure that reports are made?

It's already happening.

So we we have that's already done.

I don't know why we would put that in our sanctuary city code, it's a part of the this city uh police department policies.

So we are gonna talk about that, right?

Rodney, like we can talk about codification we haven't talked about actually putting in police reports and if it's if it's something that's already happening, then it shouldn't be a problem adding it to our sanctuary city.

I guess my point is there we could add so many things if it but it's already being done.

So if the council wants us to add that to the code somehow, we can figure out how to do that.

I just want to make sure there's police report filed.

And then when people need to get one to find their loved one, they can get it.

Councilor Ambry.

Yes.

Yeah.

Um, like security cameras in the city.

You know, like traffic light cameras.

Um we we don't control any traffic light cameras, they don't pipe through the police department.

Uh but if they do somewhere else, I I don't even know if yeah.

We don't we don't have um in Hillsborough, we don't have like red, we don't have intersection cameras, at least for traffic enforcement purposes.

They're on they're on uh county roads.

Uh I'm I'm not sure if the county does that.

Okay.

Typically they are, and within Hillsborough, uh the council made a decision years ago.

We're talking about this that we don't do red light cameras.

There are other cities that have red light cameras.

I yeah, I can't speak to how they manage that data specifically.

I don't think it's the police departments, it's usually like public works or transportation departments that manage that.

All right.

Counselor Sergado and then Counselor Sinclair.

Yeah, I just have a couple of things.

So a couple of people brought something to my attention, and I looked it up and I couldn't really confirm it.

So I want to know you received this memo.

So apparently the FBI sent a memo to a lot of local police departments because of the increase of ICE activities, and they're warning that people are using that to their advantage to dress up as ICE agents and kidnap people.

Is that an accurate report that's out there that memos were sent to local police departments to warn them about this?

Um I I won't say absolutely not um because sometimes they come through different channels.

They'll be shared with a crime analyst or they'll come directly to me, or they'll go to our records unit.

I haven't seen any that are usually passed across as law enforcement information.

So it may exist, uh, but we're we're very keen.

Uh I I've issued a I don't want to sound, you know, I don't want to sound like I'm putting bravado out there, but I I mentioned I you know a warning people uh do not do that.

We'll we will um take that very seriously and seek to prosecute um immediately.

So uh I I'd say there might be one.

Um I don't know if we've received it directly.

Okay, can you figure that out and send that to us if if you if they did send it out?

Because I think that would be helpful for us to know that that communication is going out.

Yeah, and we will check and sometimes those are regional.

Okay.

We may not see it out here, but they're seeing it in some other part of the country.

So maybe like a newsletter or something that we should okay.

Uh and then to counselor Alker's point, I think you know, if we really want to make an impact on this um issue of holding, you know, uh ICE accountable to following the law and following the constitution, you know, it's my understanding that the 10th Amendment gives states the power to kind of hold the federal government in check if they do violate the constitution.

So I think our energy would be better used in focusing on what the state can do, maybe encouraging them to call a special session to consider this, especially given all of the uh public comment we're seeing today and across the state.

So I think you know, I want to just encourage that, and maybe that's something we can talk about of how we could use our collective power to to you know influence the state to to do something a little bit more and not wait till February, right?

Because if if this memo is accurate that the FBI sent this out, I think that elevates the concern for me personally, and it adds more urgency to actually you know giving something where the local government can follow that the state leads on.

So I I just want to encourage everybody on that and yeah, and I'm sure I'm answering your question correctly.

I mean, that is a state crime.

That is not we we absolutely uh would charge and seek prosecution on something that even though they're impersonating federal officers, that would be a state crime.

Uh yes, but my my reference to the you know, encouraging and influencing the state to act is you know, around other things, right?

Creating like the mask laws, the clearly identifying, you know, pepper screening people when they're not a threat, those sort of things.

I think the state is is more prepared and has more authority to do something on that, and then that way, you know, uh all cities are protected instead of just Hillsborough.

So we're working collectively.

So I just want to encourage people to, you know, if we could focus on your gym, then I think it'd be more impactful.

We work through the city to do that.

We also have um we're also organized in law enforcement.

Uh law enforcement has deep people down at the legislature when it's in session.

Uh so if that's two pronged, um, I speak to Senator Solman um regularly.

Uh and uh yeah, we we one of the things uh I was gonna talk about is great, uh hopefully a good place to talk about is we uh speak regularly with our other Washington County law enforcement agencies to try and um have a uh consistency in the way we approach this with one another, understanding that people can get confused uh as they cross the city uh jurisdictional line or what the county does.

So we've worked, uh we met last Thursday, talked about and shared ideas about what we're doing, getting on the same page, so people hopefully very soon can expect the same thing in every city.

So councillor Sinclair.

Um I wanna go back to first thank you for staying in the hot seat and being up for it.

Oh I appreciate it.

It was cold in here earlier, so it feels pretty good.

It does, no.

Um we're in unprecedented times and it is intense, and please know that we're not trying to villainize our police department, but we're trying to protect the public as well.

I know I'm sure you can understand that.

Um I do want to talk about codification, not right the second.

I think that's appropriate.

We're talking about the proposals because that goes in alignment.

But I would like to further understand these conversations that are happening at a regional and state level.

I think what's frustrating is that we have experienced that before as a counselor, or USHP, as staff governance.

Why are we not having a special work session to understand legally what we can do when someone breaks a law here in Hillsborough?

And because we're clearly not aligning what the expectations are and the realities because people are pissed when they see law enforcement have to turn their head, not just at the objections, but regular laws being broke at street level.

Um just contact, period, outside of the kidnappings.

Um, and that's the part that really upsets our community.

I mean, all of our community, even if at the most base level, we're not enforcing the law that is beyond, and people think that we are being neglectful of our duties at not that study.

But we are to me, I feel like the codification piece is relevant because we as council aren't governing what our expectations are.

We have not set that as a body.

So that is on us.

That is not on HP, that's not on staff.

That's on us as a council.

So shame on us.

So we better get to work and get some things done as we can't think for everybody else.

I'm sorry, uh as far as uh a work session.

Happy to have that.

Um I think in the last work session uh a couple of weeks ago, Chief Coleman did address um what and and our attorney Chad Jacobs addressed uh what we can and can't do.

Now to the level that you're talking, we're happy to talk more about it.

Um I don't know that there's that much more depth beyond what we've shared.

We're happy to have a work session though, but I I uh there's not a ton of information out there beyond what we've already shared.

But if the council wants to have more discussion about that, we'd be happy to.

Can you say that?

So um time-wise, what would that look like if we did have a special work session?

Uh we can do that whenever the council wants.

Um before um in December, absolutely.

We have we we have the two regular meetings in December.

If the council wants to call a special meeting, you know, it um September the next couple of weeks.

We can do that.

The council can determine when you want to have that meeting.

I just need to hear it from the majority of the council and make sure everybody's on board with that.

So um we've already I've already tried to uh clear out a lot of the work sessions over the next few months so we can be very flexible with adding whatever we need to for the council.

In December, we typically just have one council meeting.

We have the second one.

People agree not to have it.

So I think we should keep it this year, if if it's then, but I think we should talk about this sooner.

Yeah.

We already have plan to have that meeting, uh, the second meeting in December this year.

So we have those two work sessions, and again, if the council wants to do a separate one at a different date, um we just need to hear that.

Yeah, I think we need a separate one.

I think we need to have an additional work session as soon as possible.

Out of curiosity to cover what all these questions here, and we're still questioning HPD on what we can and can't do.

I still don't know.

Why can't we uh why can't HP step in when I agents are switching license plates?

Um and there's documentation on it, and it's been confirmed through perk and ACLU and um uh I can't make other people, but the point is this is being documented.

Like hundreds and hundreds of reports, and we are people are pissed they're in the no because to them this is data that now is creating a pattern, and where is it going to?

Where's it going to be?

So where's the accountability?

That's why people are upset.

And then it gets put on you guys, but yeah, we as council have not enforced that that's our expectation for policy.

You know what I'm saying?

Like there's a lot that we haven't done yet in communicating with one another as a body and with HPD.

We have not done that work yet, in my opinion.

Council.

And I just want to add that we haven't um I don't I'm not comfortable with the way that we're addressing public safety right now.

I'd like to get to a place where I can feel a little more comfortable about it, and we're not there, we're nowhere near there.

Council may offer a suggestion.

Um, there's a lot of um things you've asked us to look into case in point the discussion today.

Um many of these are showing up in the proposals you have.

Yes.

And we have a suggested approach on how to to tackle that.

Um it might help to look at what that is.

It provides a little bit more structure on how we have these conversations.

Um so I just wanted to share that because we have an approach we wanted to share with you.

Um so I'm not saying that let's punt this to the next couple of slides, but let's punt this to the next couple of slides if that's okay.

And um, I think Jim wants to finish off his stuff too.

Oh thanks for I think we've you know, in the interest of time, I think I covered most of the things that I was hoping to touch on, but I I'm here for the for more questions if need be.

Um yeah, the the license plate thing is um I I don't know you know where those vehicles are.

I imagine some they're doing the same thing here in Hillsborough.

And again, if our officers they don't know what's an ICE vehicle and what's not.

I think most of us think you know, Windows tinted, it's an SUV, but they can move away from that tomorrow into a different kind of vehicle.

They're um we we would stop a vehicle if um the license plate didn't match the vehicle, if like perhaps we were behind it at a stoplight and we were checking things like that, or if we didn't see a front plate, it may be something that we would stop a vehicle for, but that is not at the highest level of um infractions out there.

We concentrate more on speeding things that cause accidents.

Um so I don't think you would see us writing a lot of tickets across the board to people that don't have front plates.

It is again it is a violation.

They may there, I just want to just throw it out there that they may be allowed to do that for operational security.

It may not ultimately be something that would be you know, would pass muster in court.

Now we could still write the ticket, but um, if it's for operational security, it may not be something that could be um that would stick.

Counselor Sogato.

Does HDD pull over cars that don't have license plates on them?

Yeah, yeah.