As I wrote about a few days ago, the anti-illegal-immigrant law in Hazelton, PA has been placed on hold by a federal judge. Today, Ellen Barry has an article in the LA Times regarding the changes that have taken place in Hazelton since the law was first passed.
The changes came bit by bit to Hazleton this fall.
Rich O’Brien woke up one morning and his neighbors across the street were gone. For the first time in memory, William Sernak, who farms in a town nearby, could not find enough workers at harvest time. And Amilcar Arroyo has watched as the wire transfers sent from his store dropped from $700 a day to $200 to $50.
O’Brien, a truck driver, has watched the change with deep satisfaction.
“The drug dealers are starting to leave town,” said O’Brien, 61, a longtime resident. The street is “better empty than full of drug dealers and murderers and thieves.”
Barkeep Maurice Umbriac, 70, noted that some of the immigrants were good people. But he could see O’Brien’s point: “People keep complaining the businesses aren’t doing well over there, but what kind of business do you want?”
More than 30 cities and towns, including Escondido, Calif., have considered or passed ordinances based on Hazleton’s. Most are waiting to see whether the law withstands court challenges by civil rights groups, which argue that local governments have no right to regulate immigration. A U.S. district judge last week granted a temporary restraining order to stop enforcement of the Hazleton law, which was to have taken effect Nov. 1. Barletta said he expected the case to be appealed to the U.S. Supreme Court.
In Hazleton’s heyday 70 years ago, coal miners from Italy, Czechoslovakia and Ireland streamed through the streets at the end of their shifts. But coal and textiles collapsed, and by 2000, the population had declined to 23,000, with a median age of 40. The Latino arrivals — many of them from New York and New Jersey — opened 50 businesses downtown and boosted property values.
With the arrival of families from larger cities, though, crime in Hazleton began to change, said Police Chief Robert Ferdinand. There had always been a drug trade in Hazleton, but it became more brazen, with “a certain cold-bloodedness to it that we had never seen before,” he said. The 30-man police department was overwhelmed, he said, and people began to worry.
David Vaida, an Allentown, Pa., attorney who joined the lawsuit against the city, said people in Hazleton would “rue the day they drove the Hispanics out.”
“The economic benefits are going to go away,” he said. “They will be what they say they want to be, which is a decaying town, slowly losing population because there are no opportunities.”
But that was not the view of Bill Rinaldi, who owns six rental units in Hazleton. He said the mayor was “on the right track, getting rid of the trouble.” Another landlord, a 62-year-old Dominican man, said he had gradually come to see the ordinance as a positive move.
“If it keeps away illegals who have been involved in criminal activity, it would be good for everyone,” said the man, who spoke on condition of anonymity out of concern for his privacy. “Like everyone else, I did have a negative reaction initially, but one has to be able to take a second look.”
In related news, the neighboring town of West Hazleton passed an ordinance similar to the one in neighboring Hazleton:
A garbage-collection fee hike was a much hotter issue at Thursday’s borough council meeting than a vote on a revised Illegal Immigration Relief Act, which was adopted with no vocal opposition.
Borough council voted 5-0 to pass the act, which is nearly identical to Hazleton’s. The city and its mayor, Lou Barletta, were cast into the national spotlight when Barletta presented the controversial ordinance to council in June.
Officials in West Hazleton, a neighboring borough of about 1,600 residences, received little publicity when council passed the first version in August.
Antonio Rodriguez, a Latino professor from Hazleton, said the ordinance, which punishes landlords and business owners who rent to or employ illegal immigrants, is needed to curb crime. He also said all immigrants should learn to speak English.