After area residents spoke for around an hour at a meeting on Tuesday about the impact heightened federal immigration enforcement actions are having on Aurora’s community and pushed for the city to take action, Mayor John Laesch said the city was looking into ordinances passed by others and will soon be formally proposing one of its own.
The Aurora City Council on Tuesday evening had so many who wanted to speak, primarily about what federal agents have been doing within the city, that aldermen voted to suspend meeting rules to let residents continue to make their voices heard beyond the 30 minutes allowed during the public comment period.
Those at the meeting talking about the federal immigration enforcement push, sometimes through tears, spoke of neighbors scared to leave their homes and what they said were warrantless arrests and the use of excessive force.
Just after the meeting’s public comment period, Ald. Mike Saville, 6th Ward, asked Mayor Laesch what his plans were, as many people had come to the meeting to speak about an ordinance around immigration enforcement operations in the city. Laesch said the city was looking at ordinances passed by other municipalities and was trying to combine them into something that would work for the city of Aurora.
Such an ordinance is set to go before the Aurora City Council’s Rules, Administration and Procedure Committee at an upcoming meeting, according to Laesch. The next meeting of that committee is on Nov. 4.
Laesch told The Beacon-News on Wednesday that the ordinance is still being worked on, but it would probably be focused on city-owned property. As for enforcement, which he called the “real challenge,” it might have to do with the accountability commission that Gov. JB Pritzker is putting together, he said.
The Department of Homeland Security did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
Saville said he asked the question because people “voiced their very real concerns about themselves, their families and our community, and I thought they had a right to know what the next step was so they can go home and be satisfied that their advocacy is working.”
This comes on the heels of two Aurora-area residents being detained and later let go over the weekend. The Chicago Tribune reported that 35-year-old Ruben Morales Jr., of Yorkville, and 38-year-old Jessi Olazaba, of Aurora, both said they were harmed by federal agents as they were detained after responding to alerts of suspicious vehicles parked at Allen Elementary School.
Both also recounted the story at the City Council meeting on Tuesday. Morales said he was slammed to the ground and handcuffed, while Olazaba said she was pepper sprayed and shoved to the ground, where she hit her head. Still, she can feel the pepper spray burning her, Olazaba said, and she has to sleep with water bottles in her hands to keep them cool.
According to the Chicago Tribune, a Department of Homeland Security official said Morales and Olazaba approached and hit the agents’ vehicle, and also accused Morales of assaulting an agent, during a U.S. Border Patrol targeted enforcement operation in Aurora.
But Morales told the Tribune he had motioned for the driver of a suspicious car to roll down its windows. When someone in the back pointed something at him and shouted for him to get back, he threw up his hands and turned to get away while yelling for help, but masked agents pepper-sprayed him from behind, chased him and tackled him to the ground, he said at the time.
Olazaba told the Tribune she filmed and called the police before an agent pepper-sprayed her, and that another agent pushed her as she photographed the car’s plates.
At Tuesday’s meeting, both Morales and Olazaba called on the city to create zones where federal immigration enforcement agents would not be allowed. Morales also asked the City Council to listen to all those who spoke at the meeting and put in place safeguards so federal agents cannot operate without proper identification.
“Beyond those requests, I’m asking for something deeper,” Morales said. “That we choose compassion over silence. That when power crosses the line, we draw it back with truth, courage and unity.”
After their comments, cheers and applause could be heard from the audience. Others who spoke at the meeting also called for the city to create places where federal agents would not be allowed, asked for the police to intervene and not work with federal agents, or generally asked the city to protect its immigrant community.
Tuesday’s meeting is not the first time residents have pushed the city of Aurora to respond to heightened federal immigration enforcement efforts. For example, demonstrations were held earlier this month in Aurora, including one at City Hall and another later in the day that Mayor Laesch said he joined in, after federal agents were seen across the city.
After those protests, Laesch condemned federal immigration enforcement activity in the area, calling it a “wrongful use of federal funds to violate the civil rights of our residents.”
rsmith@chicagotribune.com
