Howard County ends ICE contract
Legislators try to put an end to feds using jails statewide
Maryland state and county leaders are taking steps to prohibit local jails from being used by the federal government to house people detained on immigration matters.
The Maryland House of Delegates last week approved a bill with a veto-proof majority banning the practice. And on Friday, Howard County took steps to end its 26-year contract with U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement.
Holding such detainees is a way for local governments to raise money when they have vacant space in their jails. Opponents argue that local jails shouldn’t participate in and profit from immigration enforcement, which is a federal matter.
Howard County sent ICE written notice Friday of its intent to terminate its contract with the agency. Ending the pact requires 60 days’ notice, the documents state, and so detainees currently in the detention center must be removed “no later than May 18,” according to documents from the Howard County Office of Law.
The partnership, which had existed since 1995, allowed immigration detainees to be held in the Howard County Detention Center in Jessup. The center does not hold women or child ICE detainees.
Howard County’s action comes a day after a bill banning the practice passed the Maryland House by an 88-64 vote.
“Maryland is better than ICE and its detention centers,” said Del. Vaughn Stewart, a Montgomery County Democrat and sponsor of the “Dignity Not Detention Act.” Stewart’s bill would require the three counties housing ICE detainees — Frederick, Howard and Worcester — to end their agreements by Oct. 1, 2022.
The bill also bans local governments and the state government from subsidizing the construction of any privately-run immigration detention centers.
The bill now moves to the state Senate for consideration.
The bill’s Senate sponsor, Sen. William C. Smith Jr., chairman of the Judicial Proceedings Committee, said he hopes senators will consider the legislation during the session’s remaining three weeks. But Smith, a Montgomery County Democrat, worried that intense debates over other big issues — major policing reforms, an overhaul of the state’s parole and juvenile justice systems — could dominate the agenda and leave little time for another hotly debated proposal.
The debate over whether local jails should house immigrant detainees has
been particularly intense in Howard County, where residents have protested periodically outside the county jail.
Under pressure, Howard County Executive Calvin Ball, a Democrat, changed the county’s policy last year to hold only those “convicted of violent crimes” on behalf of ICE.
Howard’s prior policy allowed the jail to house ICE detainees convicted of any crime, gang members, deported people who returned to the U.S. and those charged with jailable offenses.
The Howard County Council passed a bill last fall to end the county’s contract with ICE, but Ball vetoed it.
Federal inspectors issued a report last fall after finding in 2019 that the Howard jail excessively strip-searched detainees and failed to always provide three hot meals per day as required. The county’s corrections director said the report didn’t reflect the current policies and treatment of detainees.
Howard is paid about $2.8 million per year under its ICE contract, which makes up about 13% of the jail’s total $21 million budget, according to a nonpartisan legislative analysis.
Ball declined to comment on the end of the ICE contract during a Monday event with local Asian American business and community leaders. The county plans to hold a news conference about the contract termination at 11 a.m. Tuesday in Ellicott City.
Liz Alex, chief of organizing for CASA, an advocacy group for Latino and immigrant people in Maryland, called the move “a big step forward.”
“Folks have been fighting for this for years,” Alex said. “[This is] really responding to a sustained public outcry. We don’t want our local budget to be balanced on the back[s] of immigrants.”
The other counties with ICE contracts are
Frederick County, which makes $1 million per year, and Worcester County, which brings in $4 million per year. Worcester’s payments from ICE make up 42% of the budget for the jail, according to the nonpartisan analysis.
Anne Arundel County briefly had a contract to house ICE detainees, but the federal government canceled it in 2019. The cancellation came shortly after County
Executive Steuart Pittman, a Democrat, ended participation in another program known as “287g” that trains local correctional officers to screen newly-booked individuals for potential immigration violations.
At the time, the county was receiving $118 per person per day to house about 130 ICE detainees at the Ordnance Road Correctional Center in Glen Burnie.
During an online public hearing on the state bill earlier this month, many people urged state delegates to pass the bill, including members of groups that advocate for immigrant rights, civil liberties and social justice.
But some said that the counties still should be able to enter into the detention contracts, including the head of the Maryland Association of Counties.
The association argued in written testimony that the bill would undermine a county’s authority to run its own operations, and “management of county jail contracts and policies should be left to the discretion of those counties.”
The Worcester County Board of Commissioners said in written testimony that the county’s jail has been housing detainees since 1999 in “a safe and secure environment.” The county expanded its jail in 2011 to accommodate an influx of ICE detainees, particularly during the summer.
“Prohibition of these services and the resulting loss of revenues would be devastating to the operations of the Worcester County Jail,” wrote Joseph M. Mitrecic, president of the Worcester board of commissioners.