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About The daily Astorian. (Astoria, Or.) 1961-current | View Entire Issue (Aug. 7, 2017)
THE DAILY ASTORIAN • MONDAY, AUGUST 7, 2017 COUNTY FAIR 7A Colin Murphey/The Daily Astorian People wait in line for the ferris wheel at the Clatsop County Fair in Astoria last week. The fair ended Saturday. More photos online at DailyAstorian.com Chicago files federal lawsuit over sanctuary cities threat By MICHAEL TARM and SOPHIA TAREEN Associated Press CHICAGO — Mayor Rahm Emanuel has taken his fight against President Donald Trump’s immigration policies to court, with Chicago becom- ing one of the first cities today to sue the government over what many U.S. cities argue are illegal bids to withhold pub- lic safety grants from so-called sanctuary cities. The 46-page lawsuit was filed in U.S. District Court in Chicago, a day after Emanuel announced the litigation and said the city won’t “be black- mailed” into changing its values as a welcoming city. He argued it’s unconstitutional for a city “to be coerced on a policy.” A first order of business now that the suit has been filed will be to ask a judge to put a freeze on the policy at least until the civil case plays out, said Edward Siskel, the head of City Hall’s legal depart- ment. That request for a prelim- inary injunction could be made within days. Chicago officials say there are new qualifications for a grant that requires cities to share information with U.S. immigration authorities, which they allege are unconstitutional. Chicago has received the grant funds since 2005, including $2.3 million last year. They were used for buying police vehicles, radios and SWAT equipment. “These new conditions — which would give federal offi- cials the power to enter city facilities and interrogate arrest- ees at will and would force the City to detain individuals lon- ger than justified by proba- ble cause, solely to permit fed- eral officials to investigate their immigration status — are unau- thorized and unconstitutional,” the complaint read. “These new conditions also fly in the face of longstanding City pol- icy that promotes cooperation between local law enforcement and immigrant communities, ensures access to essential city services for all residents, and makes all Chicagoans safer.” Those grant amounts of money are relatively small, but Chicago leaders say they fear more impactful restrictions could be coming and so they hope to establish in court that such government measures are illegal. It is the latest round in a bat- tle between several major U.S. cities that opt to limit cooper- ation with federal government efforts to enforce immigration law and the Trump adminis- tration, with federal officials threatening for months to with- hold funding for sanctuary cit- ies, saying they don’t comply with federal laws. Last month, Attorney Gen- eral Jeff Sessions said local governments would lose the money if they do not give advance notice when immi- grants in the country illegally are about to be released from custody. He also wants immi- gration agents to have access to local jails. He has argued that the policy makes everyone safer. Chicago has been a sanctu- ary city since the 1980s, beef- ing up its policies in the past decade, particularly since Trump took office. The city prohibits police from providing federal Immi- gration and Customs officials access to people in police cus- tody, unless they are wanted on a criminal warrant or have serious criminal convictions. Local police are also barred from allowing ICE agents to use their facilities for inter- views or investigations and from responding to ICE inqui- ries or talking to ICE officials about a person’s custody status or release date. Authorities contend the pol- icy helps encourage residents of the immigrant community to inform police when they are victims of crimes. The lawsuit, which names Sessions, seeks to remove the immigration-related conditions for the grant applications. When asked for comment about the lawsuit, the Depart- ment of Justice spokesman directed The Associated Press to Sessions’ previous com- ments, including those saying sanctuary cities threaten safety. “It’s especially tragic that the mayor is less concerned with that staggering figure than he is spending time and tax- payer money protecting crim- inal aliens and putting Chica- go’s law enforcement at greater risk,” said department spokes- man Ian D. Prior in an email. Emanuel and other city lead- ers have rejected that the city’s policies protect immigrants with criminal records who are living in the U.S. without legal permission. Port: Process could take up to six months Crab: Bill ‘brings some stability’ Continued from Page 1A managed solely by the states instead of coming under fed- eral oversight. The bill per- manently extends the agree- ment with the states to cooperatively manage the fishery in federal waters. Previously, the states had to routinely extend the agree- ment. The most recent ver- sion expired in 2016 without a replacement. “We were lucky that our fishermen continued to honor the spirit of the rule,” said Dan Ayres, coastal shellfish manager with the Washing- ton Department of Fish and Wildlife, about the recent season. “What it does is it brings some stability to the crab fishery on the West Coast that was uncertain as long as the management struc- ture was subject to change,” said Dale Beasley, president of the Coalition of Coastal Fisheries and of the Colum- bia River Crab Fisherman’s Association. Under the tri-state agree- ment, state fishery manag- ers have been able to quickly adjust to the cyclical nature of the crab fishery, Beasley said. Crab populations can vary greatly, sometimes from season to season. “This is a historic event for the coastal communities that depend on crab,” Beas- ley added. “It really is. I don’t think people realize how important this is to sustain our coastal communities.” Beasley worked to keep the bill in front of legisla- tors, traveling to Washing- ton, D.C., himself to rep- resent the West Coast and testify at a House hearing in 2015, and now the fishery will fall squarely under state management. He and Ayres say they are relived the bill passed and will be, as far as anyone can tell, signed into law soon. Without that tri-state plan in place, Ayres said, “it could really get sticky if we didn’t have authority over what goes on.” Beasley believes the bill passed in large part because of the bipartisan champi- ons it found in U.S. Rep. Jaime Rep. Herrera Beutler, R-Washington, in the House of Representatives and Can- twell in the Senate. Oregon commercial fish- ermen harvest an average of 14 million pounds of crab each season. Washington state harvests an average of 9.5 million pounds each sea- son. Cantwell’s office esti- mates that, in Washington, the harvest brings $61 mil- lion into the state’s economy annually and supports more than 60,000 maritime jobs. Continued from Page 1A Starr: Often speaks at school assemblies “The intent is to get the air- craft as close to the runway as possible,” Kobes said, adding something as small as 30 feet can make a difference to an incoming aircraft. Kobes said airport stake- holders have been in discus- sion on the issue for about a year. A subcommittee of the airport committee was formed to tackle the issue, includ- ing pilots from the U.S. Coast Guard, U.S. Army and Life Flight Network. The subcom- mittee members will soon bring the issue before the War- renton City Commission and seek referral to staff. Kobes said the process could take up to six months. Continued from Page 1A progressively trusted him to help them in those efforts. “I proved it, so they just let you go in and do it,” Starr said. “They know that we know what we’re doing.” ‘Messy wreck’ Airport industrial The airport falls under a gen- eral industrial zone in Warren- ton’s city code, which allows for airport support structures such as hangars, weather sta- tions, fuel terminals and stor- age buildings. The code also allows for conditional uses such as runway extensions and relocations. The zone prohib- its uses that interfere with elec- tricity or lighting at the airport. The Daily Astorian The Port of Astoria will seek changes to Warrenton’s zoning to protect the airspace around the Astoria Regional Airport. Kobes said the city’s zone has a lot of similarities with the Department of Aviation’s, but “basically, there’s no enabling language in there relative to the day-to-day operations of the airport.” He said the safety zone is also meant to avoid things like trees growing around runways and lights shining into the air- port, which can affect military pilots using night vision. Warrenton Planning Direc- tor Skip Urling said he’s not prepared to comment on the Port’s proposal. According to Warrenton’s municipal code, legislative text amendments require “city decision-makers to consider applicable compre- hensive plan policies or provi- sions.” The proposal would go through the Warrenton Plan- ning Commission and a pub- lic hearing before the City Commission. The accident that most sticks out in Starr’s mind took place about 10 years ago near Nicolai Mountain. A man speeding down a hill swerved and hit a woman who was distracted by a mobile electronic device. The woman and her husband — both visiting from Canada — were killed, and her car was completely wrecked. “It was a very messy wreck, and it affected a lot of people,” Starr said. Some of those people — the woman’s family — vis- ited him one day at his yard. A Christian family, they were hoping to access the car’s CD player. “They wanted to know what mom and dad were lis- tening to before they went to heaven,” Starr said. Starr often speaks at school assemblies, such as the Every 15 Minutes pro- gram, about the dangers of distracted driving. To illus- trate his point, he often hauls in wrecked vehicles he has collected, including the one that killed the Canadian cou- ple 10 years ago. “People were really amazed at how bad this car was,” he said. “I always wanted to make it realistic. I know it saved a few lives just by talking to different people.” After nearly two decades in the business, Starr’s new profession continues to roll along. “I still enjoy people, which is pretty amazing con- sidering how demanding this job is.”
