LAKELAND (Florida) LEDGER

July 25, 2006

Avon Park Ordinance Fails

Councilwoman Brenda Gray switches vote on immigrant policy.

By KEVIN BOUFFARD
The Ledger

AVON PARK -- Saying she prayed for God's guidance on her vote on the controversial Illegal Immigration Relief Act, Avon Park City Councilwoman Brenda Gray heard a "no."

Gray switched her vote from a month earlier and cast the decisive vote that sent the ordinance to defeat Monday at the end of an emotional five-hour meeting. The measure failed by a 3-2 vote.

"Yes, the Lord answered my prayers," Gray said after the vote.

Gray's switch left only Mayor Tom Macklin and Councilman Doug Eason supporting the controversial proposal that generated unprecedented national media attention, protest rallies and a divisive debate between Avon Park's Hispanic community and many other residents since the council's 3-2 vote on June 26 at the ordinance's first reading.

Council members George Hall and Sharon Schuler also stood on their previous votes against the ordinance.

After the vote, the crowd of more than 300 people erupted in cheers. Outside the Community Center, hundreds more chanted "USA" and blared their car horns.

The ordinance would have prevented city officials from licensing any business that "aids and abets illegal aliens or illegal immigration" anywhere in the United States "for a period no less than five years from its last offense."

It also provided for "aggressively prohibiting and punishing the acts, policies, people, and businesses that aid and abet illegal aliens," including fines of no less than $1,000 on people or companies that knowingly rented or leased property to illegal immigrants. Finally the ordinance called for establishing English as the city's official language and barred conducting any municipal business in another language.

The defeat of the proposal came after Eason's unsuccessful attempt to table the ordinance, which only Macklin supported.

Hall and Schuler said the ordinance would need so much work that the council should start over rather than tabling Macklin's proposal.

"It is obvious the people of Avon Park don't understand this ordinance," Schuler said during the debate after hearing from almost 100 people, most of them opposed to the ordinance, during a public hearing. "I feel that, without legal counsel, we need to take a step back and amend this ordinance at some future date."

Macklin suggested the issue would come back to council in some form, but he declined to say when.

"This doesn't mean there won't be another ordinance," the mayor said.

Emotional speeches both by supporters and opponents dominated the public hearing. The opponents, most of them Hispanic, argued that the ordinance would result in discrimination against Hispanic residents, both legal and illegal.

Backers of the ordinance continually stressed it dealt with illegal residents only.

But the argument that appeared to carry the day came from several prominent business and political leaders, including Highlands County Commissioner David Flowers, a former Avon Park city councilman.

Flowers urged the council to put off a vote, saying the issue needed to be examined much more thoroughly before a final vote.

"This proposal has already divided this community, and the impact may last a long time," Flowers told Macklin, his friend of 30 years.

Flowers criticized the mayor for putting the ordinance forward without a public workshop of any kind and for copying it from an ordinance from Hazelton, Pa., without further research.

"Their demographics are not anywhere near the demographics of Avon Park," he said. "There is no agriculture there."

"Is this the kind of publicity we need in Avon Park? I don't think so," Flowers said.

Former Avon Park Councilwoman Justine Devlin read a letter from the Highlands County Republican Party Executive Committee that also urged a delay because "not enough thought, input and legal advice has been garnered for an informed vote."

Before the meeting, Gray was seen as the key swing vote after she told The Ledger last week she was reconsidering her earlier position. She spoke after outgoing City Attorney Mike Disler called the ordinance "poorly drafted" and probably unconstitutional in a July 13 Ledger story.

It was the first time Disler had spoken publicly about the ordinance, and the council voted unanimously to fire him two days later at a special budget meeting. Gray said she supported the firing because Disler should have raised his concerns at the June 26 meeting.

Gray said too many legal questions remained about the proposal.

"The ordinance was not introduced in the right way," she said. "When an ordinance is given to me, I like to feel all the I's are dotted and the T's crossed. This needs to be looked at again."

Against the background of the national debate over illegal immigration, which many analysts think will be a key issue in November's congressional elections, the Avon Park ordinance brought national media attention to this city of nearly 9,000 residents in northern Highlands County just one mile from the Polk County line.

Macklin appeared on "Lou Dobbs Tonight" on CNN and the Fox News cable channel, and the story was covered in many television news programs in Tampa, Orlando and elsewhere in Florida.

The New York Times ran a story on the efforts in Avon Park and Hazelton. Most of Florida's major newspapers also had stories on the ordinance and the subsequent controversy.

The Hispanic community in Avon Park and across the state appeared united against the ordinance, which they viewed as discriminatory.

The Avon Park Chamber of Commerce and many local companies with a substantial Hispanic workforce or customer base also strongly opposed the ordinance. Citrus growers, still an influential economic sector in Highlands, led the opposition from the business community.

The ordinance appeared to enjoy support from the city's non-Hispanic communities, both white and black, and among businesses without a large number of Hispanic workers or customers.

The ordinance faced a possible legal challenge even before the vote.

Carlton Fields, a Tampa-based law firm, sent the city a letter threatening a legal challenge on behalf of Amado and Garciela Islas of Avon Park, who own rental property in the city, according to Nancy Ciampa, a lawyer in the firm's Miami office.

"Carlton Fields is urging the City Council not to pass the ordinance because such actions would overstep the city's authority," said Ciampa, quoting the letter. "Illegal immigration is an issue that should be handled by the federal government on a national basis."

Many opponents raised the specter of legal costs: The city could not afford to defend the ordinance in court.

"If the city has that kind of money in its coffers, I don't see it. I don't think it's there," said Patricia Graf, the vice president of Highlands Independent Bank and the Avon Park branch manager.