Ezell Says INS May Target Illegals in Costa Mesa ‘Soon’

INS Western Regional Commissioner Harold W. Ezell said Wednesday that immigration agents may raid an area in Costa Mesa where illegal aliens gather to seek work despite a controversial decision by that community’s City Council to study the problem before taking any action.

Ezell, who lives in Orange County, said he read a newspaper article Wednesday on Costa Mesa residents’ concerns about illegal aliens congregating at a public park and on street corners while seeking work.

“Why do they want more study?” Ezell said. “All they need to do is get into a car and drive around Costa Mesa, and you can see the problem is there.”

Costa Mesa Relative

Ezell said that the number of illegal aliens seeking day labor in Orange County is on the rise and that he was recently told about the problem in Costa Mesa by a relative who lives there.

He said he forwarded a note Wednesday to the head of INS operations for the region that includes Orange County, advising him to investigate. That, Ezell said, could result in an INS sweep soon.

“I’m sure you may see some changes over there real soon,” Ezell said.

Earlier in the day, a spokesman for the Costa Mesa Police Department said it would be “premature” to conduct a raid now.

“We have the authority (to request an INS sweep), but we’ll wait for the study to fully understand our alternatives,” Police Capt. Robert Moody said. “We’ve had INS sweeps in Costa Mesa in the past, and they don’t seem to have a long-lasting effect. But the department doesn’t have a good, solid solution to the problem.”

Members of immigrant rights groups in Orange County and some city officials criticized INS neighborhood raids, saying they disrupt communities, split families and contribute little toward solving long-term immigration problems.

The Rev. Jaime Soto, chairman of the Orange County Coalition for Immigrant Rights, said that with Mexico’s economy near a crisis, “there are very strong push factors,” and with jobs available in the United States, “we have strong pull factors.”

“We’re not going to be able to create an environment to scare the immigrant away,” Soto said. In fact, he added, illegal aliens who are apprehended during INS raids tend to reappear within a few days after they are deported to Mexico.

Ezell said he recognizes the need for an international approach to halt the influx of illegal aliens. That approach, he said, should involve enforcement of sanctions against U.S. employers who knowingly hire undocumented workers.

“The bottom line is it’s either that employer sanctions are going to work or we put the military on the border. And we don’t want to do that,” Ezell said. “We really want a program that helps the situation in Mexico. But they’ve got to ask us for help, and they haven’t done that yet.”

Undocumented day laborers have been a persistent dilemma not only in Costa Mesa but also in other cities in the county, including Laguna Beach, Orange and Santa Ana.

Ezell said exemptions for agricultural employers to sanctions under the new Immigration Reform Act will be in effect until Dec. 1, 1988, and will serve as a “magnet” allowing illegal immigration.

“But we never sold the American public on the idea--or told them--that employer sanctions were a total panacea for immigration. It did give us some of the tools, and once we have all employers being treated the same you’ll see some changes,” Ezell said.

Hundreds of day workers have been congregating at Costa Mesa’s Lion Park and on Placentia Avenue and other thoroughfares.

Since 1986, residents have complained of idle men loitering at the park, drinking beer, urinating in public and intimidating park users, Councilman Orville Amburgey said Wednesday.

“We’ve had our human relations people trying to mitigate the situation for two years now, but it’s not successful,” he said. At a City Council meeting Tuesday, Amburgey unsuccessfully sought approval of an ordinance that called for “eliminating illegal aliens” from the city’s western barrios.

“What I meant was the day workers who are naturalized (citizens) and those with immigration green cards can be helped by our human resources people at City Hall,” Amburgey said. “We can teach them the U.S. laws and our rules here. But we can’t condone having the illegal aliens here.”

Instead of accepting Amburgey’s proposed ordinance, the council voted to ask the city’s Human Relations Commission to study the issue and make recommendations.

“For too long,” Amburgey said, “Costa Mesa has had the attitude that the problem is too monumental to handle. But if we try to ignore it, it won’t go away. Many residents are upset about this, and I feel that if we address the issue, other cities may follow our lead. To move the mountain you’ve got to bite it off in small chunks.”

Mayor Donn Hall noted that after a highly publicized police and INS crackdown on day laborers in the city of Orange last year, “the laborers have begun coming back again.”

On Wednesday, about 75 men gathered early in the morning at one corner of Lion Park, waiting for prospective employers to approach them.

For the most part, these day laborers seek construction, gardening and other odd jobs at $4 to $7 an hour.

Some said they understand the problems they are causing but that conditions in Mexico motivated them to enter the country illegally.

“What politicians here don’t understand is that we are here out of necessity, nothing else,” said one 43-year-old day laborer from Michoacan, Mexico. He said he has spent nine years going back and forth across the border.

“The politicians know what we need, but they don’t do anything about it. If we can’t find work, we will have to go back to our country.”

Most others, however, said they would move to another area of the county to look for work if immigration crackdowns make it impossible to wait in the park.