Kemp Says No to Costa Mesa Anti-Alien Rule

In a move that effectively kills an effort by city officials to deny social services to illegal aliens, Housing and Urban Development Secretary Jack Kemp said Friday that agency grant money cannot be withheld from programs that serve undocumented residents.

“I come to this issue with an understanding and sensitivity for the great wealth of talent that has come to our country from Latin America, the Caribbean and other nations,” said Kemp, who grew up in Los Angeles and noted that he has ties to the Mexican-American community. “It struck me as bad policy, counterproductive and un-American to take human services from children or ask charities to do that.”

Immigrants rights groups, who have voiced concerns about the increasing attempts by local governments to restrict the lives of undocumented workers, hailed Kemp’s decision.

“It’s a good sign,” said Charles Wheeler, director of the National Immigration Law Center in Los Angeles. “We are pleased he responded so quickly and correctly on an issue that is not only legally wrong but would have been politically wrong as well.”

“I think it is tremendously courageous and that Kemp is to be saluted,” said Umberto Juarez, an employment specialist with the Mexican American Legal Defense and Educational Fund.

Kemp’s directive came in response to an attempt by the city of Costa Mesa last August to bar public service groups from receiving federal grant money unless they agreed to not knowingly serve illegal aliens. The council, which approved the policy by a 3-2 vote, did not say how agencies were to go about determining the status of clients. Directors at many organizations protested that they would either have to establish costly and time-consuming screening procedures or forgo city financial assistance.

The city had suspended the policy pending a legal ruling from HUD as to whether the policy violated federal anti-discrimination guidelines.

Immigrant rights groups, charitable organizations and even city officials were shocked two weeks ago when HUD general counsel Frank Keating ruled that the policy appeared to violate no federal law.

Days later, however, Kemp, who had not seen the ruling before it was issued, stayed the opinion and expressed concerns about its national implications.

Friday’s directive, which supersedes the Keating ruling, expressly forbids cities that receive HUD grants to impose discriminatory requirements on public service groups. The ruling was dispatched to HUD’s 10 regional managers.

The directive states that “no grantee under HUD-funded community development programs can discriminate . . . on the basis of race, color, creed or alienage,” provided that the grantees in question do not dispense cash payments or other types of “welfare” assistance.

“To change our effective policy to exclude aliens from community development programs would lead to discrimination against foreign-born and foreign-looking citizens in situations where service providers . . . would be forced to make decisions with insufficient information, sometimes in emergency or life-threatening situations,” Kemp wrote in the memo.

Kemp, who lived for a time in Costa Mesa and whose sister-in-law works at an Orange County shelter for battered women, also said implementation of policies similar to the one approved in Costa Mesa would have the kind of “inflammatory impact in communities that we don’t want in America.”

“I know I will get some criticism on this,” he said Friday in a telephone interview from Washington, “but I think that men and women of goodwill on both sides will see that in the long run (non-discrimination) is better for America than turning service providers into agents of the Immigration and Naturalization Service.”

Costa Mesa City Councilwoman Sandra L. Genis, who voted againt the policy along with Councilwoman Mary Hornbuckle, applauded Kemp’s decision as a clear message that should discourage cities from enacting policies that might have a “discriminatory impact” on Latinos and other minorities.

“There’s just the general attitude that you read in the paper about a church being vandalized or a synagogue or black people being the people who are victims of hate crimes, and it’s real disheartening when you realize that some of the actions in your own city are conducive to the sort of atmosphere that’s encouraging some of those actions,” Genis said. “I hope that we’re going to get away from that.”

City Councilman Orville Amburgey, who proposed the policy, rejected Kemp’s reasoning and said that he will try to get the policy instituted anyway.

“I think his arguments don’t hold water at all,” Amburgey said. “He knows full well we are not asking agencies to do any policing. They don’t have powers (under the policy) to arrest people, they merely have to screen them. I think it’s clear (Kemp) is not the conservative that people imagine him to be.”

Kemp’s directive came after a hastily called meeting Wednesday in Washington between the secretary, immigrant rights groups and Costa Mesa Mayor Peter Buffa. Buffa could not be reached Friday for comment about the latest development.

Buffa has said, however, that he would not be willing to risk losing HUD money--the city has nearly $800,000 in Community Development Block Grants this year--should the agency object to the city’s grant policy.

Supporters of the Costa Mesa anti-alien grant policy, particularly Amburgey, have argued that the city has become a “magnet” for illegal aliens from Mexico who are seeking to take advantage of the free food, clothing and medical assistance offered by charities in the area.

Kemp dismissed that argument as “unrealistic.”

“They are not coming for welfare, they are coming for jobs and to give their children an opportunity to have a better life,” he said. “I think the United States should take immediate steps to help Mexico with its severe debt problem. . . . . That would make more sense than to punish these poor people.”

Kemp also reiterated his position that the portions of the 1986 Immigration Reform and Control Act that restrict benefits for newly legal residents need overhauling and that he is reviewing that issue with Congressional leaders and officials at the Justice Department.

Mary Anne Perez contributed to this report.