Dear Orville, HUD Is Watching : Costa Mesa gets a social justice reminder

It’s not every day that a local city councilman gets a personal plea for social justice from the secretary of housing and urban development in Washington.

But Secretary Jack Kemp’s letter last week to Costa Mesa City Councilman Orville Amburgey was much more than another piece of mail.

It was an eloquent statement of the federal government’s responsibility to promote fair play on immigration policy in the cities and towns of America, especially those that are making a serious effort to come to grips with the problems of illegal immigrants.

Amburgey, playing on local fears of a growing immigrant community, has spearheaded a relentless but, to date, unsuccessful effort to get his council to force charities to check citizenship before they give out food, clothing or other emergency services.

Earlier, Kemp had said that Costa Mesa could not withhold federal money from charities that refused to screen immigrants. His letter made it clear that the first ruling was only a rough policy draft.

His elaboration said that making help contingent on resident status would risk losing some or all of their HUD-administered block-grant funds.

For Costa Mesa, that would endanger income that came to nearly $800,000 last year.

Kemp’s well-reasoned message said, in part:

“The potential for discrimination against foreign-born and foreign-looking citizens by service providers unfamiliar with complex immigration laws is acute and real,” he wrote.

“If the Costa Mesa policy regarding illegal immigrants were to be applied across the Southwestern United States, I could foresee many unjust violations of the civil and human rights of Mexican-Americans and Asian-Americans.”

Kemp, a conservative Republican and former New York congressman--who once lived in Costa Mesa and still has close ties to Southern California--disputed Amburgey’s negative assessment of illegal immigrants:

“Far from being a drain on the economy, immigrants add vitality, innovation and entrepreneurial skills which make our economy dynamic and help keep it growing.”

Kemp’s earlier communication to Amburgey complained of what he saw as use of the word conservative as a synonym for lack of feeling or caring, concluding that “those who have been blessed by this land should attempt to be a blessing to others.”

It couldn’t be said better.

And Kemp’s letter last week not only put Costa Mesa on notice but also sent a message to local governments everywhere in the nation that the federal government will insist on fairness.