About 100 people showed up to a village board meeting in Spencer on Monday night, to talk about a proposed policy to prohibit the village police officer from any involvement with Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) activities within the village.
Normally five or six residents attend. A number of people who spoke at the meeting were residents of the town of Spencer of which the village is a part. The village, in Tioga County, is about 20 miles south of Ithaca.
Fewer than 800 people live in the village and it has one part-time police officer.
The idea of the policy change was brought up in August after ICE agents stopped a vehicle and arrested 10 men who lived in the village. They worked at a nearby farm. The village police officer said he just happened to see the incident and directed traffic around ICE agents as they made the arrests.
Streets in Spencer are two lanes and do not have shoulders.
At Monday’s meeting, Sheila Covell said she lives in the town. She is against the policy for reasons heard from a number of others.
“I would hate to see this town turn into a third-world town,” Covell said. “I like walking my dog everyday with no fear. I wonder if this will bring our land, our house values down, if this is pushed into effect.”
Denise Price also lives in the town and spoke in favor of the policy.
“You’ve been living with undocumented folks who’ve been living and working in your community this whole entire time,” she said, “and the only reason people are up in arms about it is because it’s been brought to your attention that they were undocumented. Now they’ve been vilified and now there’s all this misinformation and fearmongering.”
The policy would not stop ICE from arresting people in Spencer or restrict residents from calling ICE. It did not suggest making Spencer a “sanctuary city.” But many who spoke ignored that and said their reason for opposing the change was because they didn’t want to “ban” ICE or make the village a “sanctuary city”.
The board vote was inconclusive: two board members against, one in favor and one abstaining, saying he wanted more time to consider the matter. It can be reintroduced but Mayor Gilbert Knapp said that is unlikely.