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18.031 Resolution calling for President Trump to Preserve DACA - redlined as amended 3-15-2018 In the City Council, February 1, in the year of Two Thousand and Eighteen Upon the recommendation of Councilor Marianne LaBarge, Councilor William H. Dwight, and Councilor James Nash R-18.031 Resolution calling for President Trump and his administration to preserve DACA and DHS to extend Temporary Protected Status (TPS) for all nationals who cannot safely return to their home countries. WHEREAS: Northampton is a Sanctuary City and we maintain a long and proud history as a community that supports, values, and respects immigrants, regardless of their status of documentation, and we embrace refugees escaping war and natural disasters; and WHEREAS: Temporary Protected Status (TPS) is a form of immigration status that has been granted sparing over the last three decades and only in situations in which natural disasters or widespread armed conflict in a given country has posed grave danger to the public provides employment authorization and protection from deportation for foreign nationals who cannot be safely returned to their home countries; and WHEREAS: It is estimated that ending TPS for immigrants from El Salvador, Haiti and Honduras would result in a $6.9 billion reduction to Social Security and Medicare contributions over a decade, and the deportation of these individuals would cost taxpayers approximately $3.1 billion dollars; and WHEREAS: TPS keeps families together, safe, and productive while their countries of origin are still struggling with a lack of jobs and crime; and WHEREAS: The City of Northampton recognizes the overwhelmingly positive contributions of TPS holders and their families to the economy, social fabric, diversity and well-being of our community; WHEREAS: The Department of Homeland Security (DHS), has decided to not extend designations of Temporary Protected Status (TPS) for all nationals that currently hold TPS including over 300,000 Salvadoran, Honduran, Nicaraguan and Haitian immigrants; and WHEREAS: In light of the Trump Administration’s radical increase of interior and exterior immigration enforcement through executive orders, funding requests, and policy guidance, the continued existence of TPS is very much at risk; and WHEREAS: when a country is designated for TPS, its nationals who were in the U.S. on the designation date may remain here legally with employment authorization if they pay a fee, pass a criminal background check, pay taxes, and meet other requirements, but TPS status does not confer a right to permanent residency or citizenship; and WHEREAS: there currently are 10 TPS designated countries, which are El Salvador, Haiti, Honduras, Nepal, Nicaragua, Somalia, South Sudan, Sudan, Syria, and Yemen, and about 400,000 people from these countries have lawful TPS status; and WHEREAS: the Trump Administration ended TPS for Nicaraguans and Salvadorans on November 20, 2017 and January 8, 2018, respectively, and the administration deferred a decision on Honduras, suggesting that it, too would be cancelled; and WHEREAS: TPS holders will face severe hardship and even death in their countries of origin due to crime and a lack of access to adequate jobs, healthcare, and education; and WHEREAS: in the Commonwealth of Massachusetts, there are more than 12,000 TPS recipients, including 7,800 people from El Salvador, Honduras, and Haiti; and WHEREAS: in the Commonwealth of Massachusetts, Salvadoran and Haitian TPS holders respectively have lived in the United States for an average of 22 and 15 years, respectively; and WHEREAS: it is a universal human right for families to remain united without fear of separation, and TPS keeps families together, safe, and productive; and WHEREAS: in the Commonwealth of Massachusetts, 5,300 U.S. born children have parents from El Salvador, Honduras, and Haiti who have TPS; and WHEREAS: large numbers of TPS recipients have worked long enough for their current employers to have developed specialized skills and attachments that would be hard to replace, resulting in nearly a billion dollars in turnover costs and cost about $45 billion in GDP over the decade; and WHEREAS: about 1 in 3 TPS holders owe mortgages that would be in danger of foreclosure if TPS were ended; and WHEREAS: $645.8 million would be lost annually from the Massachusetts GDP without TPS holders from El Salvador, Honduras, and Haiti; and WHEREAS: the deportation of all undocumented immigrants from Massachusetts would result in a loss of $9 billion or 2% of the Commonwealth’s GDP, and about 55,000 jobs; and WHEREAS: in 2012, President Obama issued an Executive Order to create a program known as Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA); it gave undocumented youth whose parents had brought them to the United States as a child and before their sixteenth birthday the ability to live, work, and study in the United States for a period of two years, subject to renewal; and WHEREAS: DACA has protected nearly 800,000 people, including over 8,000 in Massachusetts; and WHEREAS: President Trump announced a rescission of DACA but has allowed for a six-month window during which Congress can pass new legislation to protect those who rely on the program; and WHEREAS: ending DACA would cost Massachusetts nearly $606.6 million in annual GDP losses; and WHEREAS: all students in Northampton have a right to attend public schools regardless of their immigration status and the Northampton School District has invested valuable resources in our Commonwealth’s DACA recipients, and they in turn have responded by successfully continuing their education and by making important contributions to the workforce and to society; and WHEREAS: almost 90 percent of DACA recipients are currently working, and if DACA were to be ended, about 650,000 workers would be removed from the U.S. economy, to a cost of over $433 billion in lost GDP over the next decade; and WHEREAS: ending TPS and DACA would cause enormous and unnecessary hardship to themselves, the schools they attend, the families they support, the businesses where they work, and the neighborhoods where they own homes; and WHEREAS: the Trump Administration can improve our security, our economy, and our communities by extending TPS, and Congress can do the same by enacting legislation that would permit current TPS and DACA recipients to remain; and WHEREAS: approximately 11 million undocumented immigrants reside in the United States and are valuable members of our community; and   WHEREAS: the United States government must assume responsibility for its economic and military policies that have produced poverty and violence abroad, thus forcing people to migrate and navigate an immigration system that is designed to keep the majority of people undocumented or living with a precarious legal status; and WHEREAS: Salvadorans migrated to the United States to flee a US-financed civil war in the 1980s that led to the deaths of 75,000 people; and   WHEREAS: the United Nations Truth Commission documented how US-financed and trained military officials in El Salvador committed eighty-five percent of human rights abuses, including murder and torture; and WHEREAS: Hondurans have recently migrated to the United States to flee the 2009 US-backed military coup that resulted in the ouster of a democratically elected president and high rates of violence; and WHEREAS, the City of Northampton believes that each resident of our City, regardless of immigration status, deserves to be treated with respect and dignity, and that each DACA and TPS recipient, and undocumented person should be allowed to fulfill their dreams in the only country they call home, the United States of America. NOW THEREFORE BE IT RESOLVED: The Northampton City Council supports the Temporary Protected Status program and is calling on the Department of Homeland Security to reconsider the decision to not extend the TPS program supporting Immigrants and Refugees escaping war, natural disasters, and crime; The Northampton City Council calls upon the DHS Secretary to promptly extend the TPS designations for all 10 current TPS countries by 18 months, the maximum amount of time permitted by the TPS statute and regulations; and BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED: the Northampton City Council calls upon Congress to pass legislation that preserves the ability of all current TPS holders to continue living and working legally in the United States. BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED: the Northampton City Council calls upon President Trump and his administration to preserve the DACA program and urges members of Congress, including our own Senators and Representatives, to take bipartisan action to pass legislation that provides DACA recipients the promised citizenship they deserve and end the uncertainty they face. We urge that the legislation be passed without any additional conditions, whether it be additional funding for border security or measures that would heighten the risk of deportation of other immigrant groups. BE IT FURHTER RESOLVED: the Northampton City Council encourages Congress to seek and consider a solution that grants permanent status and a pathway to citizenship to the broadest group of immigrants possible, including undocumented immigrants without DACA and TPS.   AND BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED: That the City Clerk be and hereby is requested to forward a suitably engrossed copy of this resolution to President Donald Trump, Homeland Security Secretary Kirstjen Neilsen, Congressman James McGovern and Massachusetts Senators Edward Markey and Elizabeth Warren on behalf of Northampton City Council.