Representatives of Movimiento Cosecha GR listen to county officals during Monday night’s meeting.
Members of Movimiento Cosecha GR and GR Rapid Response to ICE met with representatives from Kent County on Monday, August 6, 2018 to discuss ending the County’s contract with ICE.
The meeting, facilitated by Assistant County Administrator Matthew VanZetten, brought commissioners Robert Womack, David Bulkowski, Stan Stek and Chief Deputy Over Corrections Chuck Dewitt to the table where members of Movimiento Cosecha GR and Rapid Response to ICE shared experiences that are happening in the local immigrant community.
Kent County’s Robert Womack, Matthew VanZetten and Chuck Dewitt at Monday night’s meeting
Gema Lowe, lead organizer of Movimiento Cosecha GR, suggested that the purpose of the meeting is to have clear steps going towards ending the contract with ICE.
People of color are being stopped for petty, non-arrestable offences that are leading to arrest and ultimately, deportation. Major issues of concern and perception are driving while black or brown.
“The community is scared and has lost trust in the police,” Lowe said. “Many people in the area have been separated from their families.”
GR Rapid Response to ICE member Amy Carpenter mentioned how people in the immigrant community need help, saying that the arrests have caused families to lose their breadwinner, ultimately having to go without food and or even to lose their housing.
After listening to the concerns presented by the groups, Commissioner Stek wanted to know the core issue the organization is asking the commission to consider.
“Is it rubber-stamp the resolution without doing an analysis, without doing the thinking, without doing the investigation, without doing a lot of due diligence, or are they asking to roll up sleeves and do that analysis?” Stek asked.
Stek added, “All I am saying is, equip us with as much as you think you can and let us do some analysis and thinking.”
Upset that neither the sheriff nor undersheriff was present at the meeting and feeling that the movement was being lectured to by county officials, Cosecha members walked out of the meeting before its conclusion. No decision was made, commissioners were left to discuss the issue without further input from the group.
County officials talk among themselves after Cosecha members walked out of the meeting.
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