Federal Judge Rules Against Ordinance for Farmers Branch in Dallas to Rent Apartments to Illegal Immigrants

According to the Dallas Morning News, a federal judge struck down an ordinance that is in place to restrict area property owners from renting most apartments to illegal immigrants.

Residents of the city of Farmers Branch, which began to talk of the ordinance about two years ago, voted the initial proposal 2903 into Ordinance in May of 2007, by an overwhelming 2-to-1 vote, has had the rule overturned by US District Judge Sam Lindsay.

The city still has in place a newer ordinance, 2952 that is supposed to take effect 15 days after a judge's final ruling on Ordinance 2903. Many believe that even though Judge Lindsay has rejected the original ordinance, the second ordinance should stand up in court and allowed to take effect. However, residents of Farmers Branch do not believe that this battle will be easy to get to pass and may entail trips back and forth to court again.

Ordinance 2903 would require that all property owners and apartment managers that tenants are either U. S. Citizens or that they are legalized residents allowed to reside in the United States. However, Judge Lindsay stated that it is not up to a city to determine whether a person is legally residing in the country.

As for Ordinance 2952, there are differences that city council members of Farmers Branch believe will help to enforce without fear of it being overturned. Ordinance 2952 would require that property owners and apartment managers use a federal database in order to verify that the potential tenants are able to reside in the residence.

The reason that the Farmers Branch issue came to fruition is that members of the city council believe that since some immigrants are in the country illegally, that they should not be able to live legally within the city limits of Farmers Branch, as suburb of Dallas.

In the city of Dallas, there are no such rules in place. The city of Texas, being very close to Mexico does have a large population of Hispanic residents, of which some are illegally living in the United States. However, what many people do not realize is that there are individuals from other countries as well that are illegally living in this country.

It is harder for citizens of other countries not connected to the United States, such as Mexico and countries in Central and South America. Nevertheless, this is not impossible. In some situations, people that come to the US to visit for vacation or to attend school, do so and never leave the country.

My interaction with illegal immigrants is that I honestly would not know which immigrants are illegal. This is not something that people publicize. In fact, many people do everything in their power not to reveal that they are not here legally. Some refuse to call police when crimes are committed against them, for fear that it will lead to their deportation.

Dallas has not even thought of putting such ordinances into place. In most cities, it would be hard to enforce such an ordinance. Dallas' City Council has a diverse group in place, including African-American and Hispanics. This is a reason that such an ordinance would never obtain enough votes from Dallas City Council members to add to a ballot for official voting. On the other hand, Farmers Branch has a city council that does not have any members of Hispanic origin.

Source:

Stephanie Sandoval, Judge rejects Farmers Branch ordinance on renting to illegal immigrants, The Dallas Morning News