By Joseph A. Curtatone

(The opinions and views expressed in the commentaries of The Somerville Times belong solely to the authors of those commentaries and do not reflect the views or opinions of The Somerville Times, its staff or publishers)

Last week I signed an executive order that limits Somerville’s participation in the flawed federal Secure Communities program, through which U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) asks—but does not require, as this is a program and not federal law—local law enforcement to hold undocumented immigrants after they have already posted bail or been ordered released by the courts. Somerville is taking this step to bring people who are already valuable, contributing members of our community out of the shadows. We want to encourage and boost cooperation with local law enforcement and keep families together, a factor that can stop crime before it happens. This is pro-public safety and pro-family values. News of my executive order inflamed passionate debate on both sides of the immigration issue, but too many of the arguments against this action are based on flawed logic and ignorance of the facts about undocumented immigrants in our country. Let’s clear up some of those myths.

Some said that crime will go up in Somerville because of this order. Beyond the fact that this assertion paints with a broad, discriminatory brush implying that all undocumented immigrants are criminals, it runs contrary to the facts we’ve seen nationally and here in Somerville. Nationally, the CATO Institute points out that data shows immigrants are actually less likely to commit crimes than native-born residents. In Somerville, since 2008, our Police Department has had an internal policy that they do not contact ICE about undocumented immigrants unless they are suspects in a serious crime, such as assault, rape, or weapons charges. What has happened since 2008? Crime in Somerville has dropped by roughly one-third.

Let’s be clear: If you commit a serious crime in Somerville, you will still be investigated, arrested and prosecuted to the full extent of the law. This executive order does not change that, nor will it stop Somerville Police Officers from working and cooperating with ICE on the apprehension of real threats to public safety, such as national security issues, violent crimes and felonies. Regardless of your immigration status, if you commit a serious crime in Somerville, you will pay the consequences, and if you are an undocumented immigrant, that includes deportation.

What we won’t do anymore is participate in the part of Secure Communities that doesn’t work. We are not going to hold people for minor violations, like traffic stops, that normally do not result in incarceration. An ICE detainer is a voluntary request according to ICE’s own internal documents—not a law—and it’s a request issued by an ICE officer, not a warrant issued by a judge. If a court orders someone released for a misdemeanor or other non-violent crime, unless ICE has a criminal warrant or other probable cause not related to immigration enforcement, Somerville Police will not hold them. There’s a legal reason for this: a federal judge ruled last month that holding a person released by the courts would violate the Fourth Amendment, and leave our city vulnerable to a lawsuit.

But it’s not just a practical and legal action on our part. It’s a moral action. These people are already part of our community—students in our schools, workers and customers of our businesses, contributing to our vibrant neighborhoods and our economy.

A common refrain is that these members of our community should have “gotten in the line” and “followed the process” of legal immigration. The problem is: there is no line or process for most people. Unless you have an immediate relative in the U.S. who is a citizen or lawful permanent resident, legally coming to this country generally means that a person must have a college degree, in a specialty occupation, with a job offer in hand from an employer who is willing to file the paperwork for a labor certification and pay up to $10,000 in legal and other fees. These provisions would have disqualified many of our parents and grandparents from legally immigrating years ago.

Even for a college educated person in a specialty occupation in that situation, a green card typically takes six to 10 years, so employers who want these foreign born, college educated specialists to start right away must apply for a temporary work visa—which has an annual cap and is capped for this coming year at 65,000. As of April 7, U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services had already received enough petitions to meet the cap level. Coming to this country is next to impossible for so many who only desire to work hard and provide a better life for their families.

What about fair taxation? Residents pay their fair share of taxes that pay for services, but what about undocumented immigrants? The truth is that undocumented immigrants pay a significant amount of state and local taxes—$10.6 billion as recently as 2010. That year, the estimated 120,000 to 200,000 undocumented immigrants in Massachusetts contributed more than $150 million in state and local taxes. They also contributed a net $12 billion in taxes to the Social Security trust fund. By 2007, the Social Security trust fund had received a net benefit of somewhere between $120 billion and $240 billion from undocumented workers, the vast majority of whom never receive Social Security benefits.

A deadlocked Congress has left us with a broken federal immigration system, pushing members of our community into the shadows on the margins of society. We cannot wait for the federal government to act anymore. We need to make sure that our community members who are contributing to our lives and our economy are not criminalized because of a broken system. These are our neighbors, our children’s classmates, our relatives and friends. These immigrants are an integral part of our communities and deserve to live as equals, and not have their lives shackled by a system that everyone knows is broken and is crying out for reform.