By Texas Insider Staff
AUSTIN TX At a time when the City of Austin faces a $28 million budget shortfall its electric utility
admits its own bankruptcy and its public transportation system is in shambles members of the Austin City Council Thursday decided that making a symbolic statement against Arizona is a more important use of their time than dealing with the problems which impact its citizens.
At its Thursday meeting the Austin City Council is to consider a boycott of the entire state of Arizona based upon the recent passage of the Immigration Law Enforcement & Safe Neighborhoods Bill (SB1070) which mandates cooperative enforcement" of federal immigration laws by Arizona law enforcement when federal officials fail to enforce them.
If the city approves the proposal from Mayor Lee Leffingwell Mayor Pro Tem Mike Martinez and council member Bill Spelman it would include cutting off ties with Arizona businesses and prohibiting travel by city employees to Arizona because of what Martinez calls an uncertain and potentially hostile environment."
How can our city council be so insensitive to the fact that this bill was needed in Arizona because of the uncertainty and danger created for citizens there by the lack of border enforcement? observed Travis County Republican Party (TCRP) Chairman Rosemary Edwards.
News reports from across Texas and other states bordering with Mexico have increasingly documented how illegal immigrants coyotes and drug dealers have made the border into a war zone where drug trains" accompanied by paramilitary forces in pick-up trucks and armed with machine guns accompany drugs and people over the border sometimes killing anyone in their way.
In a recent press release Mike Martinez talked about the citys vehement opposition to racial discrimination in any form. TCRP Communications Director Dave Nalle noted Racial discrimination is a non-issue since racial profiling is explicitly prohibited in the new Arizona law.
Perhaps Martinez should be more concerned about the cost in lives and safety to American citizens and Mexican migrants on a border where lawlessness rules and violence is out of control Nalle said. The Arizona legislature passed the law to protect the people of their state he said.
It is unfortunate Austins leaders are so far removed from any real danger that they think wasting time condemning Arizona is more important than fulfilling their own responsibilities to the people they are supposed to represent Nalle said.
Austins city accountant firm Deloitte & Touche are a division of Deloitte LLP which is an Arizona based company. Deloitte LLP also providies many of the consultants Austins city government relies on to provide justifications for decisions which many Austinites view as being made on the basis of whim and ideology rather than common sense and in the best interests of the citys residents.
