Letter to Senator Bramble Regarding HB 107

Senator Bramble,

I am a resident of Utah County asking you to please vote yes for HB 107. As a sociologist myself, I understand more than most seem to admit that research is essential for good legislation. SB 81 has some admirable goals, but unless a community and local economy is able to handle such severe changes it could become just another "Intolerable Act." Please make the decision that will best support the economy.

There is a hope among many that SB 81 will force many illegal immigrants to move out of the state, which would suddenly provide more jobs for others. This may be problematic for the following reasons:

1) Many illegals will stay rather than going; many these illegals who are currently working with no SS#, or with a completely bogus one may choose to actually steal someone's identity, which is currently unnecessary and rarely practiced.

2) The many illegal immigrants who use Tax IDs (free, currently legitimate ID numbers for employment) are currently paying income taxes that support our government funds; sending them away means losing those funds.

3) Illegal immigrants make up a huge and important portion of our consumer economy. If there is an argument that this contributing portion is insignificant, there should be research to back that up, not just hearsay.

4) Forcing many businesses to drop hundreds or thousands of employees does not cause a problem only for the individual businesses in question. It puts a rift in the entire economy. For example, slowing or halting production at a factory creates chaos very quickly at the distributer level. We need better-informed projections of how these business complications could hurt us before we decide if we're ready to make that gamble.

5) Bringing regular police enforcement into the immigrant deportation scene could easily break the local police enforcements' relationship with significant Hispanic communities. If a legal resident family of immigrants gets burglarized they won't contact the police if they distrust them because of how the community feels about them in general. The police force's goal should be to protect the community, legality aside. Over the years I have taught English to hundreds of Hispanic immigrants, legal and illegal, adult and youth--I know from much experience that they tend to band together, support each other and share common attitudes regardless of legal status. Wouldn't it be helpful to know how police departments currently feel about this potential community problem?

6) Some say that ridding an area of it's illegal immigrants will solve it's poverty problems. I contend that it would not. Many people who argue that immigration hurts an area usual fall back on the problems of associated poverty. But poverty just happens. Social scientists recognize that there is always an underclass, no matter how many types of people a society purges themselves of. I think this kind of mythology needs to be researched seriously before any kind of volatile legislation like SB 81 is put in place.