Watsonville passes sanctuary city ordinance

“Before November, we were seeing about 200, 300 people per month. (In) February, we reached more than 1,000 people came through our door,” said Maria Elena De La Garcia with Santa Cruz County’s
Community Action Board (CAB).

CAB is an organization that provides legal and social services to immigrants. Garcia said the uptick in office visits is a reflection of how anxious people are.

“The fear that someone might be picked up at work, someone might be picked up at school, and what happens when you go home and mom or dad isn’t there any more, right? That’s real fear,” Garcia said.

At Tuesday night’s City Council meeting, Garcia and others told Watsonville leaders that protecting undocumented immigrants who haven’t broken the law is the right thing to do.

“They are not illegal, there is no such person on earth that’s illegal, they may not be properly documented in this country,” one resident said during public comment. “I’m very hopeful the council will unanimously agree with me that we must do this.’

With a unanimous vote, the city made a stronger commitment to ensuring that the undocumented community won’t be targeted locally.

“I want to make sure that our folks, wherever they are at, feel that they can walk the streets, they can go to work, the kids can go to school,” mayor Oscar Rios said.

The new ordinance will go into effect in 30 days.