ALLENTOWN, Pa. — Lawmakers are weighing a measure to ensure Allentown is a “welcoming” city for immigrants ahead of the incoming administration.
Allentown City Council on Wednesday introduced a bill that, if approved, would seek to protect immigrant residents by blocking city employees from sharing their immigration status with or helping federal officials, unless required by federal law.
The bill also would codify other pro-immigrant practices and require the city to maintain a high score from Welcoming America, a nonprofit that says it’s “leading a movement of inclusive communities.”
It appears it would function similarly to sanctuary city policies that were targeted by federal officials during Trump’s first administration.
Bill 4 is “an opportunity for this board to be proactive, to get ahead of issues that are likely going to be coming down the pike given the rhetoric and the plans of the incoming presidential administration."Lehigh County Commissioner Jon Irons
Almost a quarter of Allentown’s population is foreign-born and more than half the city’s residents speak a language other than English at home, according to statistics provided Wednesday by supporters of the bill.
Allentown students are from 43 countries and speak more than two dozen languages, their demographic data shows.
‘An opportunity to be proactive’
Lehigh County Commissioner Jon Irons urged Allentown lawmakers not to wait for residents to be harmed to pass protections for immigrant residents.
Local officials “wait until there’s [legal] cases, we wait til there’s pain, we wait til there’s complaints, and we wait until the room is full of people asking for desperate changes,” Irons said.
Bill 4 is “an opportunity for this board to be proactive, to get ahead of issues that are likely going to be coming down the pike given the rhetoric and the plans of the incoming presidential administration,” Irons said.
Irons was born in Ecuador and moved to the U.S. when he was an infant. He said the ordinance would give immigrants “a sense of security.”
“The city should do everything it can to protect [resident's personal] information from possibly being leaked."Lehigh County Commissioner Jon Irons
He called on Allentown City Council to “get ahead of complaints and pain and potential liability” by making structural changes to how the city stores and secures its data.
Municipal governments hold “very, very important” and sensitive information on residents, including their immigration status and gender identity — and are “vulnerable” to hacking, Irons said.
“The city should do everything it can to protect that information from possibly being leaked,” he said Wednesday.
