Proposal to cut alien benefits gets go-ahead
Posted on Thursday, May 8, 2008
Backers of a proposed initiative aimed at cutting state benefits to illegal aliens are in a hurry to round up thousands of petition signatures after Attorney General Dustin McDaniel approved the proposal’s ballot wording Wednesday.
“I’m looking forward to gathering signatures. I can’t wait,” Jeannie Burlsworth of Bryant said. “This is not going to be an uphill climb.” Burlsworth is chairman of Secure Arkansas, a small group of volunteers that she said is gathering strength statewide as people hear about its goal to require proof of legal residency for receipt of many public services.
McDaniel approved the popular name and offered his own suggested version of a ballot title for the proposed initiated act. His approval, on the group’s third try, is not an endorsement of the measure. But it clears the way for Secure Arkansas to circulate its petition.
The group has until July 7 to turn in at least 61, 974 Arkansas registered voters’ signatures to qualify the proposed measure for the Nov. 4 ballot. Other groups working on ballot proposals, such as one to establish a state lottery and another to restrict adoption and foster care eligibility, have had McDaniel’s approval since last year.
Burlsworth said she’s not worried about the time, in part because she has “many” county campaign directors lined up who will help organize volunteers to circulate the petitions. She didn’t know how many.
“We’ve been working day and night,” she said.
The proposal would be called “An act to prevent persons unlawfully present in the United States from receiving certain public benefits.” It would require state and local governments in Arkansas to verify citizenship or legal residency of most people applying for public benefits. Each applicant would be required to fill out an affidavit saying he’s either a U. S. citizen or a “qualified alien,” a federal term that applies to legal permanent residents, among other aliens.
The government agencies would be required to ensure that recipients are eligible through the federal Systematic Alien Verification For Entitlements program.
BUSINESS LICENSE A business license is among the things being considered as a public benefit under the proposal. The proposed act would not require evidence of legal status to receive emergency health care, immunizations, treatment or testing for communicable diseases and prenatal care, among other things. It wouldn’t affect what officials have said is the biggest state expense involving illegal aliens: public education. That’s federally required. Arkansas reported spending about $ 154 million in the 2006-07 school year teaching children who are learning English, though the state doesn’t have information on what portion of that is for students who are illegal aliens.
A study released last year by the Urban Institute, funded by Arkansas’ Winthrop Rockefeller Foundation, reported that aliens and their children have a small but positive net fiscal impact on the state budget. The study found that the state spent $ 237 million in 2004 on education, health services and prison services for aliens but took in $ 257 million in tax revenue from the same population.
PROCEDURE CHANGES One state agency that would have to change its procedures if the proposal passes is the Arkansas Department of Health. The department doesn’t require any identification or proof of legal residency for receipt of services. Opponents are preparing to campaign against the proposal, if necessary, though they’ll wait to see how the signature-gathering goes. The Rev. Steve Copley, chairman of the Arkansas Friendship Coalition, said he’s hoping there’s not enough time for Secure Arkansas to get the signatures. “That’s a lot of names to get in two months,” Copley said. He said the proposal would unfairly penalize the state’s legal alien community. There are a number of legal aliens, such as people in the U. S. on work visas or student visas, who wouldn’t have the documentation required to receive services that might be necessary, he said.
The proposed act states that its provisions would be administered without regard to race or ethnicity, but Copley said he doesn’t believe it.
“How do you administer this in a way that isn’t discriminatory ?” he asked. “You end up targeting everyone who is Hispanic.” The Friendship Coalition includes clergy members, the Arkansas chapter of the American Civil Liberties Union and some of the state’s biggest businesses, including Tyson Foods Inc., Alltel Corp. and Stephens Inc. The group formed last year to lobby and campaign against “punitive” state and local laws that its members say target aliens regardless of legal status.
State Rep. Jon Woods, RSpringdale, who tried and failed to get legislation through the Arkansas Legislature last year that he thought would help curb illegal immigration, said he’s going to help Secure Arkansas in any way he can.
Woods called “brilliant” one aspect of the legislation that would require a person registering a vehicle to present a valid Arkansas driver’s license or state identification card.
“I never thought of that as a state benefit, but it is,” Woods said. “It’s a vehicle safety issue. We’re going to make our roads safer.” Gov. Mike Beebe didn’t say Wednesday whether he’s for or against the proposal because he said he hasn’t fully read it. “What I have said, though, is that preliminary drafts we’ve seen, the previous ones that were submitted, contained a lot of provisions that are already state or federal law or in federal regulations. So to some extent it would be a re-codification, if you will, of what’s already there, so we’re going to compare all that and see,” he said. “I’ve never been one to say the people don’t have a right to vote.” ORGANIZATION LEADER Burlsworth spent most of Wednesday hanging around the state Capitol, in part to call attention to and question the fact that Mexican government officials were meeting there with Arkansas officials to discuss Englishlanguage education.
She said Secure Arkansas is a small, grass-roots organization but that other like-minded people have been signing on to help since they’ve heard about it. Lawyers have written the proposal and worked with McDaniel to change its wording, though Burlsworth said the attorneys have asked her not to reveal their identities to the media.
Burlsworth, 53, is a grandmother and homemaker who said she only recently started thinking seriously about what the state might do to curb illegal immigration.
“The more I read, the more chilled I got. I’m like, ‘ Wow, we have no protection, ’” she said. “If we could just limit public benefits [from going ] to illegal aliens, we would really keep Arkansas from becoming a sanctuary.” She said she and her husband, Grady, moved to Bryant in 2004 from Rogers, where they operated an insurance business for many years. Her husband is the uncle of the late Brandon Burlsworth, the All-American Razorback football player who died in a car accident in 1999. Information for this article was contributed by Seth Blomeley of the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette.
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