The Immigrations and Customs Enforcement detention facility in Glenwood Springs has been violating its permits by holding people for more than 12 hours. The Garfield County Planning and Zoning is holding a special public meeting that could end in ICE’s special use permit being revoked. KDNK’s Lily Jones spoke with a local lawyer and human rights advocate Emma Ross, to clear up what’s happening.
For over 20 years, 100 Midland Avenue, Suite 210 in Glenwood Springs has held an Immigration and Customs Enforcement short-term detention facility. Earlier this year a Freedom of Information Act request by the city of Glenwood Springs indicated that the facility was violating the terms of its special use permit by holding people for longer than 12 hours at a time. Emma Ross M.D. is a local trial lawyer. Her work does not involve land use. But in a recent call with KDNK, she details exactly why this is a problem.
"ICE is operating this facility in a building that is zoned for general commercial use. And general commercial use is like a fitness center or a retail store. Places where people can go in and come out as they please. Detention is not the same as that kind of business use."
The permanent certificate of occupancy, which should have been filed in 2004, was apparently never issued.
"So before they could start operating a detention facility in this building ICE had to get a permit from Glenwood Springs, and the people who issue those permits in Glenwood Springs are the planning and zoning committee. Back in 2003 when ICE applied for what's called a special use permit to operate a detention facility in 100 Midland Avenue, they made a bunch of representations about what they would and would not be doing there, and those were the conditions under which the special use permit was actually granted. One of those conditions was people will be held for no more than 12 hours."
The city's Freedom of Information Act request indicates that critical term has been violated. Garfield County Planning and Zoning is holding a meeting to confirm or refute this and possibly revoke the special use permit altogether. This apparent violation is by no means an outlier. A March report by the Colorado Times Recorder reveals that ICE has been holding people for much longer than legally allowed all across the state. The agency's own rules state an individual cannot be in a hold room for over 72 hours, but in one case, an individual was detained for 39 days.
"Now that's not the only issue with the way that ICE is operating that facility or with whether correcting that one thing would then make it safe."
Fire and medical safety are also key concerns. Without the proper permits, there is no system of accountability and no guarantee of safety for the individuals being detained.
"One of the issues with this facility at a hundred Midland Avenue is that it has never been inspected for, much less passed, a fire inspection of the kind that would be needed for a building where people are being held in restraints, and the doors are locked."
The ICE facility has been under increased scrutiny over the past year as protestors affiliated with the pro-democracy group Mountain Action Indivisible have continually drawn attention to the inconspicuous little building. Although ICE is a divisive national topic, Ross believes that this is a non-partisan issue.
"If a private company or a local agency or a federal agency exceeds the scope of its permits in a way that's not safe, the city has both the right and the obligation to address that."
Garfield County Planning and Zoning is holding a public hearing on the 28th to decide whether the temporary permit of occupancy should be withdrawn and the detention facility shuttered. But Ross says it's important to understand the limits of the commission's authority.
"They could still operate their business use, right? Like their field office piece out of that building where people come for check-ins and things. I think planning and zoning in that sense can say, you don't get to operate a detention center here. I don't think they can say, you don't get to operate like any other business would in this building."
The federal government also has recourse if the meeting doesn't go well for them.
"So their first opportunity is to show up on Tuesday and actually talk in a public forum. Regardless of that, their next thing is, say, planning and zoning revokes the special use permit. They could first appeal to the Glenwood Springs City Council. If the city council signs against them ICE could challenge the decision to revoke their special use permit in court. A couple of arguments that I can certainly see ICE making would be, one, the decision to revoke their permit was arbitrary, or it was not supported by the record, which I think is part of the reason that it's important that we go through all of this process and that everybody has a chance to speak and weigh in on it. And the other argument that I can see them making is that federal law limits how local government can regulate federal operations."
The meeting on Tuesday, which is open to all, is at 6:00 PM on the first floor of the Garfield County Administration building in Glenwood Springs.
