Bexar County has been detaining undocumented immigrants for the past 12 years at the request of the federal government. However, local taxpayers have been footing most of the bill.
Bexar County Judge Nelson Wolff says that with all the rhetoric that’s going on around the nation from the President on down to the Governor over so-called 'sanctuary cities,' we don't know how far this thing is going to go and how much burden is going to be put on us.
“When the program started they gave us $547,000 a year,” said Wolff. “That’s now gone down to about 90,000, 90 some odd thousand, 80 percent drop in what they’re reimbursing. And so the cost just continued to get higher and higher to local taxpayers.”
He says that cost is some $22 million in additional spending at the local level. He sent letters this week to the Justice Department and Immigration and Customs Enforcement. He wrote that Bexar County is willing to comply with federal immigration laws, but this has created a large burden on local taxpayers that should be paid by the federal government.
