Days after one of Palm Beach County's most immigrant-filled cities signed a policing deal over the objections of ICE critics, the issue of how to deal with detentions — and the fear of them — came up again in Lake Worth Beach's search for a new city manager.
The City Commission voted 3-1 on Sept. 2 to increase payments by $500,000 annually for three years to the police agency it contracts with, the Palm Beach County Sheriff's Office, to hire park rangers. Advocates for immigrants and their U.S.-born families demanded the city reject the deal because PBSO works with U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement. The city will spend more than $15.8 million annually.
Two of the four finalists for the city manager position discussed during a Sept. 9 commission
meeting the fear from residents worrying that law enforcement will detain them and turn them over to ICE, regardless of whether they have broken the law.
About 41% of the city's nearly 44,000 residents come from another country, and 57% do not speak English at home, U.S. Census Bureau estimates show.
Resident called ICE fears 'crisis' in Lake Worth's immigrant neighborhoods
Lake Worth Beach has searched since April for a new city manager. The position carries a salary of up to $345,000, potentially making the person hired one of the county's highest-paid city managers.
One candidate who talked about immigration on Sept. 9 was Chris Rodriguez, an assistant city administrator for Washington, D.C. His résumé includes 10 years as an analyst for the CIA, which he said he was motivated to join because of the 9/11 terrorist attacks.
The other was Stan Morris, city manager of Sunny Isles Beach, whose career includes code enforcement and building division work for Broward County's government and cities in that county such as Tamarac and Southwest Ranches.
Lake Worth Beach resident Laura Devlin asked each man how he as city manager would deal with what she called the crisis in the city's immigrant communities, where families are separated due to ICE either detaining or deporting parents, and where some children have stopped attending school out of fear of either themselves or their parents being taken.
In Washington, Rodriguez said, the city government has helped to find free legal representation for residents targeted by ICE. He said he would work with commissioners to figure out what help Lake Worth Beach can provide to concerned residents.
"We do not want families separated. We do not want people scared to go to school — I've experienced that in my community, in the District," Rodriguez said, "But we also have to make sure we are being truthful and real with people. ... Once we understand what the community needs, then we can see what is possible."
Commissioner Chris McVoy, the lone "no" vote on the PBSO contract, pointed out that federal government has ramped up its denials of asylum cases. "Legal help is not going to do any good," he said.
And responding to Rodriguez's comment on doing what is possible to help immigrant residents, McVoy said "the federal government is regularly doing things they know they can't do, and they're doing them anyway. ... We need much stronger pushback that says we need to do something that actually is useful."
PBSO works with ICE under DeSantis' order, federal immigration law
Morris, who said he has a Hispanic wife and eight children with her, responded to Devlin's question by saying, "My role as a manager is I am required to follow the federal government. ... But also, I'm subject to you all (the City Commission) as policymakers, so I think between those, we work together and figure this out, understanding there are strong feelings on both sides."
Immigration-related questions were not asked Sept. 9 of the other two candidates: Rob Hillard, former city manager of Charlotte, Michigan, and Jonathan Lynn, former city manager of Winder, Georgia.
Lake Worth Beach city commissioners will soon vote on which candidate they want for the city's top executive job, with a salary range of $285,000 to $345,000. The upper limit would be higher than municipal executives' pay at bigger Palm Beach County cities such as West Palm Beach and Boca Raton.
The Sheriff's Office works with ICE through Section 287(g) of the federal Immigration and Nationality Act, which allows ICE to deputize state and local law-enforcement agencies. Gov. Ron DeSantis required Florida law-enforcement agencies to comply in 2025.
Nine of the deputies assigned to Lake Worth Beach are deputized under the federal law, interim city manager Troy Perry told McVoy in an email on Aug. 19.
Sheriff's Capt. Terrence Carn has said deputies do not conduct immigration sweeps of in schools, workplaces or churches. But the agency played a role in a countywide federal immigration sweep in July that arrested 309 people, including the owner of El Quetzal bakery in Lake Worth Beach, Jacob Zapeta-Castro.
Chris Persaud is a staff writer at the Palm Beach Post. Email news tips and information to Chris Persaud at cpersaud@pbpost.com.
This article originally appeared on Palm Beach Post: ICE fears arise as 2 Lake Worth city manager candidates interviewed
