“In 2006, ICE (Immigration and Customs Enforcement) hit Marshalltown, Iowa, Postville, 2008, 2009, 2010 Quad Cities. Let’s be prepared to answer the call,” Nora Dvorak said as she introduced Sister Jane McCarthy of the Sisters of St. Francis in Clinton, Iowa as the guest speaker in a summit on immigration at Our Lady of Lourdes Catholic Church in Bettendorf on Monday, June 30.
Sister McCarthy shared to the audience of civil rights advocates, media, and clergy what her twelve days in Postville were like. “400 adults and children fled, some have a GPS (global positioning system) monitoring bracelet before their court dates. The Guatemalan consulate has helped a lot, while the Mexican Consulate is not. With the floods in Iowa, three county jails had to evacuate. We don’t know where they are,” she said.
“What did this accomplish? Devastation, great cost of at least $10,000 per person arrested, transportation costs. The school has a loss of students, they had around 400, and thus next year they’ll have fewer teachers. This did nothing for comprehensive immigration reform which is needed. These abuses need to cease,” Sister McCarthy said.
As Nora Dvorak of Quad City Interfaith put it, everyone who attended brought their thinking caps. Dvorak mentioned Postville and how it used to be relatively obscure. “Before May, 12, 2008, Postville was a small dot on the map. Since that day, Postville has been known for the size of the raid and the way it was carried out,” Dvorak said.
For lunch, attendees were separated into two groups: immediate needs and advocacy work. Immediate needs focused on strategies while the advocacy work focused on who would help and how when an ICE raid would hit in the Quad Cities.