Southold Town Board creates Public Safety Task Force after ICE sweep in Greenport
- Nicole Wagner
- Feb 12
- 5 min read
The Southold Town Board unanimously approved a Public Safety Task Force Tuesday following public pressure to address ICE activity in Greenport — including the detention of three longtime North Fork residents on Feb. 4.
The latest sweep by Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents — following recent activity across the East End — spurred Minerva Perez, executive director of OLA of Eastern Long Island, to call for the task force. Her organization has been circulating proposed legislation among East End towns to create task forces on immigration enforcement, establish police department policies around license plate recognition technology and establish local police departments' ability to train and designate officers to investigate incidents of law enforcement impersonations.
"By and large, we’ve got safe and peaceful communities on the East End of Long Island," Ms. Perez said during the two-hour meeting at the Southold Town Recreation Center, which was attended by more than 50 residents, including Greenport Mayor Kevin Stuessi.
"What we’re recognizing with this resolution is that there are times when the safety and the peace is broken. And any town, any village when that’s happening, it’s happening in a repeated sort of way, would want to have a response to that and some sort of plan in place and not just an idea of a plan but a rock solid plan."
Town Supervisor Al Krupski said the group would review any proposed legislation that might affect local public safety. "Just because somebody submitted legislation somewhere else, doesn’t mean it’s going to be consistent with our needs in our community," Mr. Krupski said. "So we need to make sure if someone is proposing something, that it’s going to be helpful."
Councilwoman Jill Doherty, the board’s lone Republican member, did not comment after casting her vote. The new task force will include two Town Board members, two Southold Town Police Department members, a member of the police advisory committee, a member of the town’s Anti-Bias Task Force, a local school district representative, a Greenport village representative and a community member.
The group will examine health, safety and welfare concerns associated with federal immigration policy and review all proposed federal, state and local legislation to advise the Town Board. The group will meet "as needed" in response to ongoing developments in the law.
"We can monitor if a storm is coming or not but [ICE activity] is unpredictable," Councilwoman Anne Smith said. "And I don’t know exactly what that looks like, but I think it should be one of their tasks."
Town Council members positioned the task force as a vehicle for emergency preparedness and accountability when ICE operations occur in Southold. Ms. Smith noted that a group had previously been created from the Anti-Bias Task Force following ICE activity in August but the team "didn’t really keep going."
"We knew there was a draft coming with the intention of providing some starting place for the feeling of sort of helplessness that the community feels," Ms. Smith said.
Ms. Perez acknowledged local municipalities cannot stop ICE itself, but said they have the power to take accountability and responsibility for public safety in these situations. The purpose of the proposed legislation is to install an "emergency preparedness" plan if another ICE raid happens on the North Fork. She is sharing the legislation with other East End towns for them to consider what they want to adopt to ensure accountability and public safety. Southold was the first town OLA met with, starting last Friday.
She differentiated between targeted ICE actions and random raids, which she said are done to cause fear and chaos and are "breaking the back of our community."
On Feb. 4, ICE agents detained a masonry worker waiting in line for the Shelter Island ferry. Two others were taken into custody at undisclosed locations in Greenport. Federal officials and OLA identified them as Hugo Leonel Ardon Osorio, Alexandro Rivera Magana and Martir Zambrano Diaz.
Mayor Stuessi called on the Town Board to implement emergency provisions for public safety and commit a police officer to be stationed in the village. Greenport is policed by Southold Town Police.
"A hundred people that are going to go to sleep tonight on Fishers Island tonight have two police officers," Mr. Stuessi said. "The 2,000 souls in Greenport who are going to sleep tonight have half a police officer. We need coverage and we need them as a part of the community and we need them deployed when these incidents are happening as fast as possible."
Southold Town Police Chief Steven Grattan told The Suffolk Times the department typically has an officer assigned to Greenport Village when there are five officers on duty. When there are only four officers on duty, Chief Grattan said, an officer is responsible for greater Greenport and the area eastward. In the summer, he said, an additional seasonal police officer will be assigned to the Greenport Village area. The seasonal officer starts two weeks before Memorial Day and ends the season two weeks after Labor Day.
Southold currently has 54 police officers on staff and is looking to hire two new full-time officers, as the department is budgeted for 56 officers.
Councilwoman Alexa Suess, a lifelong Greenport resident, acknowledged that there is no "simple, quick fix" from a legal, procedural perspective. She said she was "disgusted" by immigration enforcement activities and called them "unacceptable."
Ms. Suess said the task force would aim to address the immediate needs of the community while developing a long-term course of legislative action.
"It’s a step forward. A small one," Ms. Suess said. "Know that I understand your anger and your pain because I feel it too. And I am listening."
Her fury was echoed by many of those in attendance. Eighteen people addressed the board, all expressing frustration with ICE activity. While some supported the town’s new task force, most argued it didn’t go far enough to ensure public safety. No one in attendance opposed its creation.
"What we need is a resolution that commits the police to active protection of the public in the face of threats to their safety by ICE and related agencies," Greenport resident Dinni Gordon said.
Carolyn Peabody, an Orient resident, acknowledged the difficulty local municipalities across the country have holding ICE agents accountable for any infractions. She suggested that the Town Board instruct the police to respond to any ICE activity in the town and verify their credentials and surveil their actions.
"We do not have the jurisdiction to interfere in federal actions of this sort, but we can document them," Ms. Peabody said. "And we have the right and the responsibility as a town to document unconstitutional behavior by federal agents. If we don’t do that, how the bloody hell are we defending and protecting our community by the Constitution?"
Abigail Field of Cutchogue, who lost the race for Town Clerk last November, decried ICE
activity and federal agents' actions in other jurisdictions " wearing masks, failing to display
badges and name tags, swapping license plates, driving unmarked vehicles and generally
trying to conceal their identity" which she said gives others the ability to impersonate
federal agents.
"It is incredibly important when the state gives people guns, it gives them badges and those badges are visible," Ms. Field said. "We are not worried about lawful immigration enforcement. We are worried about gangs of people — and they are gangs because they're masked and they're not showing badges — putting us all at risk."
Just a week before the ICE activity in Greenport, dozens of community members packed
Southold Town Hall to urge the Town Board to take a stronger stance on ICE activity
following the shooting deaths of Renee Nicole Good and Alex Pretti in Minneapolis.
A Change.org petition started by Greenport resident Seth Egan urging the Town Board to condemn ICE and commit to the enforcement of due process violations and constitutional rights of all community members has garnered more than 1,200 signatures.
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