Show your support as Pima County Board votes to stop receiving funds from Border Patrol's Operation Stonegarden

On February 6th, the Pima County Board of supervisors voted to stop receiving funds from Border Patrol's Operation Stonegarden.

Here is the background on Operation Stonegarden:

*Provides about $1.4 million in federal money to Pima County Sheriff's Department

*Most of that money is used for overtime compensation to Sheriff deputies. While deputies are earning that overtime, they must be in service to Border Patrol

*During those overtime hours, they are essentially beholden to Border Patrol – BP tells them where to be positioned, where to patrol, etc. Most often, they are paired up with a Border Patrol partner and ride in tandem

*Stonegarden leads to racial profiling, because it incentivizes the BP/Sheriff teams to target Hispanic drivers on the road and then pull them over for speeding 5 miles over, out tail light, broken side mirror, etc. In other words, pulling them over for things that deputies would never bother with under normal circumstances.

*Stonegarden increases criminalization of nonviolent, victimless crimes such as small marijuana possession. In fact, internal Sheriff records reveal that the vast majority of arrests coming from 

Stonegarden are for misdemeanors. Stonegarden largely does not involve busting major drug cartels, human traffickers, etc.

*Among other things, we believe that Stonegarden money was behind the Pima Sheriff/Border Patrol collaboration resulting in Scott Warren’s arrest in Ajo (the No More Deaths volunteer who was arrested in January for giving food/water/blankets to migrants). In other words, Stonegarden is directly implicated in criminalizing humanitarian aid efforts

*If we can prevail on this campaign in Pima County, it holds the potential to have a ripple effect to other counties along the border. This would make Pima the largest county in the country to reject this category of federal grant money.

We know that our Board of Supervisors listen to our Pima County community. I am asking you, with your passion for the equitable treatment of migrants to support the decision the Supervisors made and to convince them to maintain their vote.

Please take some time out of your day to write to these Board of Supervisors thanking them for voting no and asking that they do not change their vote.

Here is the contact information for the supervisors who voted to end Operation Stonegarden. You can call or use the web form to send a message.

Ramón Valadez, District 2
https://webcms.pima.gov/cms/One.aspx?portalId=169&pageId=28203
(520) 724-8126

Sharon Bronson, District 3
http://webcms.pima.gov/cms/One.aspx?portalId=169&pageId=8132
(520) 724-8051

Richard Elías, District 5
https://webcms.pima.gov/cms/One.aspx?portalId=169&pageId=28194
(520) 724-8126

Thank you so much for your time and may we stand in solidarity with our immigrant brothers and sisters.

Sincerely,
Ella Rawls, JD
Staff Attorney
Arizona Justice For Our Neighbors