Simi inserts itself into SB 54 debate—twiceFree Access

EDITORIAL

In today’s day and age of heightened sensitivities and social media mobs, it makes sense to choose one’s battles wisely. Our City Council did exactly the opposite when it decided to jump into the Senate Bill 54 debate.

The poor decision-making started in April when the council voted in closed session to submit a letter in support of the Trump administration’s lawsuit against California’s “sanctuary state” law (SB 54). When a group of residents threatened to sue the city for potentially violating the Brown Act with that vote, the council, in the spirit of transparency, held an open meeting on the issue June 25.

For more than five hours at that meeting, people on both sides of the debate shared their views, with many urging city officials to take a neutral stand. But in the end, officials again voted to oppose the sanctuary law.

Let’s be clear: We have some serious concerns about SB 54 and want to see the loophole closed that permits serious offenders—those supposedly exempted from the law’s protections—to post bail before seeing a judge. It was this loophole that allowed a suspected illegal-immigrant sex offender to skip town earlier this year in Moorpark.

But the council’s support of the federal lawsuit isn’t going to bring us any closer to that solution; it’s only going to further divide a city with a complicated past on race relations.

The June 25 meeting also ignited a firestorm of controversy on social media that thrust a Woodland Hills woman and a Simi Valley teenager into the spotlight.

The discord was fueled by a photo taken by another newspaper in which a woman wearing a “Make America Great Again” hat appears to be yelling at a Hispanic boy during a recess of the meeting. Some online viewers vilified the woman and called for a boycott of her business. But in a television news interview, the boy took the high road, saying he and the woman were actually having a “civil” conversation.

He urged people to stop harassing her. Meanwhile, all the attention caused the boy’s parents to be worried for his safety.

Just like the photo that caused the uproar online, immigration is not a black and white issue. Context is everything.

The discussion about SB 54 was an opportunity to teach our youth a lesson in civil discourse, not just at City Hall but online too.

Simi Valley is home to a diverse population representing a wide spectrum of ideologies, ethnicities and cultures. We must not allow the poor judgment of a few to contaminate the civility of the majority.

Going forward, the Simi City Council, for its part, should stick to nonpartisan local issues, such as community policing, land-use and road repairs. And we who live here must not let hostilities that dominate national politics divide us.