UPDATE 1/15/2025 3:45 P.M. — A group of common council members and advocates say they’ve been left out of the discussion for the relocation of an ICE facility on Milwaukee’s northwest side.
Milwaukee’s Immigration and Customs Enforcement office plans to move from its downtown location on Knapp St. and Broadway to Lake Park Dr. in District 9. Plans for the move have been in the works since as early as April 2023, when its downtown location was sold to the Milwaukee School of Engineering.
Alderwoman Laressa Taylor clarified during a press conference Wednesday, “that office intends to move to this facility and operate exactly as they operated, at least that is the word they have given.”
A protest joined the press conference outside the proposed Lake Park Dr. location, constituents sharing grievances over a lack of opportunity for community members to be involved in the decision.
“A facility is moving into the district without giving residents of the district any time to evaluate, to discuss, or to have any type of community organizing to discuss whether or not that facility is welcomed here,” Taylor said.
A zoning modification proposal from 2023 says the facility would be used to “process non-detained report-ins and detainees for transport to holding facilities.”
But many expressed concern that the facility move would lead to other operations, like detention. For example, the zoning proposal from 2023 calls for an 8-foot-tall privacy fence and a secure entryway called a sally port.
“I am firmly opposed to an expansion of ICE-type detention services in the City of Milwaukee,” Alderman Jose Perez said.
The only detention center in Wisconsin is the Dodge County Detention Facility in Juneau.
Alderwoman Taylor said council members have plans to meet with the owner of the proposed building site. The Department of Homeland Security has not provided a timeline for the move.
MILWAUKEE – A Milwaukee alderwoman is expressing her concerns over a proposed U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement detention facility that has been proposed for the city’s northwest side.
Alderwoman Laressa Taylor says her office received a request, through a third party, to support ICE as it plans to move into the 9th District. The agency has requested support for modifications to a building located at 11925 W. Lake Park Dr. Those modifications include adding a sally port and a chain link fence with privacy slats. The sally port would be used to transport prisoners to and from the facility.
“I want District 9, and the rest of the city, to know that we do not support the Department of Homeland Security in their decision to move into our district, and we definitely do not support any such modifications to any building in our district (as a location to house prisoners!).” said Alderwoman Taylor Tuesday.
ICE has not made a public statement about plans for the facility.
The Alderwoman will hold a press conference outside of the proposed facility Wednesday at 1:00pm.
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