Policy

A Cambridge law now encourages police to issue summonses to, not arrest, unlicensed drivers

The policy comes as part of the city's "Welcoming Community Ordinance."

Pat Greenhouse/Globe Staff, file

February 20, 2020

3 minutes to read

A recently passed law in Cambridge is encouraging police officers to dole out a summons for those caught driving without a license — instead of handcuffs.

The measure is one part of the “Welcoming Community Ordinance” passed by the City Council last week that codifies how the so-called sanctuary city’s departments should interact with federal immigration enforcement agencies.

Specifically, the ordinance bars Cambridge police from taking on investigations based solely on a person’s actual or perceived immigration status; city employees from inquiring about an individual’s immigration status; and authorities from detaining an individual based only on an Immigration and Customs Enforcement, ICE, detainer or administrative warrant, among other provisions.

The ordinance, however, still allows for police to work with federal authorities on human trafficking cases.

The law essentially puts many existing local police polices into municipal code, Wicked Local Cambridge reports.

The ordinance also asks police to, “whenever possible in the officer’s discretion,” issue a summons to appear in court when they encounter a driver without a valid license, instead of taking him or her into custody. The measure is allowed under the condition there are no other violations that would warrant an arrest.

The policy adds another protection for undocumented immigrants in the city.

Councilor Quinton Zondervan told Wicked Local arrests require police to collect fingerprints, which, in turn, become ICE-accessible records.

“If ICE is searching for this person they now have a record of that person having been arrested and can identify them through their fingerprints,” he said. “If this person is served a court summons, that’s much more benign and doesn’t put them so easily on ICE’s radar so to speak.”

Between 2017 and 2019, city police issued 278 unlicensed operation of a motor vehicle charges, Wicked Local reports. Of those incidents, the vast majority of alleged violators received summons, or 201 of those cases, and 77 arrests were made, Deputy Superintendent Rick Riley told the news outlet. In incidents involving arrests, those cases likely involved other charges as well, he added.

Additionally, under the provision, authorities acting in those situations are now directed to give the driver a reasonable opportunity “to arrange for a properly licensed operator to drive the vehicle before seeking to impound the vehicle, unless the violation is one subject to a statutory or regulatory requirement of vehicle impoundment.”

“We need to protect our community members from a federal government that’s out of control,” Zondervan told Boston 25 News. “(If) there are no other reasons for the police to arrest someone, give them a court summons instead, which keeps them out of the clutches of the Trump administration.”

The council voted to pass the ordinance, 8-0, on Feb. 10, with Zondervan voting “present.”

The vote came after Zondervan expressed concerns over amendment language regarding the inclusion of a reference to a federal law that states state and local laws cannot prohibit communication with federal immigration agencies.

“I’m objecting to that because it gives our police cover to say, ‘Well we had to share this information with the federal government because that’s federal law,’” Zondervan said, Wicked Local reports.

“Our federal government right now, their official policy is to throw people in cages and abuse and torture them, in some cases letting them die,” he added. “So I do not want any cooperation with that federal government policy in our law.”

Zondervan motioned to have the ordinance go back to committee for further review, but other councilors shot it down.

City Solicitor Nancy Glowa told councilors the wording was put in place to match what was included in a similar law passed in Amherst that was later approved by the state attorney general’s office.

While similar ordinances have been deemed unconstitutional in some courts, there are no “decisions that are binding precedent in Massachusetts or in the First Circuit,” Glowa wrote in a memo to the council.

Technically, federal law bans state and local officials from prohibiting communication between agencies, but it does not require local departments to communicate with federal counterparts, either, said police Commissioner Branville Bard Jr.

“We don’t collect information, you know, pertaining to immigration status,” Bard added. “So we wouldn’t have that information to share anyway.”

Officials said the changes received support from local police and the American Civil Liberties Union.

The ordinance comes just as state lawmakers are considering a bill that would allow undocumented immigrants to obtain driver’s licenses — a proposal that has garnered support from police chiefs and was backed by the Joint Committee on Transportation earlier this month.