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Brooklyn Park moves to codify employee limits on immigration enforcement and expands community outreach
Summary
City staff recommended a Council resolution and department-level policies to limit city employee inquiries into immigration status; police and fire will finalize department language, communications will distribute multilingual FAQs and staff proposed public events Feb. 19 and March 20.
Brooklyn Park’s City Council on Feb. 3 directed staff to prepare a public resolution and refine department policies that limit when city employees may inquire into a person’s immigration status.
City Manager Jay Stroebel told the Council he would bring a high-level update at the next regular meeting and return a proposed resolution within two weeks. HR Director Kraabel said staff had reviewed 20-year-old “separation” ordinances from Minneapolis and St. Paul and found no equivalent citywide policy in Brooklyn Park; she advised the Council to decide whether the city should continue collecting and retaining I-9 documentation or purge images after verification.
City Attorney Thomson said disciplinary authority could be enforced through policy, but a resolution would put the Council’s position on the public record; he explained that an ordinance would require two readings and publication and is typically reserved for matters that create a new criminal or enforcement regime.
Police Chief Mark Bruley provided a revised departmental policy (4.13) and told the Council the police would not use department operations “for the sole purpose of enforcing federal immigration laws.” He said, “The Brooklyn Park Police Department employees shall not initiate actions to determine, verify, or detect a person’s immigration status, including but not limited to questioning any person about their immigration status except as listed” for narrow criminal-investigation contexts. Bruley said the change aims to make expectations clear to officers and to the public so immigrant community members feel safe reporting crime.
Fire Chief Conway said the fire department’s policy already excludes asking about immigration status during emergency response and added a provision that responders “shall not request information pertaining to a patient’s immigration status.”
Communications Manager Risikat Adesaogun described a city communications push that included a GovDelivery news release to roughly 15,000 subscribers, translated FAQs in Spanish, Hmong, Vietnamese and Somali, updates to an online community-resources tool and targeted outreach to cultural media outlets. Assistant City Manager Dr. Angel Smith and REDI Manager Marcellus Davis said staff are scheduling community-led, multilingual engagement events — proposed Feb. 19 (Human Rights Commission) and March 20 — and are coordinating with local schools, colleges and community partners on door-knocking, multilingual flyers and virtual sessions.
Council members asked for two parallel tracks: a near-term, public-facing resolution that signals the Council’s position and department-level operational reviews to identify where employees collect or retain immigration-related documents and whether those practices should change. Mayor Hollies Winston said he favored a resolution as a public statement while departments complete deeper process reviews.
Next steps: staff will return a high-level update at the council meeting next Monday and present a draft resolution and recommended department policy language within two weeks for Council consideration.
