HB1570

I support HB 1570 because it appropriately places decisions about participation in federal immigration enforcement agreements where they belong: with local, elected budget authorities accountable to taxpayers. These agreements can carry real financial, staffing, and opportunity costs for municipalities, and HB 1570 ensures transparency, public notice, and fiscal oversight before local resources are committed. The bill does not prohibit cooperation with federal authorities; it simply ensures that such cooperation is deliberate, informed, and subject to local control. That balance respects both responsible governance and community trust.

To Chairman Roy and the Members of the House Committee on Criminal Justice and Public Safety, My name is Carleigh Beriont, and I am a resident of Hampton. I strongly support House Bill 1570, which establishes an important mechanism for fiscal oversight and local accountability when law enforcement agencies are considering entering into federal immigration enforcement partnerships. By requiring approval and continued review from the governmental budget authority, this legislation ensures that the significant costs and potential impacts on local resources are thoroughly examined and debated by the officials directly accountable to the community. This transparency is crucial, as participation in programs like Section 287(g) can have far-reaching financial, operational, and social implications for local jurisdictions. HB 1570 empowers local residents and their representatives, giving us a direct voice in decisions that affect our safety, budget priorities, and reflect our values as a community. The provisions for cost reporting, public notification, and the ability for local authorities to terminate these agreements if they become too burdensome protect municipalities from unfunded mandates and ensure that local law enforcement remains focused on the needs of our communities. HB 1570 models New Hampshire’s tradition of local control, fiscal responsibility, and government accountability, and I urge its passage. Thank you.

NH should be spending it's money on the people in NH not on Federal programs like ICE that have a budget of their own. We should have transparency on how much money supporting ICE and federal agents is costing us, We already support them through state taxes. Towns and cities do not need to be spending more on them

Please pass this bill to limit law enforcement's involvement with ICE activity. ICE's actions are deeply disturbing to me as someone who believes in the humanity of each person, which demands treating others with respect. ICE is intimidating our neighbors and is terrifying to all including citizens exercising their rights.

No taxation or use of taxpayer money without representation!

I support this bill. Because I believe we need local budgetary authority!

I support this bill which will help control local and State budgets.

It seems rather foolish to repeal the business entrprise tax when the state faces fiscal challenges. This will increase financial pressure on property poor towns.

Local citizens should have a say on whether their money is spent on federally responsible law enforcement.

I am outraged that any public servant whose salary is paid by local taxes ( by me, my family, my townspeople) could agree to use our money to work for or with ICE without our consent. And we do not consent to our tax money funding the brutal and bogus ICE operations we are witnessing in New Hampshire and around the country. This agency has stopped protecting us and is just now harming us. And it is a disgrace to its original intent.

I want more transparency in all law enforcement engaged in immigration. Border patrol, ICE, DHS, and all law enforcement need to be held to account for their actions.

I support this bill: Requires local budgetary authority before a law enforcement agency enters into an agreement with ICE.

This bill is consistent with the philosophy of local control, a core principle of New Hampshire law.

I support this bill which requires local budgetary authority before a law enforcement agency enters into an agreement with the federal Immigration and Customs Enforcement to assist in the enforcement of federal immigration law, grants the budgetary authority continuing power to terminate the agreement, and provides for a penalty for failure to comply. It's important that local authority is granted.

State law enforcement should not participate with ICE under its current leadership. ICE is racially profiling, violating people's rights, and even murdering people.

DEFUND ICE and have sheriff's report how much they have to spend when they mobilize their departments to help them.

Do not let ice come here and attack the citizens and non citizens who just want to have a better life. They arent trained, they dont know the laws, and a majority of them have no respect for the citizens they are supposed to be protecting.

The property tax dollars I pay for services locally should be focused ONLY on services serving the local population. I do not consider aiding ICE a service that serves the local population. These agreements that many state and local police have entered into with ICE do nothing to help me or my neighbors and take time away from our local law enforcement's regular responsibilities. Further, given the lack of restraint, minimal training, and example after example of dangerous behavior on the part of many ICE officers we've been observing over the last few months, it only makes sense for the power of the purse be returned to our local officials. At the least, that could send a message that regular everyday citizens do not approve of ICE's overly aggressive, provocative, and at times illegal behavior.

As a resident of New Hampshire for nearly fifty years I stand for the land and the people of this state and vehemently oppose an open-ended invitation to the financially unsupported labor of our local law officers and deputies for training and/or additional supports of ICEs cowardly and abhorrent abductions upon our neighbors, business owners, workers and friends. I support HB1570. It is the right of communities and locals to know ahead of time the financial strain of what they are signing up for with regards to ICE. thank you for your consideration, Melissa Spencer

Local budgetary authorities must be granted authority to not financially support ICE and have power to terminate these agreements.

Please let us have some say on where our tax dollars go. Most of us would prefer spending money on schools, roads, supporting the elderly, etc. than on cruelly rounding up immigrants whose biggest sin is to want to be American. Thank you.

I do not want my tax dollars to support terrorizing our neighbors as the current ICE operations have been doing.

The federal govt should reimburse local law enforcement for any ICE related activity. The towns need to know how much this is costing and be able to refuse to cover it.

I do not want my local and state tax dollars to support ICE activities in NH.

NH has historically prided itself on small government and strong local control. ICE has dramatically demonstrated its hostility to working cooperatively with local communities. HB 1570 represents a reasonable and much needed means to assert some degree of local control over immigration enforcement through budgetary oversight. I strongly urge you to support this much needed legislation Thank you for your consideration John Walsh