Cambridge Commission on Immigration Cautions Against Duplicating Immigration Support Services

Cambridge’s Commission on Immigrant Rights and Citizenship cautioned the city against duplicating non-profit services in a Tuesday meeting, amid a push to increase city-run support for residents amid heightened federal immigration enforcement.

The commission’s monthly meeting centered on a policy order passed earlier this month, which called for an expansion in city resources — including a 24/7 emergency hotline, a multilingual interpreter network, and specific protocols for handling Immigration and Customs Enforcement interactions.

The order was motivated by an incident early last month when a Cambridge family was confronted by ICE agents and faced with detention. The family sought support from the city after many local offices and nonprofits had closed for the day, according to Mayor E. Denise Simmons, prompting the desire to ramp up city-operated services.

Commissioner Karin Lin said that the city was “trying to reinvent the wheel” because the proposed resources duplicated many services already provided by local nonprofits.

“It makes far more sense for the cities to connect with and support the organizations that have been doing this for a long time and already have the reach and the organization, rather than trying to start up something city-specific from scratch,” Lin said.

She argued that a city-run hotline would be redundant because the LUCE Immigrant Justice Network of Massachusetts — a group of immigration rights organizations working to verify reports of ICE arrests across the state — currently offers a hotline for immigration issues every day from 5 a.m. to 9 p.m.

Redundant services are not a new sticking point in Cambridge. The city established a civilian alternative response team to dispatch to certain mental health emergency calls last July. Weeks later, the Cambridge Police Department rolled out their own co-response team, pairing an officer with a social worker — though significant overlap has often put the two teams at odds.

Residents also formed the Holistic Emergency Alternative Response Team, a non-police response independent of the city, which has struggled to find footing with the rise of the city-funded teams.

But even when competing against similar city-funded services, the commission said that nonprofits often face a major hurdle: promoting their resources publicly.

The commission, which aims to provide resources and support to immigrants in the city, lists services on various pages of their website — including a “know your rights” video for residents faced with immigration enforcement and information for free legal clinics. Commissioners said at the Tuesday meeting that many people still do not know where to find the resources online.

“It’s a good reminder to figure out how to be more out in the community, so folks know that we’re, ideally, a hub of information and resources,” Carolina Almonte, the commission’s executive director, said.

—Staff writer Megan L. Blonigen can be reached at megan.blonigen@thecrimson.com. Follow her on X at @MeganBlonigen.