The fate of a Herndon ordinance that forbids employers from seeking day laborers anywhere but a site on Sterling Road is in question after the town council moved to overhaul the controversial center.
The town’s anti-solicitation policy withstood a legal challenge this year based largely on the condition that laborers and employers had some place to meet.
But with the town council clearing the way Wednesday for a new operator — one that will put in place legal-status checks that would likely bar a large number of workers — the future of that ordinance is again in question.
“If they go ahead with [the checks], I have no doubt there will be a number of legal organizations that will be standing in line to challenge it,” said John Steinbach of the Woodbridge Workers Committee, a member organization of the immigrant-rights group Mexicanos Sin Fronteras.
But Steinbach said he is uncertain of the outcome of such a challenge “given the current judicial climate.”
Herndon’s mayor is confident the town will prevail.
“I think that our ordinance would still be valid even if our site checked for legal presence,” Mayor Stephen DeBenedittis said at Wednesday night’s council meeting.
The ordinance, put in place to accompany the creation of the day laborer center two years ago, was first challenged in Fairfax County District Court by Stephen Thomas, a Reston man arrested in 2006 after hiring a day laborer at a 7-Eleven on Elden Street. Thomas appealed after a judge sided with the town in March, and both sides are now awaiting a Circuit Court judge’s decision.
The Town Council voted 6-1 to renew the day labor site’s permit Wednesday night, leaving Reston Interfaith managing the center while the town weighs a bid from a potential operator who has pledged to check the worker’s legal presence. If the town puts in place the new checks at the center and the anti-solicitation ordinance is upheld, it would likely mean illegal immigrants will have no place in Herndon to seek employment.
“I think [the council is] quite explicit that’s what they want,” Steinbach said.
