Federal money used to pay the cost for jailed illegal immigrants may not be solving the problem

TAMPA -  Supporters of Arizona’s tough new immigration law claim not enough is being done by the federal government to control the borders, and states are being asked to pay the costs of that failure.

 When it comes to the education and health care of illegal immigrants, state and local governments bear nearly the entire financial burden.

But since the early 1990’s, the federal government has been reimbursing states and counties for the cost of jailing illegal immigrants who break the law.

It’s a practice local Sheriffs love, but others call wasteful and ineffective.

Last year, the Hillsborough County's Sheriff's Office reported over 700 illegal immigrants in lock-up. Pinellas County claimed to have jailed 470. Jails in Polk County reported 177 illegals. Those numbers support claims by state lawmakers like Republican Senator, Paula Dockery who want an Arizona-style immigration crack down in Florida.

“We can tell you that a lot of our prisoners in our system are here illegally when they commit their crimes. And that is a tremendous cost to the taxpayers in Florida,” said Dockery at a recent press conference.

That cost is offset by the State Criminal Alien Assistance Program- or SCAAP. Last year the program doled out $400 million dollars to help pay for the cost of jailing lawbreakers who are in the country illegally.

Through a freedom of information request filed by our partners at Scripps Howard News Service, we found that last year, Hillsborough County was reimbursed $546,000, and Pinellas received just over $313,000.

The more illegal aliens our local jails identify, the bigger the check.

“It creates a strong incentive for jail or prison officials to try to determine whether someone is an illegal alien because if they can, then they get this money from the Federal Government. But they actually have to identify the person to do it,” said Steven Camarota, of the Washington D.C. based Center for Immigration Studies.

Whether it’s effective at controlling illegal immigration is another question.

Both the administrations of George W. Bush and Barack Obama have tried to kill the SCAAP program as wasteful spending. The Federal Immigration and Customs Enforcement Division (ICE) calls SCAAP “misguided,” saying it “does nothing to further the removal of undocumented criminal aliens currently in the United States.”

When Hillsborough County applied for SCAAP reimbursement in 2009, they listed 740 prisoners they believed would qualify as illegal immigrants. But the Federal Government ultimately approved just 64 prisoners as qualifying under program- a huge disparity. Hillsborough County Sheriffs officials could not be reached for an explanation as of Thursday.

Why does the program continue if Uncle Sam wants it gone? Because Congress gets in the way, says Camarota. Local law enforcement authorities let their congressional leaders know that they want this stream of money to continue.