Dallas suburb's renting ordinance blocked [View all]
Source: Associated Press
Dallas suburb's renting ordinance blocked
By NOMAAN MERCHANT, Associated Press | July 23, 2013 | Updated: July 23, 2013 3:13pm
DALLAS (AP) — The city of Farmers Branch will decide soon whether to continue a long, expensive fight to defend an ordinance designed to keep immigrants without legal permission to be in the country from renting.
The 5th U.S. Court of Appeals issued another blow to the ordinance Monday in ruling it unconstitutional. Council members of the suburb just north of Dallas are scheduled to discuss their options next month, Michael Jung, an attorney for Farmers Branch, said Tuesday.
Farmers Branch, a nearly 30,000-person bedroom community that is about 45 percent Latino, is one of several cities nationwide that has targeted immigration by enacting renting restrictions. The ordinance Farmers Branch passed in 2008 would have required all renters to obtain city licenses and for a city official to deny licenses to anyone found to be here illegally. Landlords who didn't comply could have faced fines or revocation of their renters' licenses.
The 5th U.S. Court of Appeals on Monday ruled that the law encroached on territory reserved to federal law enforcement. It relied heavy on last year's U.S. Supreme Court decision striking down parts of the Arizona immigration law for similar reasons.
Read more: http://www.chron.com/news/texas/article/Dallas-suburb-s-renting-ordinance-blocked-4680838.php
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