CM Mayor Mansoor Imposing Ineffective & Anti-Business E-Verify Program

Costa Mesa Mayor Allan Mansoor is proposing to impose and require that ALL businesses in Costa Mesa comply with E-Verify.  As you will see this is a burdensome, anti-business, and ineffective program that is not yet working as intended, and which should not be used in isolation.

Luckily it seems that “saner” minds may yet prevail and save businesses in Costa Mesa from a burdensome regulation that does not yet address any real issue nor by itself, but instead as others have suggested, it seems is intended to serve as a “stepping-stone” and advance the Mayor’s higher political office ambitions at the expense of Costa Mesa Businesses and its residents.

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WHAT IS E-VERIFY?:

E-Verify is an Internet-based system that allows an employer, using information reported on an employee’s Form I-9, Employment Eligibility Verification, to determine the eligibility of that employee to work in the United States.

WHO DOES IT APPLY TO?:

  • For most employers, the use of E-Verify is voluntary and limited to determining the employment eligibility of new hires only and this is very important, it is not for determining status of current employees, nor for transfers.
  • E-Verify is mandatory for some employers, such as those employers with federal contracts or subcontracts that contain the Federal Acquisition Regulation (FAR) E-Verify clause and employers in certain states.
  • Of employees whose employment eligibility is checked through E-Verify, 96.9 percent are confirmed automatically as eligible to work in the United States.

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ISSUES:

Costa Mesa Mayor Allan Mansoor is proposing to impose and require that ALL businesses in Costa Mesa comply with E-Verify.

  • Yet when one review’s the E-verify program closely and how it is managed, you will understand this is an Anti-business, and ineffective and inefficient regulation to force down on businesses – NOW and in ISOLATION.  (Based on all other non-partisan independent information reviewed, I believe E-Verify should be more appropriately used as part of Comprehensive Immigration Reform, which includes strengthening the borders and coasts and improving on the E-Verify program.)
  • And then there is question as to why, if the Mayor was the Mayor for several years he did not propose this before?  Is it because he knows that even if this is an ineffective and inefficient program, he will NOT have to deal with the repercussions, and with the negative impacts to businesses, as he hopes to “move on” to another government position.
  • Other local cities have implemented, but I doubt that they are aware of the most recent , timely and relevant audit findings by the Office of Inspector General  (OIG) of January 2010 which I was able to research yesterday, when I was informed by Vern Nelson, Editor-Orange Juice Blog that E-Verify was going to be discussed.…Audit Findings are highlighted below, and with a link to the full audit report.
  • Also at last night’s Radio Orange Juice interview, Honorable Wendy Leece, Council Member-Costa Mesa was there along with: historian / research assistant Gericault; professor/author/Latino activist Humberto Caspa; and former mayor / land use planner / OJ blogger Sandy “La Femme Wonkita” Genis.

It was “Orange Juice Refreshing” to know that Council Member Leece was open to considering this new information, and how it directly impacts the proposal in front of the Costa Mesa council.  She was also appreciative that we found this timely and relevant audit report and were sharing with her.

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INNEFECTIVE Burden and ANTI-Business with no real IMPACT:

1)       Employers must register with DHS (Dept of Homeland Security) to access E-Verify.

2)      Once registered, participating employers can electronically verify employee information.

3)      Registering and Verifying Imposes an additional burden to businesses.

4)      As mentioned before, this is for NEW HIRES and Not for PRE-EMPLOYMENT decisions, so if there is a problem (False Negative – which happens frequently), then it may wrongly impact the hiring of the “new employee”, thereby wrongly affecting both the hiring decisions of companies and the employment of the individuals because companies may not be able to wait for the employee to clear their issue with the government

5)      Also, if the Employer makes a mistake or uses the E-Verify program incorrectly, then the Employer may be terminated from the program, and thus unable to comply with this new Costa Mesa burden imposed on businesses.

6)      Imposing E-Verify on a piecemeal basis when most other cities are not requiring businesses to comply, may have the unintended consequence of making current or potential Costa Mesa businesses to consider relocating somewhere else.

7)      PRIVACY CONCERNS AND EMPLOYMENT CONCERNS:

Now IMAGINE a disgruntled employee forwards INFO either for a NEW employee or for a CURRENT employee for which they are NOT supposed to do so, but they intentionally mistype the name…thereby wrongly flagging the employee to the government…and now the employee has to go correct with the DHS . . . For example how long has it taken to get someone off a “TSA NO-FLY LIST” when the person was there by mistake…it has taken “forever”, well as you will read below, it has taken about 8-522 days for many employees to have their issue corrected.

8)      OIG audited Social Security Administration (SSA) which is responsible for the management of this program.

8A)  AUDIT report as of January 2010 OIG of SSA

SSA’s Human Resource Management Information System (HRMIS)7 showed that for Fiscal Year (FY) 2008 through March 31, 2009, SSA hired 9,311 new employees.

To determine whether SSA verified the employment eligibility of these new hires, OIG obtained the E-Verify transactions SSA submitted from October 1, 2007 to April 30, 2009.

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8B)  SSA did not always use the E-Verify program as intended.

Specifically, OIG found that of the 9,311 new employees hired in FYs 2008 and 2009, E-Verify was not used to confirm the employment eligibility of 1,767 (19 percent) new hires; 44 (less than ½ of 1% of these new hires would have received an SSA TNC) response or been referred to DHS had SSA verified them through E-Verify …(SSA TNT = The data input by the employer did not match information in SSA’s Numident”)

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8C)  DID NOT VERIFY TIMELY.

Of those verified 24% were verified late, ranging from 8-522 days.   Are Costa Mesa or any other businesses going to have to wait 8-522 for the government to clear up these issues?  Does this seem business friendly to you?

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8D)  VERIFIED WRONG INDIVIDUALS violating the MOU.

Employers are prohibited from attempting to verify current employees or transfers as again this is only meant for NEW employees.  SSA attempted to verify other New Employees, in violation of the E-Verify program.

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8E)  WRONG VERIFICATION RESULT.

Some employees were originally not verified, but were later proven to be okay because of a NAME change which employee had NOT updated with SSA; others because of INCORRECT Name spelling.

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8F)  Unknown Status

“For 39 new hires, the names, SSNs, and DoBs in HRMIS matched the Numident, but their citizenship status indicated they may not have been eligible to work in the United States.  It is possible these employees were eligible to work but had failed to report changes to their work authorization status to SSA after being issued their SSNs. They were assigned SSNs from 1963 to 2004 that indicated they were not eligible to work or were foreign-born individuals whose work authorization status was unknown.

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8G)  INPUT ERRORS

SSA had transposition errors, when inputting the data…Now imagine the transposition of errors that can also occur with NEW HIRES.

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EXCERPTS of Conclusions and Recommendations OIG audit report:

In FYs 2008 and 2009, SSA (1) did not verify the employment eligibility for about 19 percent of its new hires; (2) did not verify about 49 percent of new hires within 7 calendar days after the new hires’ date of hire; and (3) verified the employment eligibility of 26 existing SSA employees, 31 volunteers, and at least 18 job candidates, which was not in accordance with the E-Verify MoU.

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PLEASE CLICK HERE for Earlier Article on Mayor Allan Mansoor’s plans for E-Verify by Vern Nelson.

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posted by Francisco “Paco” Barragan

(My opinions only and not those of any group)


About Francisco Barragan