Nov. 18 meeting<\/a>, the City Council asked city staff to go back to the negotiating table. <\/p>\nAn initial five-year lease agreement came back before the panel on Tuesday with new terms for consideration, including CBP covering utility costs and paying the one-time fee in lieu of monthly rent.<\/p>\n
But the federal government would not contractually agree to any specific privacy language, as it cited the right to surveil any panga boat smuggling operations that proceeded on land through the city. <\/p>\n
Councilmember Mark Enmeier criticized the proposed changes and questioned the smuggling exception spelled out in the lease.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe would have to trust them without any sort of oversight,\u201d he said of CBP. \u201cWe cannot verify what the system sees or records. Residents are asked to trust a permanent surveillance system without proof or limits.\u201d<\/p>\n
Enmeier suggested the city could collaborate instead with the Orange County Sheriff\u2019s Department and Orange County Fire Authority on coastal camera systems to provide public safety without sacrificing local oversight.<\/p>\n
Knoblock inflamed detractors in the audience with his steadfast support of the CBP surveillance tower and Trump\u2019s immigration crackdown.<\/p>\n
\u201cOur privacy is not being invaded. None of your liberties are being invaded,\u201d he said. \u201cIf you\u2019re an illegal alien and you\u2019re caught in this town, you\u2019re going to be removed. That\u2019s the law of the land. It\u2019s been that way for decades. President Trump seems to be the only one in the last five years that\u2019s been willing to enforce the law.\u201d<\/p>\n
The debate continued past midnight. It came amid no statistically significant uptick in panga boat landings on San Clemente\u2019s shores last year as compared to 2024.<\/p>\n
Councilmember Zhen Wu said he did not feel San Clemente would be entering the lease agreement as equal partners with the federal government, while Councilmember Victor Cabral said it was his belief the updated terms addressed some of the concerns expressed in November by his colleagues.<\/p>\n
As a former police officer, Loeffler acknowledged that federal immigration raids under Trump have \u201cshaken\u201d trust in the federal government. But he suggested that public safety may outweigh privacy concerns.<\/p>\n
\u201cI\u2019m having a hard time seeing the privacy issue,\u201d Loeffler said. \u201cWe\u2019ll know if we see it.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cHow will we know?\u201d Enmeier asked.<\/p>\n
\u201cWhat [is the federal government] doing that you don\u2019t know?\u201d Loeffler said.<\/p>\n
\u201cExactly,\u201d Enmeier countered.<\/p>\n
At the end of almost an hour-long debate at the dais, a council majority approved the lease agreement with Enmeier dissenting and Wu abstaining.<\/p>\n
San Rom\u00e1n writes for Times Community News.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"A new U.S. Customs and Border Protection surveillance system will keep watch over San Clemente\u2019s shores for any…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":145191,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[72519,72522,7,9,8,4025,1610,3413,30712,11073,5131,14,62895,72523,72520,72521,10808,7585],"class_list":["post-145190","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-california","tag-associated-utility-cost","tag-border-protection-surveillance-tower","tag-california","tag-california-headlines","tag-california-news","tag-cbp","tag-city-council","tag-concern","tag-council-chamber","tag-enmeier","tag-federal-government","tag-immigration","tag-lease-agreement","tag-loeffler","tag-privacy-right","tag-public-safety-standpoint","tag-san-clemente","tag-term"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/145190","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=145190"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/145190\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/145191"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=145190"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=145190"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=145190"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}