Lewisville has been saving a little $$$ by hiring illegal aliens. It's still wrong.

Posted by Winston Edmondson. Please email this article to your friends and post it on Facebook.

I received an email from a citizen that lives on Kent Dr. in Lewisville. He was frustrated because the Serendipity Village improvements project has had his neighborhood in disarray since December. He's called the city on several occasions to ask why it has taken so long, and why some streets in his neighborhood were completed before his street when his was torn up first, but he's gotten no response. You can do that to, by the way. Feel free to email me if you have a problem that the city just doesn't seem interested in resolving and I'll see what I can do. I told him I would drop by and take a look at the situation. Coincidentally, they had just started to clean things up when I arrived. I did, however, find an even bigger problem.

As citizens, we've been asking our city leaders to do something about our illegal alien problem and we've been told that the city is doing everything it can do. We know that's not true. I thought they were simply being negligent, but now I see that they're actually complicit.

E-Verify is a tool provided by the Federal Government that enables businesses to ensure that they are only hiring legal workers. Our mayor, city council, and of course Ron Neiman, obviously don't think it's important to set a good example. For reasons that I can't comprehend, they don't require the businesses that the city contracts with to use E-Verify. Here I am, angry at the folks that are picking up illegal aliens in Huffines Plaza, cheating the system, paying low wages and no taxes, when all along my city has been doing the exact same thing.

I spoke with Mary Pannell, an HR Manager for Gilco Contracting, Inc. She confirmed that they do not use E-Verify, or use any other method of ascertaining the eligibility of workers that they hire. "Is it likely then that many of the people that you hire are undocumented workers?" I asked. "Well, yeah. I mean, we don't really know. That's just the way it is in this industry," was her reply. That's not the way it is for the businesses that respect the rule of law and for cities that make it a point to hire only those businesses.

I want Lewisville to be that kind of city again, and I'm sure you do to. If we need to hire a city attorney that understands that, then let's get it done. Ron Neiman seems to be steering us down a path that the majority of us do not approve of. Let's find out where our mayor and city council members stand on this issue.

The runoff election between John Gorena and TJ Gilmore is only a few days away. I'm pretty confident that John Gorena is on the right side of this issue, as he is the person that I hear championing E-Verify more than anybody else, but I'd still like to hear what Mr. Gorena and Mr. Gilmore think about this situation. I'll post an update if and when I hear from them.