Business owners, activists: “Immigrants welcome, ICE is not”
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Business owners, activists: “Immigrants welcome, ICE is not”
Cincinnati Practical Education Coalition or CPEC has been going to different business with signs that read “Immigrants are welcome, ICE is not” The group says around 40 businesses have agreed to put up the signs in their windows. Judi Lopresti is worried that her businesses could become a target for ICE agents. While the signs themselves might not stop ICE from coming in, the group says it opens the door to information about immigration rights. It’s also empowering businesses to use their right of refusal to be able to say, ‘we are not going to serve you here,’ said Emily Spring, a member of CPEC. The group is also planning events and fundraisers to help get their message across.
What You Need To Know A newly formed group of activists called the Cincinnati Practical Education Coalition or CPEC has been going to different business with signs that read “Immigrants are welcome, ICE is not”
The group says around 40 businesses have agreed to put up the signs in their windows on Cincinnati’s North side
CPEC is also giving out information along with the signs about immigration rights
It hasn’t happened at her shop yet, but Judi Lopresti is worried that her businesses could become a target for ICE agents.
“I mean you just, you just never know,” Lopresti said. “We have a lot of Latinos, all kinds of of people who don’t speak English, they come in, they need their bikes fixed.”
That’s why she says she has a sign up at the front door that reads, “Immigrants are welcome, ICE is not.”
“If somebody comes in here that’s from another country, like, come in, you’re welcome here, ICE is not,” said Lopresti.
She’s not alone. Her bicycle repair businesses is one of several on Cincinnati’s North side displaying the sign in their window. It’s a sign bartender Emily Spring and her group created after they noticed something.
“What we noticed in our industry is that our restaurants, our businesses, our parking lots are being used as public spaces where ICE can come in and take a person. We as CPEC are here to say we are not okay with that,” Spring said.
CPEC stands for the Cincinnati Practical Education Coalition. It’s an activist group she’s in.
For the last month, they’ve been making copies of the signs and going around to businesses, asking to display them. So far, they’re up at about 40 Cincinnati businesses
Duncan Maier is also a part of the effort to get even more signs up.
“I don’t think any one of us individually is ever going to be able to stop ICE or any power at large that’s trying to control people, but what I do think can be done is a group, a community of people that have a unified front about something like this can at least inhibit them,” said Maier.
While the signs themselves might not stop ICE from coming in, the group says it opens the door to information about immigration rights.
“A lot of it is education of what’s behind those signs, it’s know your rights for staff, it’s ensuring that those safe spaces, private spaces within public spaces are created that ice cannot truly cannot enter. it’s also empowering businesses to use their right of refusal to be able to say, ‘we are not going to serve you here,'” Spring said.
The group is also planning events and fundraisers to help get their message across. It’s a message Lopresti plans to keep up.
“I just want them to know that they are safe in this space,” Lopresti said.