DENVER-
Lawmakers Monday were scrambling to make sure legal residents without proper identification don’t lose state service under a new anti-illegal immigration law.
Passed during last summer’s special session, the measure bars illegal immigrants from getting non-emergency, taxpayer-funded benefits. Temporary rules were put in place for six months to make sure that legal residents without IDs, including the homeless, were able to continue getting benefits.
Democratic leaders in the state Senate hope to pass a bill to extend the temporary rules by the time they expire Thursday. The measure, already passed by the House, was set to have its first hearing in the Senate on Tuesday, Sen. Peter Groff, D-Denver, said Monday.
If the bill passes, Department of Revenue executive director Roxanne Huber told The Associated Press that her department will hold hearings to set up permanent exceptions to the rules.
Huber said some people who will never be able to provide the four forms of identification allowed under the law. She said some examples include out-of-state college students without Colorado IDs who need to be treated at the university infirmary, the incapacitated or mentally ill or people who qualify for state worker’s compensation benefits but must move out-of-state to be cared for by relatives.
The bill was a key part of a package of legislation which supporters called the nation’s toughest on illegal immigration. Huber said the permanent rules would not change that.
“We have no intention to utilize the waiver to weaken that bill,” said Huber, who took office Jan. 20.
Sen. Dave Schultheis, R-Colorado Springs, said lawmakers, and not the department, should determine who is getting benefits.
“They (the rules) could be weakened under the governor’s agencies in such a way that it allows illegals to acquire these various services,” Schultheis said.
The law requires applicants to provide secure photo identification, sign an affidavit that they are in the U.S. legally and get their application approved through the federal System Alien Verification for Entitlements, also known as the SAVE program.
The law doesn’t apply to those under 18 years old.
