Last Thursday, the Broome County Legislature hosted a public hearing to discuss next year’s proposed budget, where several residents got up to publicly oppose increased funding for the Broome County Jail.

If passed, the 2026 budget, released late September, would allocate around $55 million to Broome County Sheriff’s Office, a nearly 15 percent increase from the $47.8 million allocated in this year’s budget.

Totaling over 800 pages, the 2026 county budget lists several objectives that the sheriff’s office hopes to achieve next year, like implementing a “cost-effective opioid treatment plan option for released inmates” and continuing internal programs to reduce recidivism rates. The office will also continue to “generate revenue” by holding “prisoners for the U.S. Marshals Service, U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement and other New York counties.”

Several community members and activists voiced their opposition to the proposed funding increase, with some referencing the 287(g) agreement with ICE that Sheriff Fred Akshar signed [HYPERLINK: https://www.bupipedream.com/news/ice-will-train-some-corrections-staff-in-executing-civil-immigration-warrants/164491/] on March 10. The office agreed to participate in the Warrant Service Officer program, which allows state and local law enforcement “to serve and execute administrative warrants on aliens in their agency’s jail.”

In a Sept. 18 statement to Pipe Dream, Akshar said his office “has not been involved with any immigration enforcement in the community” and that any issued warrants would be for those already in the correctional facility. The number of ICE and U.S. Marshals Service detainees in the jail “fluctuate[s] frequently” and is not related to participation in the 287(g) program, per Akshar’s office.

At the hearing, Rev. Damon Wilson, the Broome Tioga NAACP president and pastor at the Trinity AME Zion Church, said he was “against any budget that cooperates or collaborates with ICE.”

“Our neighbors, our friends, our families all deserve to be treated with respect,” Wilson said. “And the way that ICE is addressing this issue is not only detrimental to our character as a nation, but it also is a mark on our souls.”

Immigration enforcement has been spotted in the Greater Binghamton area in the past few months. In September, ICE arrested two men in Johnson City, with an agency spokesperson telling WSKG that the men lacked “the proper documents to remain” in the country.

The ICE activity occurred without any involvement from the Binghamton Police Department.

On Sept. 11, activists and community members gathered at the United Presbyterian Church of Binghamton for a panel discussion about ICE activity nationwide and the Broome County Jail’s 287(g) agreement.

Akshar spoke at Thursday’s budget hearing and said there were “demonstrably false claims” made by those opposed to the county’s partnership with ICE. For decades, Akshar said, the Broome County Jail has held detainees for federal and state partners. He also claimed that holding ICE detainees does not negatively impact county taxpayers.

“The fact remains, I, along with men and women of the Broome County Sheriff’s Office, are dedicated [to] serving and protecting the people of this community,” Akshar said in a statement to Pipe Dream. “We are not out in the streets enforcing immigration laws, conducting raids or engaging in ICE-related enforcement activity.”

Andrew Pragacz MA ‘18, president of Justice and Unity for the Southern Tier, an organization seeking to combat mass incarceration, told Pipe Dream that it was “nonsensical” to equate regular federal detainees held in local jails awaiting trial with those detained for “civil immigration violations.”

Pragacz also claimed overtime costs at the jail would increase if the number of detainees rises.

In a Sept.18 press release, the sheriff’s office responded to some of the claims made by activists and other residents, saying that the state mandates a “set number of staff” for the 600-bed facility while staffing costs do not change “per day based on the addition or subtraction of any detainee.” Broome County is reimbursed $110 per detainee daily by the federal government, which the office said “helps offset the total cost to run the facility.”

Adam Flint BA ‘88, MA ‘98, coordinator of Concerned Residents of Greater Binghamton, a coalition of local organizations formed after the 2024 general election to protect “the welfare and rights of every person living in the Greater Binghamton region,” told Pipe Dream that he believes increased funding to the sheriff’s office was unwarranted.

“While every other department in the county is looking at cuts, the sheriff wants more money — and this is particularly unconscionable at a time where in an unprecedented move, the federal government has withheld money for food, for SNAP benefits that overwhelmingly go to the children and the elderly,” Flint said.

The county legislature is expected to vote on the budget during a special session on Nov. 6.