Southfield advocates emphasize community support while protesting GSA lease tied to ICE

“People need to be just as disgusted by what is happening in REDICO building at One Towne Square as they are by the idea of a detention center in Romulus, and we should be just as disgusted by what is happening in that office building, because it is disgusting,” Fink said, referring to the building owners. “What is happening in that office building is what enables these detention centers.”

The event, titled “What Does It Mean to Be a Good Neighbor When ICE Moves In?” focused on how the local community can react and respond to immigration enforcement. 

Beyond the regular protests hosted by Fink and her colleagues, panelists emphasized the need to support the broader community — especially those at risk of becoming targets of ICE themselves.

Elida Reyes founded Community Action for Empowerment, or CAFE, to advocate for immigrants in Oakland County and to provide direct support for those most impacted — volunteers document arrests, deliver food to affected families, and transport them to court appointments. 

At Wednesday’s event, she told the story of Vera, a young Venezuelan immigrant who arrived in Pontiac knowing no one, having fled the regime of former Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro. Reyes took her in after she came to her church looking for a place to stay.

“I treated her as if she was my granddaughter, and I put her through the school,” Reyes said. “And no one can say she didn’t have papers because we paid for the attorney. We made sure she had all her papers.”

But after leaving Michigan to visit a friend in Florida, she was stopped by ICE, detained in Louisiana, and was eventually deported to Venezuela — and Reyes has not been able to reach her since earthquakes devastated the country in June. 

She has continued her work through CAFE, accompanying people to court hearings and doctor’s appointments where they fear they or their loved ones might be detained by ICE.

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“I started this a year ago,” Reyes said. “I’d like to end it, but we can’t until it’s done.”

She further urged those in the room to similarly look out for their neighbors, offering support in times of need. 

“I’ve got grandkids, and I don’t want them to go through this. I’ve got grandkids, and I worry about their future every single day,” she said. “I don’t know what our future looks like, but if we don’t change it, it’s not good. It’s really not good.”

Dr. Patricia Talley, attending the panel as part of the Afro-Mexican advocacy organization Mexico Negro, A.C., similarly emphasized the need for community support in the face of ICE’s presence in Michigan. 

“We are all good neighbors,” she said. “We want to live in a beloved community, one where everyone is respecting their basic humanity.”

Talley’s mother, Barbara Talley, was a trailblazer for the civil rights movement in Michigan — she was the first Black member of Southfield’s city council, first elected in 1983. Throughout the event, she referenced the King Center’s work on nonviolence to inspire the community response to immigration enforcement — contacting elected officials, telling stories of immigrants, and attending town halls like the one held on Wednesday.

“We’ve been so culturalized to accept these things,” she added. “We become complacent.”

REDICO, which owns the One Towne Square building with the GSA lease in question, was invited to participate in the panel, according to organizers — a seat was reserved for the company’s CEO, Dale Watchowski. 

Asked why Watchowski did not attend, Fink said, “We sent them an invitation. We would love to have conversations with them. We have had conversations with REDICO in private. We have attempted many times to have conversations with REDICO in public. It has not been successful. I think the answer is because they don’t want to be here.”

A statement from REDICO said that Watchowski “was out of town traveling on business and has no record of receiving an invitation to this meeting.”

The statement continued on to say that REDICO has engaged consistently with local officials and community members on the GSA lease.

“The terms of the lease explicitly prohibit any law enforcement, detention or similar activities from occurring at the property,” the statement continued. “REDICO is prepared to fully enforce the agreement if the terms of the lease are violated. We have been observing the usage closely. REDICO cannot unilaterally cancel a legally binding lease with the GSA, or any tenant, unless the terms of the lease are in default. To date, government usage of the space has been for office purposes only, which is well within the terms of the lease.”

U.S. Rep. Rashida Tlaib (D-Detroit), whose district includes Southfield, also spoke at the event remotely. 

“When ICE comes into one community and violates people’s civil rights or uses weapons, excessive force, it is a violation of all of our civil rights,” she said. “These are real human beings, real lives that are being impacted, but it’s being done in a very dehumanizing, very aggressive way that it really doesn’t create a fair, just immigration system.” 

Emphasizing local organizations working to provide support and legal representation to those facing immigration detention, Tlaib also emphasized her concerns about federal law enforcement activity on Election Day — and how those are directly tied to the current immigration enforcement regime.  

“You all think about ways you can obviously uplift and show what ICE is doing with the billions of dollars that the Trump administration has been pouring in there,” she said. “It’s important to understand the impact of what the Trump administration is doing, using these law enforcement agencies or these extensions of agencies that are supposed to be keeping us safe. They’re actually not doing that.”