Bicycle volunteers monitor school zones for ICE
The group is hosting a training on Oct. 11 for cyclists who want to get involved.
Written by Kate Morrissey, Edited by Maya Srikrishnan
Before 6:30 a.m. on most weekdays, Jeane Wong pedals her e-bike to Logan Heights or City Heights, where she circles streets around several schools.
As she rides, she watches for signs of Immigration and Customs Enforcement activity.
Wong is part of the San Diego Bike Brigade, a new collective of cyclists and e-bike enthusiasts who use their morning rides to patrol for ICE near schools. The effort comes in response to ICE detaining several parents near schools in the county.
ICE has said it is not targeting people at schools but ICE officers have detained parents en route to drop off or pick up their children since the school year began. In August, activists in City Heights also documented officers pulling into and then out of an elementary school parking lot in August.
Wong said the Bike Brigade will help parents know when there is a threat — and also when there isn't one.
“When people see us, we want them to feel really safe — ‘Oh, that's the San Diego Bike Brigade. I feel really good about taking my kid into school,’” Wong said. “And just taking that terror off their plate. The people who see me, that's how it goes, and I love it, giving them that peace for that moment.”
The group will host a training in partnership with Universidad Popular, a North County-focused grassroots organization that creates community education spaces, on Oct. 11 at Malcolm X Library for people interested in learning how to recognize ICE and what to do if they come across an immigration operation.
San Diego County is home to hundreds of schools, and Wong hopes that the number of volunteers will grow to keep eyes on all of them.
A teacher at a daycare herself, Wong said that ICE should not operate in school zones because it will traumatize any child who sees that activity.
She said volunteers who see ICE activity can contact the school to help divert arriving traffic down different streets to avoid the officers. She has built a relationship with teachers and administrators at the schools she rides by so that they and the parents trust her.
On one morning ride near King Chavez Academy of Excellence, Wong said, a police car pulled up with sirens and lights on during the morning drop-off.
“Of course, everyone is terrified,” Wong recalled. “These are humans being hunted.”
Wong said she approached and investigated. She learned the police officer was putting a fix-it ticket on a car, and she signaled to the principal and students with their families that they were safe.
“I was there and gave a thumbs up, and I could just feel their heart rate go down,” Wong said. “It's an amazing, beautiful thing.”
For people interested in making their morning bicycle ride part of the ICE patrol effort, Wong said it's important to pay attention to cross streets as they ride because if the cyclists come across ICE, their minds will likely go blank. She says the cross streets out loud to herself as she goes by to help her mind stay focused on her location.
She also shares her location through her phone with someone who keeps watch to make sure she stays safe.
Volunteers will learn more at the training about their rights, safety precautions and how to identify ICE vehicles, she said, so that they're not raising false alarms and adding to families’ anxiety, the opposite of the group's goal.
On a recent Friday, Wong circled through Logan Heights, gliding slowly past vehicles with tinted windows before pedaling on to her next stop. She's done the route so many times now, she said that she knows which cars look out of place.
Each time she rode past a pedestrian, she greeted them with a “Good morning” and a smile.
As she passed one school, a child recognized her from his time at her daycare.
“Keep going!” he yelled as she whizzed by.
As she pulled up at Burbank Elementary, the school's speaker blasted “La Chona” into the street to welcome students for the day. She gave a fist bump to one of the administrators who stood in the street directing traffic.
Satisfied that students had safely reached campus for another day, she pedaled home.
“The resistance to all of this is community,” Wong said. “That's what you have to do — you have to build your community.”
