With Budget crisis looming, Perry goes after Sanctuary Cities in "emergency"

Well, thanks to republican voters, Rick Perry gets to pull his stunts for another 4 years. According to the Mark Whittingham, writing for Yahoo News, Perry decided Tuesday to assign "emergency" status to two pieces of legislation. This designation will ensure that these two issues will be put on a "fast track" in the legislature. In particular, Perry's two priorities are 1) private property rights and 2) getting rid of sanctuary cities.

While the private property issue makes sense, the idea of referring to the elimination of sanctuary cities as an emergency was not expected. Private property legislation will seek to reaffirm that people's property cannot be taken under "eminent domain" by another private property entity on the basis of the latter promising more tax revenues to the local government. As far as the issue of eliminating sanctuary cities, this is what Yahoo News contributor Mark Whittingham is reporting:

The policy of police departments in certain cities to not inquire as to the immigration status of people who are arrested for other crimes or otherwise come in contact with the police has been termed by opponents of the policy "sanctuary cities" as it protects illegal immigrants from local police inquiries.
Proponents maintain this allows illegal immigrants to give information to the police without fear of being deported. Proponents also maintain it is not the job of the local police to enforce federal immigration laws.
Opponents counter that the policy of "sanctuary cities" constitutes a de facto amnesty for an entire class of criminals. Regardless of the intentions of illegal immigrant to make better lives for themselves by living and working in the U.S., they have violated the law by entering the country illegally.
Sanctuary Cities and States Information Resource suggests that the following Texas communities are sanctuary cities: Austin, Baytown, Brownsville, Channelview, Denton, Dallas, El Cenizo, Fort Worth, Houston, Katy, Laredo, League City, McAllen, Port Arthur and San Antonio.