If Howard County can’t stop an ICE facility, maybe they can tax it

State lawmakers representing Howard County plan to introduce a bill next session aimed at raising tax rates for a proposed U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement field office in Elkridge.

For months, local leaders have tried and failed to block construction at the privately owned building at 6522 Meadowridge Road, which is nearly complete and slated to replace the agency’s field office located in Baltimore’s Hopkins Plaza. A federal judge granted a preliminary injunction against Howard County in August, reinstating the permits that local leaders revoked in February.

State Sen. Clarence Lam, one of the bill’s sponsors, said this week that local leaders cannot stop ICE from operating a facility in Howard County, but they hope the bill will defray its potential financial burden on the county and residents.

“There’s nothing we can overtly do to stop this facility from moving in, but we also should not be bearing the full cost of a decision we had no say over,” Lam said.

The bill would authorize Howard County alone to raise property and transfer tax rates for any leased facilities with secure confinement capabilities and is “not targeted at a single place, institution or facility,” Lam said.

An attorney for the facility’s owner, Genesis GSA Strategic One, did not immediately respond to a request for comment Thursday afternoon.

Rates would be set by the County Council based on a county assessment of its anticipated costs for providing emergency medical and law enforcement services, investigating deaths and serious injuries, and other related infrastructure.

For example, Lam said, the county could be forced to expand its police presence near the facility — which is situated near a medical clinic, residential neighborhoods, schools and parks — to mitigate the possibility of confrontations between protesters and ICE agents.

The lawmakers modeled the bill after a financial tool that the General Assembly authorized in 2024 to help jurisdictions like Baltimore reduce vacant and abandoned properties. The city has since delayed its rollout of the tax hike until at least 2028, pending tweaks from state lawmakers that would allow some exemptions.

Howard’s bill would exempt licensed health facilities such as hospitals, nursing homes and assisted living facilities.

Representatives for ICE previously told the county that the Department of Homeland Security and immigration authorities intend to use the Elkridge facility primarily for office space and as a “small detainee processing facility,” according to a federal lawsuit Genesis filed against the county in the spring.

The complaint states no detainee would be held there for more than 12 hours or outside operating hours from 6 a.m. to 6 p.m. Detainees requiring overnight stays would be transferred to other facilities, such as county jails that have contracts with the federal government.

ICE has faced scrutiny for overcrowding its temporary holding rooms and denying detainees access to medical care in Baltimore, in violation of a federal court order.

Lam and bill co-sponsor Del. Gabriel Moreno, an immigration attorney, gathered Thursday afternoon with more than 50 advocates outside the county government headquarters in Ellicott City to promote the bill.

The activists waved signs that said “Community not cages,” “ICE out of HoCo! Now” and “Come for one, face us all.”

Nearly a quarter of Howard County’s residents are foreign-born.

“We see this as the perfect type of legislation for the time, the environment that we’re currently living in,” Moreno said.

Local bills that come before the General Assembly with the support of the county’s delegation typically pass into law out of deference, but Lam said he doesn’t expect that will occur with this measure.

He warned there will be additional scrutiny, calling the bill “precedence-setting” and “a heavy lift.”

The bill must clear a number of approvals before local leaders can raise taxes on the ICE facility. If it garners enough support in the General Assembly to become law, the matter then must be taken up by the County Council and would be subject to the county executive’s veto.

Lam and Moreno said they expect the federal government could sue over the measure, but they’re prepared to work with the Maryland Office of the Attorney General to defend it.

California enacted a similar law in September that will tax 25% of private detention facility operators’ gross income beginning in July 2028. A for-profit prison company filed a federal challenge to the law earlier this month.

Even if the Howard County measure clears such hurdles, some aspects of the bill would fall outside of lawmakers’ control. When asked whether a landlord could pass the extra tax burden back onto the federal government — and therefore taxpayers — Lam acknowledged the possibility.

“How the owner handles that tax is up to them,” he said.

The facilities’ operation will be managed by the federal government, which has a lease agreement with Genesis. Details of the lease have not been made public and were sealed during the federal court proceedings.

Lawmakers said they will convene a public hearing Dec. 21 on the bill at Howard County’s George Howard building.

Banner reporter Hallie Miller contributed to this story.