Officials in Orange County decry ICE's plan for detention center in Chester
County Executive Steve Neuhaus said he does not want to deal with clashes between ICE agents and protesters and that he does not want the county to host a facility that might be holding good, innocent people.
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Officials in Orange County said Friday that they received no prior notification that U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement is looking to turn a 400,00-square-foot warehouse into an immigrant detention center that county leaders do not want in the county.
County Executive Steve Neuhaus said the owner of a vacant warehouse formerly used by Pep Boys in the Chester Industrial Park told the county ICE officials have been inquiring about using the warehouse as a detention center for immigrants.
Neuhaus said Friday in a Zoom interview that he is disappointed since the county has been hoping the warehouse would become a film studio.
He said he does not want to deal with clashes between ICE agents and protesters and that does not want the county to host a facility that might be holding good, innocent people.
"The federal government is hunting people down," Neuhaus said. "They say they're mostly bad people, but if there are families with children, that's a problem. We owe it to ourselves to come up with a better solution than to round them up as cattle in a temporary center in a warehouse."
According to documents obtained by the Washington Post, ICE is considering 22 other similar detention centers nationwide to keep up with the increased rates of detention and deportation of immigrants.
The Department of Homeland Security, which oversees ICE, reported a record 605,000 deportations in 2025.
Larry Wheelock, of Chester, is worried for the growing local immigrant population.
"We have a lot of hardworking people here," he said. "And I wouldn't trust them to not go after those people."
Chris Zis said that since there are immigrants who should be detained, "why not" hold them in Chester?
"Where are they going to put them?" he said. "Going to put them out on the streets so we can still take care of them too? Come on. Let's be realistic here."
Several other officials, including Chester Town Supervisor Brandon Holdridge and Rep. Pat Ryan, are fighting the preliminary plans.
"I am against any and all ICE presence in Chester," Holdridge wrote in an email to News 12 Friday afternoon. "The well documented abuses and illegal actions being carried out by this President's Department of Homeland Security have no place in our town, let alone our country."
Holdridge added he is concerned about traffic, infrastructure and public safety.
"It's disgusting, infuriating and UNAMERICAN," Ryan wrote in a post on X.
They have few immediate options for recourse.
The federal government has the right to renovate a warehouse into a detention center as long as it complies with local zoning laws.
Officials with ICE have not responded to multiple requests for comment for this story.
