A Douglas County legislator wants to crack down on companies that knowingly hire illegal aliens.

Rep. Tom Holland, D-Baldwin, filed legislation Wednesday that would quintuple the fines levied against businesses that use illegal immigrant workers.

The 2004 Patriotic Employer Act would increase the fine from the current level of $500 to $2,500 and would increase possible county jail sentences from a month to a year. Holland also is proposing fines of $25,000 for companies who are found guilty of a second offense. The bill also would create a hot line for people to report companies that they suspect of using illegal workers.

“I get calls from small businesses who say they’re getting beat out of business because their competitors are using illegal immigrants,” Holland said. “If the state is going to seriously talk about economic development, we’ve got to address this.”

Holland also said he was introducing the legislation in response to a Kansas proposal to allow illegal immigrants to obtain driver’s licenses.

“I think that is just putting an advertising sign on our state telling illegal immigrants to come on in,” Holland said.

Elias Garcia, executive director of the Kansas Advisory Committee on Hispanic Affairs, said he had concerns about proposals to stiffen the penalties for hiring illegal immigrants. Garcia said he thought the effort could produce large administrative burdens for small businesses because they would be forced to double check documents like Social Security cards, driver’s licenses and federal identification numbers to make sure they were not counterfeit.

“I think this is going to place a tremendous hardship on employers,” Garcia said. “It will require a lot more work for the little guy, and he already has enough to do.”

Garcia said he was concerned it also would create a negative atmosphere for legal immigrants.

“The supporters of proposals like this say they’re not anti-immigrant, but I’m afraid that may be an unintended consequence,” Garcia said.

Holland said his main reasons for the bill were economic. He said he had begun to hear from several construction company officials, particularly in the Kansas City area, who believed they were facing unfair competition from illegal immigrants.

Officials with several Douglas County construction companies said Wednesday that they didn’t believe the problem had become widespread in the Lawrence area.

“It is nothing that has been discussed at any of our meetings,” said Bobbie Flory, executive director of the Lawrence Homebuilders Assn. “But we definitely agree that everybody needs to be competing on a level playing field.”

David Reynolds, president of Lawrence-based Apple Tree Homes, said he hadn’t seen a problem with illegal workers in the Lawrence market. But he said he knew it was a problem in other parts of the country, especially the South.

Reynolds said he would prefer to see the industry police itself but said increasing the fines might be appropriate.

“It would definitely make someone think twice about breaking the law,” Reynolds said.

Jim DeHoff, executive director of the Kansas AFL-CIO, said the labor union was supportive of Holland’s proposal.

“We think this is an issue that is going to have to be addressed one of these days,” DeHoff said. “What you’re seeing is that you were once able to make a nice living in some of these trades, but now it is tough. It is slowly eroding this country’s middle class.”

The bill number is HB 2818.