Food and clothes, for those fearful of leaving home. Transportation and accompaniment, for those needing to attend court hearings. Observation and documentation, where federal immigration authorities are active.

Several dozen community members are banding together in a growing group called Bowling Green Community Defense to provide these and other supports for people here, especially immigrants targeted by the Trump administration’s national ramp-up of aggressive immigration enforcement tactics.

“No one in our community should be afraid to live their life, go to work or take their kids to school,” said Ayla Newton, a mother of two who’s lived here since 2013 and operates two businesses.

“It’s about making sure our neighbors aren’t facing that fear alone, and I care about this because I live here. These are my neighbors.”

The volunteers, who began coalescing as a group after last April’s Hands Off protest, held their first public meeting recently. There’s an urgency to train members so they can pitch in quickly, safely and responsibly — and get the word out about its hotline, 270-681-2598, so people in need can get their help.

Federal immigration authorities overall have been fairly quiet in the city, said group media liaison Wyatt Southerland, who juggles the volunteering with school at Southcentral Kentucky Community & Technical College and work in the entertainment sector. But recent information from their network has them anticipating an increase in immigration authority operations in the near future, he said.

“We believe that Bowling Green is made up of everybody here — (…) citizens, permanent residents, asylum seekers, refugees and undocumented people — and we’re committed to protecting all of our neighbors from illegal actions,” Southerland said.

“We want to empower people to act in whatever ways they feel like they can. We want people to lean into their strengths.”

The group uses its hotline and network to collect up-to-date information on sightings of Immigration and Customs Enforcement. When they find people experiencing immigration raids or harassment from law enforcement, they observe, document and protest, Southerland said.

The group has also accompanied around a dozen people to immigration court, ICE appointments, other federal buildings as needed, as well as a biometrics site in Nashville for fingerprinting, said member Cathy Severns, who separately helps lead the local group SOKY Indivisible.

A necessary element, group leaders said, is community support — bringing clothing, food other needed resources to those who struggle to access them.

Newton recalled one group who was targeted by racial slurs at a local factory. They fear deportation because of their skin color and no longer felt safe staying at their job, she said — and so, people will call Bowling Green Community Defense to seek out resources while protecting their families.

For Allen County resident Brittany Sperriko, who works full time in the city, this has meant spending any time not working to support others through the group.

It has meant coordinating weekly with a food pantry and church to serve Latinos afraid to go out for food; participating in a warm clothing drive, where remaining clothes went to a local public school where kids needed socks and gloves; making an hour-plus drive up to Grayson County — where numerous ICE detainees have been reported — to speak for two minutes on behalf of immigrant community members to the county’s jailer, magistrates and judge-executive.

“I really feel like silence is permission, and we don’t owe compliance to terror or injustice,” Sperriko said. “We should do everything that we (…) can to ensure we aren’t complying (…).”