PROVIDENCE — A panel monitoring implementation of Governor Carcieri’s executive order on illegal immigration will hold a hastily convened meeting tomorrow to discuss members’ concerns that they were unaware that federal immigration agents were raiding state courthouses midway through the panel’s first meeting on July 15.

In an e-mail sent on Tuesday to panel members, Vice Chairwoman Deborah A. Smith of the Governor’s Office of External Affairs said the meeting is being convened “because of the unfortunate controversy surrounding our first meeting earlier in the month, and the many questions left unanswered as we face the need to protect and serve the legal immigrant community of Rhode Island.” The Journal obtained a copy of Smith’s e-mail yesterday.

Federal Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents, accompanied by state police, arrested 31 suspected illegal immigrant maintenance workers at simultaneous “enforcement actions” at six courthouses at 5 p.m. on July 15. TriState Enterprises and Falcon Maintenance, state contractors, supplied the workers who now face non-criminal charges of being in the country illegally.

The 27-member Governor’s Panel on the Implementation of the Illegal Immigration Executive Order will hold its public meeting at 1 p.m. at the state Department of Administration, across the street from the State House, said Carcieri spokeswoman Amy Kempe. She said Carcieri does not plan to attend, having announced at the first meeting that he would attend future meetings only if he is asked.

Meanwhile, Bruno Sukys, director of the International Institute of Rhode Island’s Feinstein Center, said he is resigning from the panel and does not plan to attend tomorrow’s meeting.

The Journal has also learned that members of the Governor’s Commission on Hispanic/Latino Affairs — a smaller, long-existing advisory group — have drafted, but not yet submitted, a group resignation letter. Sukys is also a member of that commission.

Sukys and Jaime Aguayo, retired from the Small Business Administration, both said that a majority of commissioners “all signed [the draft resignation letter] collectively last week.” The Rev. Eliseo Nogueras, commission chair, declined comment.

“I’m out of here. I’m resigning from both of them,” said Sukys, referring to both the advisory panel and the Hispanic/Latino affairs commission. “For him [Carcieri] blaming the undocumented, the illegal aliens, we felt he was just using that as an excuse” for the state’s economic woes. “It’s their fault — all the politicians — for not being able to work together, and solve problems.”

Sukys said that after Carcieri “ignored” the Hispanic/Latino commission, he hoped that the larger, more diverse panel “had a better shot.” But the coinciding courthouse raids and advisory panel meeting “was too much. We just lost trust.”

Kempe, the governor’s spokeswoman, reiterated yesterday that “the advisory panel meeting was scheduled well in advance” of the ICE arrests at the courthouses, and that the timing of the courthouse arrests and the meeting “are coincidence.”

But the Rev. Donald Anderson, executive director of the Rhode Island State Council of Churches and member of the governor’s executive order advisory group, said, “The governor’s office was given a general heads up a couple days before the raid. The meeting was already set.

“Evidently there was some discussion about what to do about the meeting in case — they didn’t know the precise time — but they knew these [two events] could happen very close. There was some discussion, should they keep the meeting at same time? Postpone it?”

Ultimately the decision was to keep the meeting at its scheduled time, said Mr. Anderson, who suggested the panel raise questions as to “why law enforcement couldn’t let us know during the meeting” that the courthouse arrests were under way. (State police Col. Brendan Doherty, a panel member, was at the meeting, as was Carcieri.)

Mr. Anderson noted that “calls were flying around on cell phones” throughout the state “as soon as the first arrests took place.” He said that “one or two” panel members received calls near the end of the meeting … “and I received a call at about 8:30 p.m., but we realized at that point there wasn’t much that could be done.”

Mr. Anderson said questions about the coinciding events led to “some behind-the-scenes conversations” and a meeting he attended last week with Smith, the vice chair, and retired Rear Adm. Joseph Strausser, panel chairman, and several other panel members.

“The people that I have talked to are all hopeful we can resolve the concerns over the timing of the sweep being coincidental with the meeting of the panel,” Mr. Anderson said.

Although Mr. Anderson said he has “heard rumors that there were some members of the panel who might resign over the timing of the sweep and our meeting, my feeling is that this panel is our best venue for getting good and helpful and productive conversation around the immigration issue. So my strong hope is that that we can figure out a way to resolve this problem.”

He added, “I want to stay at the table until I’m absolutely convinced we can’t get any good out of this.”

The Rabbi Alan Flam, head of the Rhode Island State Board of Rabbis, said while he has heard “that the most effective thing would be to resign … I said at this point, I’d like to think the panel can do something that’s useful.”

Rabbi Flam said while he still opposes the governor’s order, “it doesn’t mean as an advisory panel we can’t talk and understand the very complicated dimensions this has. I don’t think it was the governor’s intention to hurt families.”

kziner@projo.com