A study released last week shows that Beaufort County's Mexican immigrant population has nearly doubled since 2000. To some this news is a full-speed-ahead signal to pass a county law discouraging the employment of illegal immigrants.

Despite the fast-paced growth from 2,168 in 1990 to 11,912 in 2005 (449 percent), the County Council should reset the clock on the proposed regulations whose wording seems to change each time a committee or the council meets. Council passed the second of three readings of the ordinance almost immediately after changing the wording.

A legal opinion requested by council Chairman Weston Newton is expected soon. "We need a knowledgeable opinion of someone who is well-versed in this area rather than relying on an ordinance in a small town in Pennsylvania where a judge has already issued a temporary restraining order," Newton said recently at the council's Community Services and Public Safety Committee.

Seeking the opinion should tell the council whether it is on a reliable path, basing its ordinance in part on one approved in Hazleton, Pa, where a federal judge has issued a temporary restraining order blocking it from going into effect. But if a federal judge has reservations, the Beaufort County Council also should have reservations, even without an expensive legal opinion.

The most worrisome details in the process are:

Some members of the council might understand the ordinance, but the public doesn't, and the wording changes often. Even the name of the document has changed from the Illegal Immigration Relief Ordinance to the Lawful Employment Ordinance.

The lineup has changed in the elected body where the real authority for illegal immigration rest, and the regulations governing them are likely to change, too, after Democrats take charge of Congress in January.

President Bush and Nancy Pelosi, who will become House Speaker in January, have said changes are coming and probably will include a mechanism to earn legalization and citizenship. That news should be reason enough to hold off on passage.

No matter how much applause council members receive, they should start the process over, listening in the meantime to what Congress is saying and then to what residents of Beaufort County say at public hearings.