PORTLAND – A spokeswoman for the Department of Homeland Security said Thursday that leaving five Hispanic men at a Portland homeless shelter – rather than leaving them to fend for themselves on the streets – was “a humanitarian gesture.”

“We determined that they were neither a national security nor a public safety risk,” Paula Graettinger, a public affairs officer for Immigration and Customs Enforcement in Boston, said Thursday. “They were released on their own recognizance [by the Office of Detention and Removal] and had no cash or means to secure other arrangements.”

The men were dropped off on Friday night at the Oxford Street Homeless Shelter in Portland after spending 46 days in jail on federal charges.

No one notified city officials, however, that the men needed assistance, Gerry Cayer, director of Portland’s Department of Health and Human Services, said Thursday.

“The principal issue is the federal government’s total disregard of local government,” he told a Portland newspaper on Wednesday. “It’s the Department of Homeland Security not appreciating other levels of government as they go through their work.”

Julio Cesar Erazo, 45, Roberto Erazo-Santos, 44, and Carlos Ernesto Vasquez-Espana, 50, all of El Salvador, and Jose Alfonso Vasquez-Rodiguez, 25, and Fernando Garcia, 38, both of Honduras, were arrested on Sept. 26 outside a residence on Houlton Road in Mars Hill after a border patrol agent on routine patrol saw them lying on the ground.

They were sentenced on Thursday, Nov. 11, in U.S. District Court in Bangor to time served after they waived indictment and pleaded guilty to possessing fake Social Security cards and fake resident alien cards.

Only three of the men stayed at the shelter on Wednesday night, Cayer said Thursday. He said that he did not know where the other two were staying now.

Cayer said the men all had been issued work visas and were looking for jobs.

Maine’s two U.S. senators asked the Department of Homeland Security to explain why the men were dropped off at the shelter after Cayer called their local offices.

U.S. Sen. Olympia J. Snowe asked DHS Secretary Tom Ridge to outline the procedures for the detainment, transportation and deportation of individuals who are determined to be in the country illegally.

“Individuals who unlawfully enter the United States should not be released on their own recognizance with the expectation to appear for deportation at a later time,” Snowe said on Wednesday in a press release.

U.S. Sen. Susan Collins also asked the department “to examine current policy and whether the city should bear the burden of providing shelter for individuals in similar situations.”

Cayer said Thursday that his “recent conversations” with homeland security officials had been encouraging.

“We’ve discussed how in the future they could be communicating to us locally so we’re part of the solution rather than feeling ‘dumped’ on,” he said. “We all have to appreciate that migrant workers are part of the Maine economy and any regional immigration service had to acknowledge that these folks are part of the state of Maine. We have to be equipped and prepared to do the right thing.”

Typically, immigration officials detain illegal workers after they have completed their sentences, Jon Haddow, the Bangor attorney who represented Erazo said on Wednesday.

In similar cases handled in federal court, illegal immigrants and workers have been taken to Connecticut for deportation hearings and then returned to their native countries.

Graettinger denied Thursday that the men’s release was unusual. She could not recall, however, the last time illegal immigrants had been released in Maine in a similar manner. Grettinger also did not know when the men might be facing deportation hearings before an immigration judge.

U.S. District Judge John Woodcock last week sealed the courtroom for a few minutes during the sentencings to consider evidence presented by the U.S. Attorney’s Office concerning a sentence recommendation.

“There is no reason to believe in this case that these individuals face any kind of harm being in the community,” U.S. Attorney Paula Silsby said Thursday in a phone interview.