Big Bend Gazette
June 3, 2011
[missed this story when it was initially published]
by John Waters
The proposed border wall/fence for Presidio County along the international boundary with Mexico has been scrapped, according to Department of Homeland Security officials.
Earlier last month during a speech in El Paso, President Obama declared the proposed fencing/wall as mandated by the Secure Fence Act of 2006 “basically finished.”
In response to a query from the Gazette, Bill Brooks, Public Information Officer for U.S. Customs and Border Protection’s Marfa Sector said, “We have no fence under construction in Marfa Sector. The Presidio proposed fence will not be constructed.” Brooks added that a lack of funding doomed completion of the project.
In 2008 as mandated by the Secure Fence Act, the Department of Homeland Security announced six miles of concrete wall would be placed atop levees near the international bridge between Ojinaga and Presidio.
When cost estimates of $20 million per mile were received, the project was placed on hold. Precisely when the project was terminated is unclear, although Brooks confirmed no public announcement of the project’s termination was made.
Cynta de Narvaez of Terlingua exclaimed, “Yippee!” when told of the wall’s demise. “We used every method in any civilian’s arsenal—from hall meetings, to honking at placards, to letter writing, to using the media—to try to inform the agencies responsible for our security that the wall was irrational in every way, and they completely ignored us. If there is going to be mutual respect, then we must keep the relationship clean. They should be accountable to us for their misinformed policies; they should acknowledge their bad choices—and then we can all move on.”
http://bigbendgazette.com/2011/06/03/homeland-security-officials-confirm-thatpresidio-border-wall-is-dead/
Showing posts with label Big Bend. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Big Bend. Show all posts
Tuesday, November 13, 2012
Monday, October 24, 2011
How to Build a Deadly Electric Border Fence
Mother Jones
October 24, 2011
Tim Murphy
Two Saturdays ago, Republican presidential candidate Herman Cain floated an idea to dramatically curb illegal immigration: build an electrified fence along the US-Mexico border that could kill people who try to cross it. The next day, he told NBC's David Gregory that he was joking. That Monday, he reverted to his original proposal after a summit with Arizona sheriff Joe Arpaio. On Tuesday, at the GOP presidential debate in Las Vegas, Cain reiterated that he had been joking, but he refused to dismiss the idea of constructing an electrified barrier across the length of the border.
So could the United States really build an electrified fence along the entire length of the Mexican border? And how much would it cost?
First off, you'd have to build lots of fences. Dale Stoutenburg, mechanical technician with Gallagher Security—a multinational fence manufacturer that provides electrified barriers for ports, corrections facilities, and ranches—says the company is capable of building fences up to 75 miles long. If nothing else, they're pretty easy to power—given that the southern border is a desert, solar panels would provide a self-sufficient energy source. Stoutenburg says a panel the size of a big-screen TV could power a 50-mile stretch of 3,000-volt fence.
But from there, things quickly get complicated. Generally speaking, electrified security fences aren't designed to provide a lethal shock. "We refer to it as a 'safe but memorable' pulse; you don't want to attempt to climb it, but it's safe," says Nathan Leaphart, CFO of Electric Guard Dog, a South Carolina-based company that makes perimeter electric security fences. "Really, the lethal electric fence market is extremely small. To my understanding it's only for like maximum security prison-type situations. Occasionally, will see it on the local news, but frankly no one's ever asked me to build one."
Killing someone with an electric fence takes a good deal of engineering. It has a lot less to do with voltage than the force of the current. If the current isn't strong enough, the shockee might just keep on climbing—and if the current is too strong, the chances of it being lethal start to go back down. At 200 milliamps of current you might end up with third degree burns and be knocked unconscious for a bit, but on the upside, you'll be thrown off the fence almost immediately.
So if you really want a lethal fence, you'll need a sustained current (as opposed to a pulse, which switches on and off every couple of seconds) that's low enough so that the shockee will essentially be paralyzed and unable to release his or her grip, thereby staying on the fence long enough to killed. That kind of killer shock happens from time to time with livestock, which become entangled in electrified fences and die from the extended electrocution. Cain's proposed fence also calls for barbed wire on the top, which is not recommended for electric fences because of the risk that animals or people will become trapped on the fence. But in this case, since lethality is the goal, it would actually be a benefit.
If President Cain decided to go ahead with the construction of an entirely new fence the length of the border, he would run into another fairly significant hurdle: water. The Rio Grande doubles as the international border from El Paso to the Gulf of Mexico. It's anything but an unmovable line in the sand: In 2008, it rose 27 feet in some places and left parts of the Big Bend region in West Texas underwater. If an electrified fence is submerged, it could be rendered functionally useless.
"The fence would still try to power through the water to get through that, but it'd be bogged down so hard the shock value wouldn't be worth nothing," Stoutenburg says. Also, he says, "The real problem is moving water and what it carries with it." A downed power line or any large object in the floodwaters could function as a battering ram against the fence. Another problem is that a fence along the river could turn into a dam when the river spills over, potentially altering the course of the Rio Grande—and the border itself. "That would be very hard to control and unengineer and fix, and would be in violation of treaties with Mexico," says Matt Clark, of Defenders of Wildlife in Arizona, which monitors environmental issues in the Southwest.
So how much would this electrified border fence cost? First, you'd need to build a new fence from scratch; you couldn't simply run a wire through the existing stretches of fence. "We really can't electrify an existing fence," Leaphart says. "Just the way these electrical pulses work, you can't make it operate in something that's built in the manner that a chain link fence is built. It's an independent fence and you have to have isolated wires that are kept off of holes to keep them from [wearing] out. It really does have to be built separately."
Cain, along with Rep. Michele Bachmann, has specified that the fence should extend across the entire southern border and should be contiguous (as opposed to the "virtual fence" of surveillance cameras and drones the feds use in some parts). The border with Mexico is about 2,000 miles long, stretching from Brownsville, Texas, on the Gulf of Mexico to San Diego on the Pacific. But the per-mile cost of building a fence can fluctuate significantly—anywhere from $2 million to $70 million per mile depending on the terrain and the style of fence. It's relatively easy to get construction equipment and laborers to operate it in San Diego; it's a lot harder to get it into the middle of Cabeza Prieta National Wildlife Refuge in Arizona. And no one's even tried to come up with a cost estimate for a fence through Big Bend National Park, which hugs 244 miles of the border in Texas. Much of that route is inaccessible to vehicle traffic, and a lot of it is inaccessible even by foot. Especially the part of the border that's a giant canyon
From the Border Patrol's perspective, there is no need for a fence in these kinds of inaccessible or inhospitable areas; the unrelenting desert is a sufficient obstacle. The agency maintains that only 652 miles of the southern border actually need a man-made physical deterrent; 649 miles of barriers and fences have already been installed.
So what's the bottom line? A 2006 Congressional Research Service report (PDF) found that the total cost of building and maintaining a fence along 700 miles of the border could be as high as $50 billion. The New York Times pegged it at about $22.4 billion to complete a contiguous border fence for the other 1,400 miles—and that's not including the cost of purchasing land. Those two calculations are a bit imprecise and based on different sets of assumptions—Cain himself might say they're "apples and oranges"—but they're at least a starting point. You might realistically peg the cost of a second fence, this one with a near-continuous electric pulse capable of killing a human, at certainly no less than $75 billion. And unlike the Great Wall of China, which Cain has previously floated as a model, the fence he's talking about building is only expected to last 20 to 25 years.
On the plus side, that makes the money spent on warning signs look like lunch money. As Cain noted, the electric border fence would have to have "a sign on the other side that says, 'It can kill you!'" But for liability purposes, you would want signs on both sides of the border, since the fence wouldn't discriminate between unlucky American citizens and foreigners. Leaphart's company recommends placing a warning sign every 50 to 100 feet. For the entire length of the border, that adds up to about 106,000 signs per side. Using the conservative assumption that the signs would cost $100 apiece, they'd cost $21.2 million. It's also considered standard practice to construct a barrier such as a nonelectric chain-link fence in front of the electrified fence, to prevent accidents.
To Cain's credit, there are precedents for constructing an electrified fence along the length of an international border. North Korea maintains its 151-mile demilitarized zone with South Korea through a combination of deadly electrified fences and land mines. India has built hundreds of miles of electrified fences through Kashmir to stop militants from smuggling weapons (though the project took 15 years). And ironically, Uzbekistan, which Cain recently referred to dismissively as "Ubeki-beki-beki-beki-stan-stan," has built a 380-volt electrified fence along its 130-mile border with Afghanistan.
Update: Here's one last challenge, which applies to all border fences, but especially electric ones given the effe: how to deal with the Rio Grande's tributaries? The Pecos River, for instance, flows for 926 miles, before emptying into the Rio Grande.
http://motherjones.com/politics/2011/10/herman-cain-border-electric-fence
October 24, 2011
Tim Murphy
Two Saturdays ago, Republican presidential candidate Herman Cain floated an idea to dramatically curb illegal immigration: build an electrified fence along the US-Mexico border that could kill people who try to cross it. The next day, he told NBC's David Gregory that he was joking. That Monday, he reverted to his original proposal after a summit with Arizona sheriff Joe Arpaio. On Tuesday, at the GOP presidential debate in Las Vegas, Cain reiterated that he had been joking, but he refused to dismiss the idea of constructing an electrified barrier across the length of the border.
So could the United States really build an electrified fence along the entire length of the Mexican border? And how much would it cost?
First off, you'd have to build lots of fences. Dale Stoutenburg, mechanical technician with Gallagher Security—a multinational fence manufacturer that provides electrified barriers for ports, corrections facilities, and ranches—says the company is capable of building fences up to 75 miles long. If nothing else, they're pretty easy to power—given that the southern border is a desert, solar panels would provide a self-sufficient energy source. Stoutenburg says a panel the size of a big-screen TV could power a 50-mile stretch of 3,000-volt fence.
But from there, things quickly get complicated. Generally speaking, electrified security fences aren't designed to provide a lethal shock. "We refer to it as a 'safe but memorable' pulse; you don't want to attempt to climb it, but it's safe," says Nathan Leaphart, CFO of Electric Guard Dog, a South Carolina-based company that makes perimeter electric security fences. "Really, the lethal electric fence market is extremely small. To my understanding it's only for like maximum security prison-type situations. Occasionally, will see it on the local news, but frankly no one's ever asked me to build one."
Killing someone with an electric fence takes a good deal of engineering. It has a lot less to do with voltage than the force of the current. If the current isn't strong enough, the shockee might just keep on climbing—and if the current is too strong, the chances of it being lethal start to go back down. At 200 milliamps of current you might end up with third degree burns and be knocked unconscious for a bit, but on the upside, you'll be thrown off the fence almost immediately.
So if you really want a lethal fence, you'll need a sustained current (as opposed to a pulse, which switches on and off every couple of seconds) that's low enough so that the shockee will essentially be paralyzed and unable to release his or her grip, thereby staying on the fence long enough to killed. That kind of killer shock happens from time to time with livestock, which become entangled in electrified fences and die from the extended electrocution. Cain's proposed fence also calls for barbed wire on the top, which is not recommended for electric fences because of the risk that animals or people will become trapped on the fence. But in this case, since lethality is the goal, it would actually be a benefit.
If President Cain decided to go ahead with the construction of an entirely new fence the length of the border, he would run into another fairly significant hurdle: water. The Rio Grande doubles as the international border from El Paso to the Gulf of Mexico. It's anything but an unmovable line in the sand: In 2008, it rose 27 feet in some places and left parts of the Big Bend region in West Texas underwater. If an electrified fence is submerged, it could be rendered functionally useless.
"The fence would still try to power through the water to get through that, but it'd be bogged down so hard the shock value wouldn't be worth nothing," Stoutenburg says. Also, he says, "The real problem is moving water and what it carries with it." A downed power line or any large object in the floodwaters could function as a battering ram against the fence. Another problem is that a fence along the river could turn into a dam when the river spills over, potentially altering the course of the Rio Grande—and the border itself. "That would be very hard to control and unengineer and fix, and would be in violation of treaties with Mexico," says Matt Clark, of Defenders of Wildlife in Arizona, which monitors environmental issues in the Southwest.
So how much would this electrified border fence cost? First, you'd need to build a new fence from scratch; you couldn't simply run a wire through the existing stretches of fence. "We really can't electrify an existing fence," Leaphart says. "Just the way these electrical pulses work, you can't make it operate in something that's built in the manner that a chain link fence is built. It's an independent fence and you have to have isolated wires that are kept off of holes to keep them from [wearing] out. It really does have to be built separately."
Cain, along with Rep. Michele Bachmann, has specified that the fence should extend across the entire southern border and should be contiguous (as opposed to the "virtual fence" of surveillance cameras and drones the feds use in some parts). The border with Mexico is about 2,000 miles long, stretching from Brownsville, Texas, on the Gulf of Mexico to San Diego on the Pacific. But the per-mile cost of building a fence can fluctuate significantly—anywhere from $2 million to $70 million per mile depending on the terrain and the style of fence. It's relatively easy to get construction equipment and laborers to operate it in San Diego; it's a lot harder to get it into the middle of Cabeza Prieta National Wildlife Refuge in Arizona. And no one's even tried to come up with a cost estimate for a fence through Big Bend National Park, which hugs 244 miles of the border in Texas. Much of that route is inaccessible to vehicle traffic, and a lot of it is inaccessible even by foot. Especially the part of the border that's a giant canyon
From the Border Patrol's perspective, there is no need for a fence in these kinds of inaccessible or inhospitable areas; the unrelenting desert is a sufficient obstacle. The agency maintains that only 652 miles of the southern border actually need a man-made physical deterrent; 649 miles of barriers and fences have already been installed.
So what's the bottom line? A 2006 Congressional Research Service report (PDF) found that the total cost of building and maintaining a fence along 700 miles of the border could be as high as $50 billion. The New York Times pegged it at about $22.4 billion to complete a contiguous border fence for the other 1,400 miles—and that's not including the cost of purchasing land. Those two calculations are a bit imprecise and based on different sets of assumptions—Cain himself might say they're "apples and oranges"—but they're at least a starting point. You might realistically peg the cost of a second fence, this one with a near-continuous electric pulse capable of killing a human, at certainly no less than $75 billion. And unlike the Great Wall of China, which Cain has previously floated as a model, the fence he's talking about building is only expected to last 20 to 25 years.
On the plus side, that makes the money spent on warning signs look like lunch money. As Cain noted, the electric border fence would have to have "a sign on the other side that says, 'It can kill you!'" But for liability purposes, you would want signs on both sides of the border, since the fence wouldn't discriminate between unlucky American citizens and foreigners. Leaphart's company recommends placing a warning sign every 50 to 100 feet. For the entire length of the border, that adds up to about 106,000 signs per side. Using the conservative assumption that the signs would cost $100 apiece, they'd cost $21.2 million. It's also considered standard practice to construct a barrier such as a nonelectric chain-link fence in front of the electrified fence, to prevent accidents.
To Cain's credit, there are precedents for constructing an electrified fence along the length of an international border. North Korea maintains its 151-mile demilitarized zone with South Korea through a combination of deadly electrified fences and land mines. India has built hundreds of miles of electrified fences through Kashmir to stop militants from smuggling weapons (though the project took 15 years). And ironically, Uzbekistan, which Cain recently referred to dismissively as "Ubeki-beki-beki-beki-stan-stan," has built a 380-volt electrified fence along its 130-mile border with Afghanistan.
Update: Here's one last challenge, which applies to all border fences, but especially electric ones given the effe: how to deal with the Rio Grande's tributaries? The Pecos River, for instance, flows for 926 miles, before emptying into the Rio Grande.
http://motherjones.com/politics/2011/10/herman-cain-border-electric-fence
Friday, July 1, 2011
Border fence replacement set to wrap up July 22
Nogales International
July 1, 2011
by Jonathan Clark
Construction crews are putting the finishing touches on a border fence replacement project in Nogales that has been a technically challenging but assault-free experience for workers, authorities said Thursday.
With only a quarter-mile left to go on the 2.8-mile fence, Granite Construction is slated to wrap up the $11.6-million project on July 22, said Sabri Dikman, acting patrol agent in charge at the Nogales Border Patrol Station. Work began in early March.
Speaking at a press conference at the corner of Nelson and East International streets, Dikman called the replacement of the landing-mat barrier with a bigger, stronger bollard-style fence, “a project that is significant to the community of Nogales and the Border Patrol agents who work in Nogales.”
“This is going to be able to provide our agents the ability to see potential threats that approach the border, and be able to proactively react to those threats,” he said as a crane hoisted a panel of see-though, interconnected-tube fencing into place on the hillside behind him.
But while agents have faced assaults – especially rock-throwings – from hoodlums in Nogales, Sonora who have used the flat-panel landing-mat fence as cover, no construction workers on the project have been assaulted, Dikman said.
Mike Tatusko, projective executive for Granite Construction, confirmed that his crews have been kept well protected and safe.
“(Security) was something we addressed and were very mindful of daily, but CBP has given us great support and we haven’t had any issues,” he said.
As the old fence came down across from the Buenos Aires neighborhood on the east side of Nogales, Sonora, crowds of dozens of people would gather to watch. Tatusko said the observers came out of curiosity – or to try to salvage bits of the old fence – but didn’t abuse the workers physically or verbally.
“We had no issues whatsoever,” he said.
The rugged terrain of central Nogales presented plenty of issues, however, as the Granite crews worked to access and dig into the steep and rocky hillsides. “That’s almost a 60-percent grade right there,” Tatusko said, pointing to the hill above Nelson Street.
“In more forgiving areas, we can do up to two or three miles in a week,” he said. “When it’s situations like this, it might be two or three (eight-foot) panels a day.”
Do’s and don’ts
The new fence is grounded by a six-foot-deep concrete footer, and while there are no drainage tubes built into the footer, Tatusko said, there are drainage ways and gates built sporadically along the fence to help with runoff during coming monsoon rains.
The construction of those gates has also proved to be a challenge, as so even after the old fence was torn down, workers have had to leave a few spots covered with temporary barriers as they continue on, Dikman told the Nogales International.
“That’s a vulnerability and they certainly take advantage of it. So that’s why we’ve seen activity in those specific areas where, as they build and construct, there are some gaps,” he said. “On July 22, those will all be gone.”
Some residents east and west of town have expressed concern that a more impenetrable border barrier in Nogales will push more illegal activity into outlying areas. Dikman said the completed fence would allow the Border Patrol to focus more on those trouble spots.
“As the fence is completed, we’re able to adjust our resources to meet any potential threats to the east or the west, or the more remote areas,” he said.
Dikman also reaffirmed the Border Patrol’s hands-off approach when it comes to people who want to socialize with friends or relatives across the new see-through barrier.
“As long as they’re not passing persons or contraband across the fence, we welcome the cross-border communications,” he said.
A Sonoran reporter asked Dikman if the Border Patrol would allow artists in Mexico to hang artwork on the south side of the fence – such as the community mural painted on the landing-mat fence west of the DeConcini Port that was saved from demolition. But Dikman said his agency couldn’t allow anything to obstruct the sight lines through the fence.
“We don’t advocate … that people damage or alter the fence,” he said. “It’s owned by the United States government.”
http://www.nogalesinternational.com/articles/2011/07/01/news/doc4e0dec0099af4443536252.txt
July 1, 2011
by Jonathan Clark
Construction crews are putting the finishing touches on a border fence replacement project in Nogales that has been a technically challenging but assault-free experience for workers, authorities said Thursday.
With only a quarter-mile left to go on the 2.8-mile fence, Granite Construction is slated to wrap up the $11.6-million project on July 22, said Sabri Dikman, acting patrol agent in charge at the Nogales Border Patrol Station. Work began in early March.
Speaking at a press conference at the corner of Nelson and East International streets, Dikman called the replacement of the landing-mat barrier with a bigger, stronger bollard-style fence, “a project that is significant to the community of Nogales and the Border Patrol agents who work in Nogales.”
“This is going to be able to provide our agents the ability to see potential threats that approach the border, and be able to proactively react to those threats,” he said as a crane hoisted a panel of see-though, interconnected-tube fencing into place on the hillside behind him.
But while agents have faced assaults – especially rock-throwings – from hoodlums in Nogales, Sonora who have used the flat-panel landing-mat fence as cover, no construction workers on the project have been assaulted, Dikman said.
Mike Tatusko, projective executive for Granite Construction, confirmed that his crews have been kept well protected and safe.
“(Security) was something we addressed and were very mindful of daily, but CBP has given us great support and we haven’t had any issues,” he said.
As the old fence came down across from the Buenos Aires neighborhood on the east side of Nogales, Sonora, crowds of dozens of people would gather to watch. Tatusko said the observers came out of curiosity – or to try to salvage bits of the old fence – but didn’t abuse the workers physically or verbally.
“We had no issues whatsoever,” he said.
The rugged terrain of central Nogales presented plenty of issues, however, as the Granite crews worked to access and dig into the steep and rocky hillsides. “That’s almost a 60-percent grade right there,” Tatusko said, pointing to the hill above Nelson Street.
“In more forgiving areas, we can do up to two or three miles in a week,” he said. “When it’s situations like this, it might be two or three (eight-foot) panels a day.”
Do’s and don’ts
The new fence is grounded by a six-foot-deep concrete footer, and while there are no drainage tubes built into the footer, Tatusko said, there are drainage ways and gates built sporadically along the fence to help with runoff during coming monsoon rains.
The construction of those gates has also proved to be a challenge, as so even after the old fence was torn down, workers have had to leave a few spots covered with temporary barriers as they continue on, Dikman told the Nogales International.
“That’s a vulnerability and they certainly take advantage of it. So that’s why we’ve seen activity in those specific areas where, as they build and construct, there are some gaps,” he said. “On July 22, those will all be gone.”
Some residents east and west of town have expressed concern that a more impenetrable border barrier in Nogales will push more illegal activity into outlying areas. Dikman said the completed fence would allow the Border Patrol to focus more on those trouble spots.
“As the fence is completed, we’re able to adjust our resources to meet any potential threats to the east or the west, or the more remote areas,” he said.
Dikman also reaffirmed the Border Patrol’s hands-off approach when it comes to people who want to socialize with friends or relatives across the new see-through barrier.
“As long as they’re not passing persons or contraband across the fence, we welcome the cross-border communications,” he said.
A Sonoran reporter asked Dikman if the Border Patrol would allow artists in Mexico to hang artwork on the south side of the fence – such as the community mural painted on the landing-mat fence west of the DeConcini Port that was saved from demolition. But Dikman said his agency couldn’t allow anything to obstruct the sight lines through the fence.
“We don’t advocate … that people damage or alter the fence,” he said. “It’s owned by the United States government.”
http://www.nogalesinternational.com/articles/2011/07/01/news/doc4e0dec0099af4443536252.txt
Monday, December 8, 2008
Mexico planting own 'green wall' along border
Austin-American Statesman
December 7, 2008
CIUDAD ACUA, Coahuila — Tractor-trailers rumble across the bridge above, but down on the Rio Grande, it's a peaceful autumn morning as ducks paddle the river and herons glide from bank to bank.
On the U.S. side of the river, in Del Rio , plans are moving ahead for a controversial security wall that will eventually stretch across 670 miles of the southwest border.
But on the Mexican side, authorities have begun work on an entirely different kind of wall: a so-called green wall, made of 400,000 trees to be planted along 217 miles of the Rio Grande.
Eventually, Mexican leaders hope the green wall will stretch the entire length of Mexico's shared border with Texas.
Officials in the state of Coahuila, where the project is beginning, call the green wall a rejection of the U.S. border barrier. The local Mexican officials hope the clusters of cypress, mesquite and ash trees will stand in stark contrast to the concrete and steel fencing being erected by the U.S. Homeland Security Department.
"This is a signal of protest, but it's also an opportunity for dialogue to find shared solutions to the question of immigration," said Gabriela de Valle del Bosque , Coahuila's environmental policy coordinator .
De Valle said the green wall will be an opportunity to bring more environmental consciousness to Mexican border communities. Area residents also will participate in riverside cleanups and classes on ecology and recycling.
Local officials hope the green wall will bring more attention to environmental worries associated with the U.S. border wall, particularly the migration of species such as white-tailed deer.
"If they put in the wall, Mexicans will find another way to get across, but the deer and other animals are not going to find a solution like Mexicans will," said Carlos Lombardo Gomez, who is in charge of technical matters associated with the green wall.
Coahuila Gov. Humberto Moreira said the green wall will result in Mexico's longest parkland corridor.
Moreira is no stranger to grand gestures. His administration has garnered national headlines in Mexico by ushering in a gay marriage law and has promised a state death penalty for murderous kidnappers, even though Mexico now outlaws the death penalty.
At a ceremony marking the start of the green wall, Moreira blasted the U.S. border barrier as a "wall of hate."
U.S. officials say the border fence is needed to bolster security along the southwest border. And supporters of the U.S. border wall warn that Mexico's green version could potentially aid drug runners and human smugglers.
Jim Gilchrist, president of the Minuteman Project, a U.S. activist group that monitors the border flow of illegal immigrants, said the green wall will "provide effective camouflage for criminal drug and human cargo cartels as they mass their illicit products behind the tree lines, awaiting delivery into the U.S. under cover of darkness."
So far, the state of Coahuila, which extends opposite Big Bend National Park almost to the outskirts of Laredo, has planted 2,500 trees along 25 miles of border. The state has approved about $1 million for the tree-planting program. Plans would extend the green wall in other border states such as Tamaulipas and Chihuahua.
The U.S. border wall is unpopular along much of the Texas border and has been opposed by most border communities in the state.
Despite that opposition, federal officials say that 90 percent to 95 percent of the 670-mile barrier should be completed or under construction before President Bush's term ends in January.
The City of Eagle Pass recently lost a court battle against the U.S. government over the border fence, and construction has begun near the city's downtown. Mayor Chad Foster , one of the border wall's most outspoken critics, said he doubts the change of administrations will halt the wall.
"I don't think President-elect Obama will take office soon enough to impact (the) damage being done in our town," Foster said.
So far, 426 miles of pedestrian and vehicle fencing have been built, according to the Homeland Security Department, but that includes just 25 miles in Texas.
Federal officials plan to build 116 miles in the state.
In Mexico, few think the green wall will have any real impact on the U.S. border barrier, but local residents are happy that it will bring more green spaces and parks.
Arturo de la Cruz Talavera, who runs daily at a park beneath the international bridge in Ciudad Acuña, is looking forward to the day when the green wall saplings grow into mature trees.
"The green wall is in favor of life, it will create oxygen," he said. "It's not like the steel wall, which just rejects."
http://www.statesman.com/news/content/news/stories/world/12/07/1207mexgreenwall.html
December 7, 2008
CIUDAD ACUA, Coahuila — Tractor-trailers rumble across the bridge above, but down on the Rio Grande, it's a peaceful autumn morning as ducks paddle the river and herons glide from bank to bank.
On the U.S. side of the river, in Del Rio , plans are moving ahead for a controversial security wall that will eventually stretch across 670 miles of the southwest border.
But on the Mexican side, authorities have begun work on an entirely different kind of wall: a so-called green wall, made of 400,000 trees to be planted along 217 miles of the Rio Grande.
Eventually, Mexican leaders hope the green wall will stretch the entire length of Mexico's shared border with Texas.
Officials in the state of Coahuila, where the project is beginning, call the green wall a rejection of the U.S. border barrier. The local Mexican officials hope the clusters of cypress, mesquite and ash trees will stand in stark contrast to the concrete and steel fencing being erected by the U.S. Homeland Security Department.
"This is a signal of protest, but it's also an opportunity for dialogue to find shared solutions to the question of immigration," said Gabriela de Valle del Bosque , Coahuila's environmental policy coordinator .
De Valle said the green wall will be an opportunity to bring more environmental consciousness to Mexican border communities. Area residents also will participate in riverside cleanups and classes on ecology and recycling.
Local officials hope the green wall will bring more attention to environmental worries associated with the U.S. border wall, particularly the migration of species such as white-tailed deer.
"If they put in the wall, Mexicans will find another way to get across, but the deer and other animals are not going to find a solution like Mexicans will," said Carlos Lombardo Gomez, who is in charge of technical matters associated with the green wall.
Coahuila Gov. Humberto Moreira said the green wall will result in Mexico's longest parkland corridor.
Moreira is no stranger to grand gestures. His administration has garnered national headlines in Mexico by ushering in a gay marriage law and has promised a state death penalty for murderous kidnappers, even though Mexico now outlaws the death penalty.
At a ceremony marking the start of the green wall, Moreira blasted the U.S. border barrier as a "wall of hate."
U.S. officials say the border fence is needed to bolster security along the southwest border. And supporters of the U.S. border wall warn that Mexico's green version could potentially aid drug runners and human smugglers.
Jim Gilchrist, president of the Minuteman Project, a U.S. activist group that monitors the border flow of illegal immigrants, said the green wall will "provide effective camouflage for criminal drug and human cargo cartels as they mass their illicit products behind the tree lines, awaiting delivery into the U.S. under cover of darkness."
So far, the state of Coahuila, which extends opposite Big Bend National Park almost to the outskirts of Laredo, has planted 2,500 trees along 25 miles of border. The state has approved about $1 million for the tree-planting program. Plans would extend the green wall in other border states such as Tamaulipas and Chihuahua.
The U.S. border wall is unpopular along much of the Texas border and has been opposed by most border communities in the state.
Despite that opposition, federal officials say that 90 percent to 95 percent of the 670-mile barrier should be completed or under construction before President Bush's term ends in January.
The City of Eagle Pass recently lost a court battle against the U.S. government over the border fence, and construction has begun near the city's downtown. Mayor Chad Foster , one of the border wall's most outspoken critics, said he doubts the change of administrations will halt the wall.
"I don't think President-elect Obama will take office soon enough to impact (the) damage being done in our town," Foster said.
So far, 426 miles of pedestrian and vehicle fencing have been built, according to the Homeland Security Department, but that includes just 25 miles in Texas.
Federal officials plan to build 116 miles in the state.
In Mexico, few think the green wall will have any real impact on the U.S. border barrier, but local residents are happy that it will bring more green spaces and parks.
Arturo de la Cruz Talavera, who runs daily at a park beneath the international bridge in Ciudad Acuña, is looking forward to the day when the green wall saplings grow into mature trees.
"The green wall is in favor of life, it will create oxygen," he said. "It's not like the steel wall, which just rejects."
http://www.statesman.com/news/content/news/stories/world/12/07/1207mexgreenwall.html
Friday, October 31, 2008
Amigos, Divided: Along the Texas-Mexico border, security fencing impacts more than illegal immigration
The Yale Globalist
October 30, 2008
In Eagle Pass, Texas, familiar faces greet each other with “Hey y’all” and “Hola amigos” from beneath the brims of Stetson hats and sombre- ros. This border city boasts the closest relationship with its neighbors across the Rio Grande of any municipality in the Lone Star State.
Eagle Pass is just across a bridge from Piedras Negras, Mexico. While the towns lie in two countries, they have operated as one community for generations.
But as the United States Department of Homeland Security (DHS) constructs a fence along the southern U.S. border in an attempt to combat illegal immigration, these vecinos y amigos—neighbors and friends—will face more than a physical divide.
Eagle Pass and the Peso
Zapopan Rodriguez Moran crossed the international bridge connecting Eagle Pass and Piedras Negras, her young niece tagging along in the humid Texas heat.
“We cross into Eagle Pass one or two times a week,” she said, fidgeting for her papers before arriving at Border Patrol. “It helps us buy things for a little bit cheaper.”
The businesses of Commercial Street in the heart of Eagle Pass receive 90 percent of their market from Mexican shoppers, who cross the bridge to buy products ranging from Western wear to tortillas.
Eagle Grocery, located on Commercial Street, is one of many Eagle Pass businesses dependent on the peso. Owners Benny and Angie Rodriguez said that even though fencing between the cities will not directly impede legal foot traffic, they are worried about the “ill feelings” the barrier could generate.
“The wall is more of an emotional barrier than it is a physical barrier,” said Angie Rodriguez. “Just seeing it will in fact send a message to the Mexicans that they are not welcome.”
Rodriguez is one of many Texas residents opposed to the fence because of the threat it could pose to maintaining amicable relations with Mexico and its citizens.
Where There’s a Will There’s a Wall
Moran returned to Piedras Negras hours lat- er with grocery bags in hand. As she passed over the riverbank of the Rio Grande, hidden Border Patrol officials eyed the tall grasses for any traces of illegal crossings.
Standing on the bridge with a clear view of the two towns, Moran wondered out loud how a fence might change their longstanding friendship. “We are not sure how it will af- fect us,” she admitted apprehensively. “Our Leaders of many Texas border towns have fought fervently against the fence. They argue that the Rio Grande, which has served as a natural boundary between Texas and Mexico since 1848, should be reinforced with technology and security before the government resorts to physical barriers. neighbors in Texas used to embrace us with friendship, but now I think everything will change.”
Chad Foster, mayor of Eagle Pass, has been fighting this change from the start. He explained how the Department of Homeland Security came to Eagle Pass in January 2006 to give a presentation to the city council, pro- posing a number of new border patrol measures.
These measures were part of the Secure Fence Act of 2006, which authorized the con- struction of double-reinforced steel fencing and the installation of lighting, cameras, ve- hicle barriers, and other security measures along the U.S.-Mexico border. At a cost of $49 billion, the Secure Fence Act mandates the construction of 700 miles of fencing through- out the 1,200 miles of border dividing the U.S. and Mexico.
The city council agreed to all proposals except for one: they firmly rejected the idea that a fence might divide Eagle Pass from Piedras Negras.
Foster said DHS officials returned to Eagle Pass in 2007 with a compromise plan that did not include the fence provision. The proposal passed on a three-two vote.
When the mayor asked the two dissenting council members why they voted against the plan, they said they did not trust DHS. Twelve days later, government representatives insisted their hands were tied by the Secure Fence Act, which allows for the construction of physical barriers regardless of objections by local communities. Fence construction would proceed as originally proposed.
Foster worked with the Texas Border Coalition, a group of elected officials from El Paso to Brownsville, on two separate letters of objection. Neither received a response.
“The first time Eagle Pass got a letter, we were sued for 233 acres of land to begin the project,” Foster said of the ex parte lawsuit filed by DHS in January 2008. “We were sucker-punched.”
The Texas Border Coalition punched back, suing the Department of Homeland Security, but ultimately Foster lost the fight.
City Attorney Eddie Morales said Eagle Pass officials ultimately gave DHS right of entry to the property because they deter- mined it would be “impossible” to win their case against the government.
The United States Army Corps of Engi- neers and DHS have now begun construction on 1.5 miles of fencing in Eagle Pass, a project they aim to complete to “a point of no return” by December 2008.
Salt Cedar Security
The Department of Homeland Security claims that the fence, in combination with doubling the size of border patrol and up- grading to the newest technologies, will help prevent undocumented immigrants, terrorist threats, and illegal substances from crossing the border.
“The bottom line that people need to rec- ognize is that the operational need for the fence is driving our priorities here,” DHS spokesperson laura Keehner told the Glo- balist. “Community activists and landowners need to understand that this is something that is operationally necessary for national security.”
According to DHS, the fence will force illegal traffic to pass through the miles of border left unfenced, which will improve the monitoring capabilities of Border Patrol.
Project construction stages vary across the border, but Keehner explained that fencing progress in California, Arizona, and New Mexico is much further along than in Texas.
Leaders of many Texas border towns have fought fervently against the fence. They argue that the Rio Grande, which has served as a natural boundary between Texas and Mexico since 1848, should be reinforced with technology and security before the govern- ment resorts to physical barriers.
“Our position is that security is a priority, but we feel we can secure Texas if we eradicate the cane and salt cedar and update our technology,” Foster said in reference to the nonnative brush lining the Rio Grande that provides a hiding spot for undocumented immigrants.
Foster offered an explanation for the disconnect with decision-makers in Washington. “San Diego, California is the only border sector with a Congressional liaison office in Washington, and the only border area that Congress officials can take a direct flight to,” Foster said. “Congress officials return from their visits to San Diego thinking they’ve seen a representative sector of the border, when that is far from the truth.” He accused the government of applying blanket policies like the fence that overlook the inherent differences between the Texas-Mexico border and other border regions.
From Fighting to Adjusting
Despite objections by local officials, construction is under way and already impact- ing every citizen in Eagle Pass.
Since flood planes prevent construction along the river, DHS must build through pri- vate property and public grounds to meet its construction goal in Eagle Pass. Conse- quently, the new border fence will separate the city from its public park and divide Eagle Pass from the intake system for its water supply.
Robert Gonzales, general manager of the Eagle Pass Water Works System, originally fought against the fence, but now that con- struction is underway, he is working with DHS to assure the water intake system is preserved.
“There is no question that most every- body would not want to have the wall, but how we feel and think about it versus how we can address it in the best, most sensible way are obviously two different things,” Gonzales said. “If we’re going to get it one way or another, we might as well look into the seriousness of it and how we’re going to try to adjust.”
Rick Chisum, an Eagle Pass resident who leases the land that holds the biweekly flea market near the bridge to Piedras Niegras, is considering how he will adapt to the changes the fence will bring.
“My business will be affected in the sense that the Mexicans will not feel as welcome,” Chisum said. “I was thinking about putting a pole in the market with the Mexican flag to encourage the people on the other side of the border that we are with them.
Division versus Diplomacy
While Gonzales and Chisum work to ad- just to a new reality in Eagle Pass, the debate over the fence continues among politicians and diplomats who fear the effect it will have on the relationship between Mexico and the United States.
“A fence alone won’t protect us from those who want to harm us,” said Representative Bennie Thompson, chairman of the Commit- tee on Homeland Security of the U.S. House of Representatives. “Even DHS has come to realize that we need an integrated approach that combines personnel, equipment, tech- nology and infrastructure.”
Meanwhile, Juan Manuel Nungaray, minister of North American Relations for the Office of Foreign Affairs in Mexico City, emphasized the importance of diplomacy, rather than division, in Mexican-American relations.
“The fence is only a political move,” he said. “The U.S. government knows they need immigration, but this is a concession to con- servatives before the 2008 election to show them that they are doing something about immigration.”
Nungaray continued, “The wall will not curb immigration. People will pass through difficult pathways, which will lead to more deaths, but they will continue to go because many can make a better life for themselves there.”
Nungaray, whose three brothers immi- grated to the U.S., said the upcoming administration must consider its relationship with Mexico to be a cooperative partnership of supply and demand.
“Somos vecinos y amigos,” he said, ex- tending his hand. “We are neighbors and friends.”
Handshakes and Heartaches
In northern Mexico, Mayor Foster shared a handshake and a hug with Jesus Mario Flores Garza, then-mayor of Piedras Negras, as they sat down to discuss the fence.
“The relationship between Eagle Pass and Piedras Negras will definitely change,” Garza said. “Our customs come from many years of being united, and our ways of life will not be the same.”
“This is una verguenza,” Foster said. “A disgrace.” “I respect the rights of the U.S. to protect itself, but there are many ways besides walls to protect a country,” Garza, a close colleague and friend of Foster, continued.“Walls have long been a part of history, and they always fall, they always fail.”
Catherine Cheney is a junior Political Science and International Studies double major in Trumbull College and a senior editor for the Globalist.
http://tyglobalist.org/index.php/20081030141/Features/Amigos-Divided.html
October 30, 2008
In Eagle Pass, Texas, familiar faces greet each other with “Hey y’all” and “Hola amigos” from beneath the brims of Stetson hats and sombre- ros. This border city boasts the closest relationship with its neighbors across the Rio Grande of any municipality in the Lone Star State.
Eagle Pass is just across a bridge from Piedras Negras, Mexico. While the towns lie in two countries, they have operated as one community for generations.
But as the United States Department of Homeland Security (DHS) constructs a fence along the southern U.S. border in an attempt to combat illegal immigration, these vecinos y amigos—neighbors and friends—will face more than a physical divide.
Eagle Pass and the Peso
Zapopan Rodriguez Moran crossed the international bridge connecting Eagle Pass and Piedras Negras, her young niece tagging along in the humid Texas heat.
“We cross into Eagle Pass one or two times a week,” she said, fidgeting for her papers before arriving at Border Patrol. “It helps us buy things for a little bit cheaper.”
The businesses of Commercial Street in the heart of Eagle Pass receive 90 percent of their market from Mexican shoppers, who cross the bridge to buy products ranging from Western wear to tortillas.
Eagle Grocery, located on Commercial Street, is one of many Eagle Pass businesses dependent on the peso. Owners Benny and Angie Rodriguez said that even though fencing between the cities will not directly impede legal foot traffic, they are worried about the “ill feelings” the barrier could generate.
“The wall is more of an emotional barrier than it is a physical barrier,” said Angie Rodriguez. “Just seeing it will in fact send a message to the Mexicans that they are not welcome.”
Rodriguez is one of many Texas residents opposed to the fence because of the threat it could pose to maintaining amicable relations with Mexico and its citizens.
Where There’s a Will There’s a Wall
Moran returned to Piedras Negras hours lat- er with grocery bags in hand. As she passed over the riverbank of the Rio Grande, hidden Border Patrol officials eyed the tall grasses for any traces of illegal crossings.
Standing on the bridge with a clear view of the two towns, Moran wondered out loud how a fence might change their longstanding friendship. “We are not sure how it will af- fect us,” she admitted apprehensively. “Our Leaders of many Texas border towns have fought fervently against the fence. They argue that the Rio Grande, which has served as a natural boundary between Texas and Mexico since 1848, should be reinforced with technology and security before the government resorts to physical barriers. neighbors in Texas used to embrace us with friendship, but now I think everything will change.”
Chad Foster, mayor of Eagle Pass, has been fighting this change from the start. He explained how the Department of Homeland Security came to Eagle Pass in January 2006 to give a presentation to the city council, pro- posing a number of new border patrol measures.
These measures were part of the Secure Fence Act of 2006, which authorized the con- struction of double-reinforced steel fencing and the installation of lighting, cameras, ve- hicle barriers, and other security measures along the U.S.-Mexico border. At a cost of $49 billion, the Secure Fence Act mandates the construction of 700 miles of fencing through- out the 1,200 miles of border dividing the U.S. and Mexico.
The city council agreed to all proposals except for one: they firmly rejected the idea that a fence might divide Eagle Pass from Piedras Negras.
Foster said DHS officials returned to Eagle Pass in 2007 with a compromise plan that did not include the fence provision. The proposal passed on a three-two vote.
When the mayor asked the two dissenting council members why they voted against the plan, they said they did not trust DHS. Twelve days later, government representatives insisted their hands were tied by the Secure Fence Act, which allows for the construction of physical barriers regardless of objections by local communities. Fence construction would proceed as originally proposed.
Foster worked with the Texas Border Coalition, a group of elected officials from El Paso to Brownsville, on two separate letters of objection. Neither received a response.
“The first time Eagle Pass got a letter, we were sued for 233 acres of land to begin the project,” Foster said of the ex parte lawsuit filed by DHS in January 2008. “We were sucker-punched.”
The Texas Border Coalition punched back, suing the Department of Homeland Security, but ultimately Foster lost the fight.
City Attorney Eddie Morales said Eagle Pass officials ultimately gave DHS right of entry to the property because they deter- mined it would be “impossible” to win their case against the government.
The United States Army Corps of Engi- neers and DHS have now begun construction on 1.5 miles of fencing in Eagle Pass, a project they aim to complete to “a point of no return” by December 2008.
Salt Cedar Security
The Department of Homeland Security claims that the fence, in combination with doubling the size of border patrol and up- grading to the newest technologies, will help prevent undocumented immigrants, terrorist threats, and illegal substances from crossing the border.
“The bottom line that people need to rec- ognize is that the operational need for the fence is driving our priorities here,” DHS spokesperson laura Keehner told the Glo- balist. “Community activists and landowners need to understand that this is something that is operationally necessary for national security.”
According to DHS, the fence will force illegal traffic to pass through the miles of border left unfenced, which will improve the monitoring capabilities of Border Patrol.
Project construction stages vary across the border, but Keehner explained that fencing progress in California, Arizona, and New Mexico is much further along than in Texas.
Leaders of many Texas border towns have fought fervently against the fence. They argue that the Rio Grande, which has served as a natural boundary between Texas and Mexico since 1848, should be reinforced with technology and security before the govern- ment resorts to physical barriers.
“Our position is that security is a priority, but we feel we can secure Texas if we eradicate the cane and salt cedar and update our technology,” Foster said in reference to the nonnative brush lining the Rio Grande that provides a hiding spot for undocumented immigrants.
Foster offered an explanation for the disconnect with decision-makers in Washington. “San Diego, California is the only border sector with a Congressional liaison office in Washington, and the only border area that Congress officials can take a direct flight to,” Foster said. “Congress officials return from their visits to San Diego thinking they’ve seen a representative sector of the border, when that is far from the truth.” He accused the government of applying blanket policies like the fence that overlook the inherent differences between the Texas-Mexico border and other border regions.
From Fighting to Adjusting
Despite objections by local officials, construction is under way and already impact- ing every citizen in Eagle Pass.
Since flood planes prevent construction along the river, DHS must build through pri- vate property and public grounds to meet its construction goal in Eagle Pass. Conse- quently, the new border fence will separate the city from its public park and divide Eagle Pass from the intake system for its water supply.
Robert Gonzales, general manager of the Eagle Pass Water Works System, originally fought against the fence, but now that con- struction is underway, he is working with DHS to assure the water intake system is preserved.
“There is no question that most every- body would not want to have the wall, but how we feel and think about it versus how we can address it in the best, most sensible way are obviously two different things,” Gonzales said. “If we’re going to get it one way or another, we might as well look into the seriousness of it and how we’re going to try to adjust.”
Rick Chisum, an Eagle Pass resident who leases the land that holds the biweekly flea market near the bridge to Piedras Niegras, is considering how he will adapt to the changes the fence will bring.
“My business will be affected in the sense that the Mexicans will not feel as welcome,” Chisum said. “I was thinking about putting a pole in the market with the Mexican flag to encourage the people on the other side of the border that we are with them.
Division versus Diplomacy
While Gonzales and Chisum work to ad- just to a new reality in Eagle Pass, the debate over the fence continues among politicians and diplomats who fear the effect it will have on the relationship between Mexico and the United States.
“A fence alone won’t protect us from those who want to harm us,” said Representative Bennie Thompson, chairman of the Commit- tee on Homeland Security of the U.S. House of Representatives. “Even DHS has come to realize that we need an integrated approach that combines personnel, equipment, tech- nology and infrastructure.”
Meanwhile, Juan Manuel Nungaray, minister of North American Relations for the Office of Foreign Affairs in Mexico City, emphasized the importance of diplomacy, rather than division, in Mexican-American relations.
“The fence is only a political move,” he said. “The U.S. government knows they need immigration, but this is a concession to con- servatives before the 2008 election to show them that they are doing something about immigration.”
Nungaray continued, “The wall will not curb immigration. People will pass through difficult pathways, which will lead to more deaths, but they will continue to go because many can make a better life for themselves there.”
Nungaray, whose three brothers immi- grated to the U.S., said the upcoming administration must consider its relationship with Mexico to be a cooperative partnership of supply and demand.
“Somos vecinos y amigos,” he said, ex- tending his hand. “We are neighbors and friends.”
Handshakes and Heartaches
In northern Mexico, Mayor Foster shared a handshake and a hug with Jesus Mario Flores Garza, then-mayor of Piedras Negras, as they sat down to discuss the fence.
“The relationship between Eagle Pass and Piedras Negras will definitely change,” Garza said. “Our customs come from many years of being united, and our ways of life will not be the same.”
“This is una verguenza,” Foster said. “A disgrace.” “I respect the rights of the U.S. to protect itself, but there are many ways besides walls to protect a country,” Garza, a close colleague and friend of Foster, continued.“Walls have long been a part of history, and they always fall, they always fail.”
Catherine Cheney is a junior Political Science and International Studies double major in Trumbull College and a senior editor for the Globalist.
http://tyglobalist.org/index.php/20081030141/Features/Amigos-Divided.html
Monday, September 29, 2008
Border wall sparks big debate in small town
San Antonio Express-News
September 29, 2008
By Hernan Rozemberg
PRESIDIO — This tiny border city in the Chihuahuan Desert has steered clear of international political controversy since the Mexican Revolution nearly a century ago, when Pancho Villa set up his headquarters in Ojinaga, across the Rio Grande, after capturing the town in a bloody assault.
But although people here are now mostly worried about a major flood threat after massive water releases from Mexican reservoirs, their attention might soon return to the issue that for months has placed them amid the uproar known as the border fence.
The Department of Homeland Security is following a congressional mandate to erect nearly 700 miles of barriers along the 1,952-mile border with Mexico by the end of this year. Some 346 miles are in place.
The move has drawn opposition up and down the border, with national attention focused on the fierce legal showdown taking place in South Texas, where many border landowners are fighting government efforts to condemn land for the project.
Hundreds of miles away in the middle of the desert, Presidio hasn't made national headlines, though a similar outcry is taking place over plans to build 6 miles of fencing to straddle the international bridge here.
With about 5,000 people and the only legal crossing point between El Paso and Del Rio, it's not known as a hub for illegal activity. It's in the Border Patrol's Marfa Sector, the agency's largest — with 510 miles of border — but by far its least active.
In the fiscal year that ends Tuesday, the sector has seen 4,741 illegal crossers detained and nearly 54,665 pounds of marijuana and cocaine seized. That pales in comparison with areas such as the Rio Grande Valley Sector, where agents have netted 94,225 crossers and 387,241 pounds of drugs.
In Presidio, the Border Patrol wanted to replace river levees — federal property, no private land affected — with guardrail-topped concrete walls. But the agency put the project on hold when bids estimated the cost at $20 million per mile, or about $120 million in total.
Going back to the drawing board, the government intends to ask engineers to retool the wall design to bring costs down. But construction has now been pushed back to July 1 thanks to that and flood delays, said Angela De Rocha, a Border Patrol spokeswoman in Washington.
Neither De Rocha nor Bill Brooks, spokesman for the Marfa Sector, would comment on why the agency deemed Presidio, a small town in no man's land, an “urban area” akin to other border cities targeted for fencing, such as Laredo and Brownsville.
But Brooks and his bosses spoke at length for months to the local media and in public meetings on why they sought fencing in Presidio.
Actually, they had asked for fencing for years, even before Congress approved the move two years ago. They said the concrete wall would both protect low-lying areas in Presidio from flooding and push illegal crossers and drug traffickers away from downtown, making them easier targets for border agents.
“It only takes a couple of minutes, and once (crossers) get into the community then they're lost to us,” Brooks told the Marfa-based Big Bend Sentinel in May. “So the point of the fence is to make them go around.”
Many community leaders and local residents said they'd reluctantly buy the anti-flooding argument. But try the national security claim and they scoff.
“I'm completely against the concept of fencing the border,” said Presidio County Judge Jerry Agan, who ended a 29-year career with the Border Patrol in 1999 as deputy chief of the Marfa Sector. “They've done quite a few things that have gotten away from the agency's mission, such as the fence.”
Other officials, from the Presidio city manager to chamber of commerce board members, concurred with Agan's assessment, arguing that a fence would go against the area's historic rapprochement — Presidio is composed mostly of Mexicans who migrated north of the river from Ojinaga.
The Mexican government has consistently labeled the move a slap in the face to cross-border partnership.
Raul Acosta, who has served for two years as the Mexican consul in Presidio, said strained relations would be devastating, since in such a desolate region, the border towns lead an “existence in complete mutual dependence.”
Presidio's reliance on Mexican shoppers became evident in recent weeks, as major floods in Ojinaga closed the international bridge, leaving stores along Presidio's main drag nearly empty.
The bridge is still closed, and folks in Presidio now are without ready access to health services — most typically seek treatment in Ojinaga, since the closest clinic on the U.S. side is 250 miles away in Odessa.
Terry Bishop, who moved to Presidio when he was a teenager and now runs his family's 2,000-acre farm, as well as a golf course, is against the fence politically, but can accept it as a flood-control measure.
“They're going to build it no matter what, so let's at least try to do something right with it,” said Bishop, 54, who leases portions of his property, which is next to the levee, to the government.
A mile or so up the road, preparing to throw just-sliced pork chops on the grill, Polo Pérez was not so willing to give the Border Patrol the benefit of the doubt.
As he saw it, resources are scarce in these parts, and it would make sense that the government invest its millions not in a border fence but in common-sense, needed projects, said Pérez, 50, who is married with three children.
Most roads, such as his, are dirt or gravel and could use paving, he said as two pickups drove by, kicking up plumes of dust. And it would be great to have a local hospital, he added.
That's just for starters — if the government wants it, he could quickly make a longer list, Pérez said.
http://www.mysanantonio.com/news/state/29873619.html
September 29, 2008
By Hernan Rozemberg
PRESIDIO — This tiny border city in the Chihuahuan Desert has steered clear of international political controversy since the Mexican Revolution nearly a century ago, when Pancho Villa set up his headquarters in Ojinaga, across the Rio Grande, after capturing the town in a bloody assault.
But although people here are now mostly worried about a major flood threat after massive water releases from Mexican reservoirs, their attention might soon return to the issue that for months has placed them amid the uproar known as the border fence.
The Department of Homeland Security is following a congressional mandate to erect nearly 700 miles of barriers along the 1,952-mile border with Mexico by the end of this year. Some 346 miles are in place.
The move has drawn opposition up and down the border, with national attention focused on the fierce legal showdown taking place in South Texas, where many border landowners are fighting government efforts to condemn land for the project.
Hundreds of miles away in the middle of the desert, Presidio hasn't made national headlines, though a similar outcry is taking place over plans to build 6 miles of fencing to straddle the international bridge here.
With about 5,000 people and the only legal crossing point between El Paso and Del Rio, it's not known as a hub for illegal activity. It's in the Border Patrol's Marfa Sector, the agency's largest — with 510 miles of border — but by far its least active.
In the fiscal year that ends Tuesday, the sector has seen 4,741 illegal crossers detained and nearly 54,665 pounds of marijuana and cocaine seized. That pales in comparison with areas such as the Rio Grande Valley Sector, where agents have netted 94,225 crossers and 387,241 pounds of drugs.
In Presidio, the Border Patrol wanted to replace river levees — federal property, no private land affected — with guardrail-topped concrete walls. But the agency put the project on hold when bids estimated the cost at $20 million per mile, or about $120 million in total.
Going back to the drawing board, the government intends to ask engineers to retool the wall design to bring costs down. But construction has now been pushed back to July 1 thanks to that and flood delays, said Angela De Rocha, a Border Patrol spokeswoman in Washington.
Neither De Rocha nor Bill Brooks, spokesman for the Marfa Sector, would comment on why the agency deemed Presidio, a small town in no man's land, an “urban area” akin to other border cities targeted for fencing, such as Laredo and Brownsville.
But Brooks and his bosses spoke at length for months to the local media and in public meetings on why they sought fencing in Presidio.
Actually, they had asked for fencing for years, even before Congress approved the move two years ago. They said the concrete wall would both protect low-lying areas in Presidio from flooding and push illegal crossers and drug traffickers away from downtown, making them easier targets for border agents.
“It only takes a couple of minutes, and once (crossers) get into the community then they're lost to us,” Brooks told the Marfa-based Big Bend Sentinel in May. “So the point of the fence is to make them go around.”
Many community leaders and local residents said they'd reluctantly buy the anti-flooding argument. But try the national security claim and they scoff.
“I'm completely against the concept of fencing the border,” said Presidio County Judge Jerry Agan, who ended a 29-year career with the Border Patrol in 1999 as deputy chief of the Marfa Sector. “They've done quite a few things that have gotten away from the agency's mission, such as the fence.”
Other officials, from the Presidio city manager to chamber of commerce board members, concurred with Agan's assessment, arguing that a fence would go against the area's historic rapprochement — Presidio is composed mostly of Mexicans who migrated north of the river from Ojinaga.
The Mexican government has consistently labeled the move a slap in the face to cross-border partnership.
Raul Acosta, who has served for two years as the Mexican consul in Presidio, said strained relations would be devastating, since in such a desolate region, the border towns lead an “existence in complete mutual dependence.”
Presidio's reliance on Mexican shoppers became evident in recent weeks, as major floods in Ojinaga closed the international bridge, leaving stores along Presidio's main drag nearly empty.
The bridge is still closed, and folks in Presidio now are without ready access to health services — most typically seek treatment in Ojinaga, since the closest clinic on the U.S. side is 250 miles away in Odessa.
Terry Bishop, who moved to Presidio when he was a teenager and now runs his family's 2,000-acre farm, as well as a golf course, is against the fence politically, but can accept it as a flood-control measure.
“They're going to build it no matter what, so let's at least try to do something right with it,” said Bishop, 54, who leases portions of his property, which is next to the levee, to the government.
A mile or so up the road, preparing to throw just-sliced pork chops on the grill, Polo Pérez was not so willing to give the Border Patrol the benefit of the doubt.
As he saw it, resources are scarce in these parts, and it would make sense that the government invest its millions not in a border fence but in common-sense, needed projects, said Pérez, 50, who is married with three children.
Most roads, such as his, are dirt or gravel and could use paving, he said as two pickups drove by, kicking up plumes of dust. And it would be great to have a local hospital, he added.
That's just for starters — if the government wants it, he could quickly make a longer list, Pérez said.
http://www.mysanantonio.com/news/state/29873619.html
Sunday, September 14, 2008
River draws a muddy line on Texas' unfenced border
Associated Press / Houston Chronicle
September 14, 2008
REDFORD, Texas — The Rio Grande takes a wide southern detour when it hits West Texas, as if unwilling to draw too straight a line between the U.S. and Mexico. Locals along this remote stretch of shallow river share the feeling.
People living on both sides of the Big Bend, as the curve is known, are glad to be mostly skipped over by plans for 700 miles of new fence along the U.S.-Mexico border — even if their unspoiled desert boundary risks drawing more illegal traffic as the rest of the line is sealed off.
"The river doesn't divide us here," said local historian Enrique Madrid, raising his voice over the joyful screams of kids, from both sides of Rio Grande, whacking at a pinata during a recent birthday party in the tiny river hamlet of Redford.
"We've crossed it long before the United States existed," he continued. "And we'll be crossing it a long time after the United States disappears."
New walls are doubling up existing barriers in California, closing wide desert valleys in Arizona and New Mexico and fencing off more populated areas of the South Texas riverbank. The new construction will leave some 630 miles along the Big Bend as the longest unfenced piece of southern U.S. frontier.
Here the Rio Grande cuts an elegantly simple border, splitting the two countries into cane-choked banks or towering limestone cliffs. The wet line in the sand means nothing to the desert's circling buzzards and migrating black bears, but it complicates life for the two-nation families and isolated local economies that need both halves of this desert to survive.
Redford, a knot of adobe homes and alfalfa fields some 300 miles downriver from El Paso, made headlines in 1997 when U.S. Marines on a secret anti-drug mission mistakenly gunned down a local high school student, Esequiel Hernandez, Jr., as he herded goats along the Texas bank.
His death prompted the cancellation of U.S. military anti-drug operations amid heated debate over whether soldiers trained to kill foreign enemies can sort friend from foe along America's often uncertain edges.
The alliances are tangled even within Hernandez's own family: A brother has pleaded guilty to smuggling immigrants, while a nephew is applying to the Border Patrol.
Such is life along this skinny stretch of the river, where native peoples built the first settlement on the site of present-day Redford around 1200 A.D.
Local residents crossed freely with the Border Patrol's tacit permission until 2001. Following the 9/11 attacks, agents declared the crossing closed and blockaded its bank with a few small boulders.
The rocks do not stop Amado Bustamante, 79, who lives across from Redford in the Mexican village of El Mulato, from wading across once a month to buy a box of lard.
"It's cheaper" on the Texas side, he said with a smile. "And they haven't caught us yet."
With only 373 agents to cover 510 miles of river, the Border Patrol's Marfa Sector tends to play its defense well behind the line, focusing on highway checkpoints between the border and Interstate 10, a hundred miles or more to the north. Agents also patrol back roads through mountain ranges stretching as much as 5,000 feet above both sides of the river. They visit traditional crossings like Redford as time permits.
"Nature has kindly fenced a lot of this area for us," says Chief Patrol Agent John Smietana.
"We're not able to cover, or even get to, the river in a lot of places on a regular basis. So it is possible to cross the river very easily in some of those places. The hard part is then getting from the river up to one of the roads to get away."
Anecdotal evidence suggests more migrants and smugglers may be willing to try.
Trend-spotting is difficult in the Big Bend since its relatively small enforcement numbers can be tipped by one big bust. But marijuana seizures are up 16 percent this year while the Border Patrol has rescued 11 stranded migrants — more saved than any year on record, though still a trickle compared to the hundreds rescued each year farther west in Arizona.
Other indicators are harder to miss. Ojinaga, a small Mexican border city across from Presidio, just upriver from Redford, has seen an unheard-of 10 drug-related killings so far this year — the last two in a midday hail of bullets on a main street.
The violence has kept to the Mexican side, even as the smuggling crosses over. In March, Border Patrol investigators broke up a local migrant smuggling operation that employed Francisco Hernandez, brother of the late Esequiel, and his wife, Paula.
Hernandez admitted bringing at least 29 migrants through the Redford crossing over the last three years, allegedly receiving $400 per person from the ringleader, Jose Franco of Odessa. Franco then paid a local cowboy to drive them on ranch roads around a Border Patrol checkpoint, according to court documents.
The cowboy was released without charge after helping investigators set up the sting that brought the group down. In August, Franco received a reduced 21-month sentence after testifying against the Hernandez couple, whose small Redford home faces likely government seizure. Both pleaded guilty to transporting illegal aliens, and face sentencing this month. Court documents allege Paula gave dry clothes to migrants after they crossed the river.
The cowboy — who spoke to The Associated Press on condition of anonymity for fear of retribution from others involved — said word had spread quickly of an easy crossing on the Big Bend's back roads, where migrants did not need to risk a long desert hike or crowd dangerously into sealed tractor-trailers.
"Word of mouth would get around that not only was it safe, but they were treated well," the cowboy said. Migrants generally rode north on the floor of a Chevy Suburban with a sheet over their heads, he said. "They weren't wrapped up in carpets. They were fed. They were able to go to the bathroom."
Smuggling wages are tempting in Presidio County, one of the poorest in the country, where a third of the 8,000 residents live in poverty.
A year after Esequiel's death, the Hernandez family won a $1.9 million wrongful death settlement from the government. But the money was set aside to care for his aging parents, and Francisco never saw much of it, according to his older brother Margarito Hernandez, Sr., a police officer in Presidio.
Francisco "doesn't have a steady job, and he's got five kids," said Margarito. "Those are factors people will take advantage of, if they know you're in need."
The Border Patrol now plans to double its Marfa Sector agents and install vehicle barriers at 30 illegal Big Bend crossings, including Redford's. Six miles of proposed fence flanking Presidio have been postponed after construction bids came in over budget.
But these barriers will not stop locals from splashing through a boundary their forebears have crossed for centuries.
Margarito Hernandez Jr., son of the Presidio policeman, remembers pedaling bikes with his cousins into the Rio Grande "just to see who could actually get to the other side."
Chatting at the birthday party, Margarito, 19, said he has applied to the Border Patrol and dreams of being posted to his family's often unpatrolled hometown as an agent who understands just how muddy a line the river can be.
He nodded his cowboy hat towards a low rise over the river where a white cross marks the spot Esequiel was killed.
"I don't see why an agent couldn't be up there on that hill."
http://www.chron.com/disp/story.mpl/ap/tx/6000736.html
September 14, 2008
REDFORD, Texas — The Rio Grande takes a wide southern detour when it hits West Texas, as if unwilling to draw too straight a line between the U.S. and Mexico. Locals along this remote stretch of shallow river share the feeling.
People living on both sides of the Big Bend, as the curve is known, are glad to be mostly skipped over by plans for 700 miles of new fence along the U.S.-Mexico border — even if their unspoiled desert boundary risks drawing more illegal traffic as the rest of the line is sealed off.
"The river doesn't divide us here," said local historian Enrique Madrid, raising his voice over the joyful screams of kids, from both sides of Rio Grande, whacking at a pinata during a recent birthday party in the tiny river hamlet of Redford.
"We've crossed it long before the United States existed," he continued. "And we'll be crossing it a long time after the United States disappears."
New walls are doubling up existing barriers in California, closing wide desert valleys in Arizona and New Mexico and fencing off more populated areas of the South Texas riverbank. The new construction will leave some 630 miles along the Big Bend as the longest unfenced piece of southern U.S. frontier.
Here the Rio Grande cuts an elegantly simple border, splitting the two countries into cane-choked banks or towering limestone cliffs. The wet line in the sand means nothing to the desert's circling buzzards and migrating black bears, but it complicates life for the two-nation families and isolated local economies that need both halves of this desert to survive.
Redford, a knot of adobe homes and alfalfa fields some 300 miles downriver from El Paso, made headlines in 1997 when U.S. Marines on a secret anti-drug mission mistakenly gunned down a local high school student, Esequiel Hernandez, Jr., as he herded goats along the Texas bank.
His death prompted the cancellation of U.S. military anti-drug operations amid heated debate over whether soldiers trained to kill foreign enemies can sort friend from foe along America's often uncertain edges.
The alliances are tangled even within Hernandez's own family: A brother has pleaded guilty to smuggling immigrants, while a nephew is applying to the Border Patrol.
Such is life along this skinny stretch of the river, where native peoples built the first settlement on the site of present-day Redford around 1200 A.D.
Local residents crossed freely with the Border Patrol's tacit permission until 2001. Following the 9/11 attacks, agents declared the crossing closed and blockaded its bank with a few small boulders.
The rocks do not stop Amado Bustamante, 79, who lives across from Redford in the Mexican village of El Mulato, from wading across once a month to buy a box of lard.
"It's cheaper" on the Texas side, he said with a smile. "And they haven't caught us yet."
With only 373 agents to cover 510 miles of river, the Border Patrol's Marfa Sector tends to play its defense well behind the line, focusing on highway checkpoints between the border and Interstate 10, a hundred miles or more to the north. Agents also patrol back roads through mountain ranges stretching as much as 5,000 feet above both sides of the river. They visit traditional crossings like Redford as time permits.
"Nature has kindly fenced a lot of this area for us," says Chief Patrol Agent John Smietana.
"We're not able to cover, or even get to, the river in a lot of places on a regular basis. So it is possible to cross the river very easily in some of those places. The hard part is then getting from the river up to one of the roads to get away."
Anecdotal evidence suggests more migrants and smugglers may be willing to try.
Trend-spotting is difficult in the Big Bend since its relatively small enforcement numbers can be tipped by one big bust. But marijuana seizures are up 16 percent this year while the Border Patrol has rescued 11 stranded migrants — more saved than any year on record, though still a trickle compared to the hundreds rescued each year farther west in Arizona.
Other indicators are harder to miss. Ojinaga, a small Mexican border city across from Presidio, just upriver from Redford, has seen an unheard-of 10 drug-related killings so far this year — the last two in a midday hail of bullets on a main street.
The violence has kept to the Mexican side, even as the smuggling crosses over. In March, Border Patrol investigators broke up a local migrant smuggling operation that employed Francisco Hernandez, brother of the late Esequiel, and his wife, Paula.
Hernandez admitted bringing at least 29 migrants through the Redford crossing over the last three years, allegedly receiving $400 per person from the ringleader, Jose Franco of Odessa. Franco then paid a local cowboy to drive them on ranch roads around a Border Patrol checkpoint, according to court documents.
The cowboy was released without charge after helping investigators set up the sting that brought the group down. In August, Franco received a reduced 21-month sentence after testifying against the Hernandez couple, whose small Redford home faces likely government seizure. Both pleaded guilty to transporting illegal aliens, and face sentencing this month. Court documents allege Paula gave dry clothes to migrants after they crossed the river.
The cowboy — who spoke to The Associated Press on condition of anonymity for fear of retribution from others involved — said word had spread quickly of an easy crossing on the Big Bend's back roads, where migrants did not need to risk a long desert hike or crowd dangerously into sealed tractor-trailers.
"Word of mouth would get around that not only was it safe, but they were treated well," the cowboy said. Migrants generally rode north on the floor of a Chevy Suburban with a sheet over their heads, he said. "They weren't wrapped up in carpets. They were fed. They were able to go to the bathroom."
Smuggling wages are tempting in Presidio County, one of the poorest in the country, where a third of the 8,000 residents live in poverty.
A year after Esequiel's death, the Hernandez family won a $1.9 million wrongful death settlement from the government. But the money was set aside to care for his aging parents, and Francisco never saw much of it, according to his older brother Margarito Hernandez, Sr., a police officer in Presidio.
Francisco "doesn't have a steady job, and he's got five kids," said Margarito. "Those are factors people will take advantage of, if they know you're in need."
The Border Patrol now plans to double its Marfa Sector agents and install vehicle barriers at 30 illegal Big Bend crossings, including Redford's. Six miles of proposed fence flanking Presidio have been postponed after construction bids came in over budget.
But these barriers will not stop locals from splashing through a boundary their forebears have crossed for centuries.
Margarito Hernandez Jr., son of the Presidio policeman, remembers pedaling bikes with his cousins into the Rio Grande "just to see who could actually get to the other side."
Chatting at the birthday party, Margarito, 19, said he has applied to the Border Patrol and dreams of being posted to his family's often unpatrolled hometown as an agent who understands just how muddy a line the river can be.
He nodded his cowboy hat towards a low rise over the river where a white cross marks the spot Esequiel was killed.
"I don't see why an agent couldn't be up there on that hill."
http://www.chron.com/disp/story.mpl/ap/tx/6000736.html
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