Public Radio International
August 13, 2014
by Jason Margolis
Scott Nicol, a college art teacher and sculptor, likes to bring people to walk the border wall in Hidalgo, Texas. On a windy day, we stroll along a path in the shadow of 18-foot-high iron bars. One of Nicol’s favorite pastimes is hunting for homemade wooden ladders.
“That’s how you get over the wall," says Nicol pointing at some ladders lying on the ground. "I mean that’s what they’re for. It takes $2 or $3 worth of hardware and nails to defeat a wall that cost $12 million a mile,” says Nicol.
That’s $12 million a mile for this section of wall — the average cost per mile across the border is closer to $4.5 million.
President Obama is asking for $3.7 billion to deal with the latest border crisis — tens of thousands of unaccompanied Central American children coming to the US border seeking asylum. House Republicans have countered with an offer of $694 million, with contingencies. The big one is that they want more border security.
That makes Nicol apoplectic. During our 30-minute stroll, we counted the Border Patrol jeeps. We found eight, as well as one ATV and a helicopter overhead. Texas Game Wardens also patrol the Rio Grande in speedboats mounted with machine guns.
“That makes me very nervous,” says Nicol. “There’s absolutely no reason or instance where you would be using that kind of artillery unless there’s a military invasion.”
Yet, more reinforcements are on the way. Texas Governor Rick Perry says he’s sending up to 1,000 National Guard troops to the border soon. Perry says they’re needed to stop drugs and criminals.
Nicol, who also does work with the Sierra Club, says the border wall became his issue for a simple reason: it just makes him angry. To him, it's too costly and divides habitat areas like a wildlife bird sanctuary on the river. He understands the need for border security, but thinks much of the wall's design simply doesn’t make sense. For example, as we’re walking along for nearly a mile, the wall stops.
“Obviously anybody that has traveled up from Central America is not going to be stopped by something that’s only 9/10th of a mile wide. They’ll just go around it,” says Nicol.
It works this way up and down the Rio Grande — there's the wall, then a gap for a few miles, then more wall.
But the chief patrol agent for the Rio Grande Valley, Kevin Oaks, says the wall isn’t as haphazard as Nicol makes it out to be.
“What it does is it slows the traffic down temporarily, so it gives the agents and whatever technology we employ a little more time to get activated,” says Oaks. The Border Patrol also has unmanned aerial vehicles — drones — that patrol more isolated stretches of the border.
Oaks admits that people can use a ladder to climb over the wall, or even tunnel under. But he says it’s all about striking a balance between what can be funded and what can be achieved.
“If you look at history, there’s no physical way that you can ever possibly, 100 percent secure the border. So you have to come up with a compromise, and that compromise is a low-risk border,” says Oaks. For him, that means safe border communities and a low flow of drugs and criminals coming across.
By many metrics, the investment is paying off — the border is the most secure it’s been in 40 years. The annual tab for immigration and border enforcement nationwide: $18 billion. The budget for just the US Border Patrol alone is closer to $3.5 billion annually.
Community activist Michael Seifert, who lives less than a mile from the border in Brownsville, says there are other costs for border residents, on both sides. Border Patrol agents have killed 19 people, some US citizens, but mostly Mexicans, in a recent two-and-a-half year period.
“And not a single one of those cases has been brought to a fitting conclusion — this is what happened, the agent was justified or not. They’re simply not pursued,” says Seifert.
Kevin Oaks says his agents aren’t acting with impunity. “Every allegation of misconduct is thoroughly investigated and adjudicated appropriately.”
Oaks says the FBI and the Office of Inspector General oversee corruption and criminal charges lodged against Border Patrol. They also conduct internal investigations.
Scott Nicol says he's never had a problem with any agents directly and understands the vast majority are trained professionals just doing their jobs. Still, he doesn’t want more agents to deal with this latest border crisis. After all, he says, Central American children are turning themselves in, not sneaking into the US.
“The response from certain politicians is, ‘Send in the National Guard, build more walls,’” says Nicol. “They can’t get their heads around immigration, they can only think about it in terms of security.”
Nicol, as well other border residents, agree more resources are needed to deal with this latest border crisis. But they want money to ease the backlog in immigration courts and provide better services for the children, not to build more security.
http://www.pri.org/stories/2014-08-13/some-texans-border-more-walls-and-patrols-wont-solve-immigration-crisis
Showing posts with label Customs and Border Protection. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Customs and Border Protection. Show all posts
Wednesday, August 20, 2014
Thursday, May 8, 2014
New Tucson center aims to ID migrants who die on trek north
Los Angeles Times
May 4, 2014
by Cindy Carcamo
Every year thousands of migrants cross the U.S.-Mexico border illegally into Arizona. Some make it to their destination. Others get picked up by authorities.
Hundreds more perish in the Sonoran desert. Some bodies are never identified and families of the missing can languish for years without word of their loved ones.
A new Tucson-based organization is hoping to change that.
On Saturday, the Colibri Center for Human Rights officially launched, hoping to address what its organizers call a “very serious human rights crisis on the border.” The center, which is supported by the Ford Foundation and others, is an expansion of an earlier effort known as the Missing Migrant Project.
That project had already collected, organized and centralized information for what is regarded as the most comprehensive database in the nation on missing and unidentified migrants.
Since 2006, the group has made 100 matches in collaboration with the Pima County Medical Examiner’s office.
Colibri, headed by executive director Robin Reineke, still helps people find their loved ones and track information on the dead and missing, but now also aims to educate people on the high number of deaths and disappearances along the southern border through research and storytelling.
For example, families of the missing will be able to post testimonials, detailing their struggle on the organization’s website. There’s also a section that shows the personal items carried by more than 2,400 migrants who died in the last 14 years during their attempt to cross the US-Mexico border.
Since 2006, about 2,000 people have filed missing person reports for those who have disappeared crossing the southern border. Most were last known to have passed through the Arizona corridor.
“The way we approach the project is the way a forensic scientists have approached mass disasters,” Reineke said. “There is a high number of missing individuals and high number of unidentified individuals. We do everything we can … and try to make a match.”
In Arizona alone, there are at least 900 unidentified remains, according to Pima County Medical Examiner data. Most of the migrants are from Mexico or Central America.
Although illegal immigration along the southern border has decreased in the last couple of years, deaths along the border are still numerous. About 165 people die every year crossing illegally into Arizona.
In places like Brooks County, Texas, deaths have drastically increased in the last couple of years, Reineke said. Colibri is also collaborating with officials there to help them with the issue.
The launch of the new organization coincided with the Tucson premiere of “Who is Dayani Cristal?” The film, a documentary about the journey to identify a man who crossed the border illegally into Arizona from Mexico, features the Pima County Office, Reineke and the work that eventually developed into Colibri.
http://www.latimes.com/nation/nationnow/la-na-nn-ff-arizona-immigration-migrant-database-20140503-story.html
May 4, 2014
by Cindy Carcamo
Every year thousands of migrants cross the U.S.-Mexico border illegally into Arizona. Some make it to their destination. Others get picked up by authorities.
Hundreds more perish in the Sonoran desert. Some bodies are never identified and families of the missing can languish for years without word of their loved ones.
A new Tucson-based organization is hoping to change that.
On Saturday, the Colibri Center for Human Rights officially launched, hoping to address what its organizers call a “very serious human rights crisis on the border.” The center, which is supported by the Ford Foundation and others, is an expansion of an earlier effort known as the Missing Migrant Project.
That project had already collected, organized and centralized information for what is regarded as the most comprehensive database in the nation on missing and unidentified migrants.
Since 2006, the group has made 100 matches in collaboration with the Pima County Medical Examiner’s office.
For example, families of the missing will be able to post testimonials, detailing their struggle on the organization’s website. There’s also a section that shows the personal items carried by more than 2,400 migrants who died in the last 14 years during their attempt to cross the US-Mexico border.
Since 2006, about 2,000 people have filed missing person reports for those who have disappeared crossing the southern border. Most were last known to have passed through the Arizona corridor.
“The way we approach the project is the way a forensic scientists have approached mass disasters,” Reineke said. “There is a high number of missing individuals and high number of unidentified individuals. We do everything we can … and try to make a match.”
In Arizona alone, there are at least 900 unidentified remains, according to Pima County Medical Examiner data. Most of the migrants are from Mexico or Central America.
Although illegal immigration along the southern border has decreased in the last couple of years, deaths along the border are still numerous. About 165 people die every year crossing illegally into Arizona.
In places like Brooks County, Texas, deaths have drastically increased in the last couple of years, Reineke said. Colibri is also collaborating with officials there to help them with the issue.
The launch of the new organization coincided with the Tucson premiere of “Who is Dayani Cristal?” The film, a documentary about the journey to identify a man who crossed the border illegally into Arizona from Mexico, features the Pima County Office, Reineke and the work that eventually developed into Colibri.
http://www.latimes.com/nation/nationnow/la-na-nn-ff-arizona-immigration-migrant-database-20140503-story.html
Wednesday, April 2, 2014
At Nogales' steel border fence, bishops celebrate Mass for both sides
Los Angeles Times
April 1, 2014
by Cindy Carcamo
NOGALES, Ariz.—It had been years since Maria Miranda of Tucson attended Catholic Mass with her son Jorge Lopez.
At one point Lopez even forgot he was on the Mexican side. He forgot about his banishment from the U.S. He forgot about how immigration officials, he says, denied him an extension to his green card and finally caught up with him at work three years ago and deported him.
Lopez was one of an estimated 300 people who gathered at the border fence in Nogales to attend a transnational Mass led by Cardinal Seán O’Malley of Boston and bishops from across the West and Southwest, including Eusebio Elizondo, auxiliary bishop of Seattle; Gerald F. Kicanas, bishop of Tucson; Mark Seitz, bishop of El Paso; and Oscar Cantu, bishop of Las Cruces, N.M.
The Mass to celebrate the lives of those who have died crossing the U.S.-Mexico border is an attempt by the Catholic Church to call on President Obama to use his executive powers to limit deportations of people who are in the country illegally.
The move comes at a time when an immigration overhaul is at a standstill and thousands of people have died while crossing the Sonoran desert in Arizona.
The border fence, the backdrop for the outdoor Mass, became the center of attention when O'Malley and the bishops gave Communion to people gathered on the Mexican side, as hands reached through the gaps in the steel slats.
In the last few years, the Catholic Church has become increasingly vocal about immigrant rights — preaching from the pulpit about immigration reform as an "ethical and moral imperative."
Late last month, Bishop Elizondo, who also is chairman of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops' Committee on Migration, wrote to Department of Homeland Security officials asking them to limit deportations.
O’Malley, who took a weeklong tour of the southern Arizona border with several bishops from the Southwest, said he was inspired and emboldened by Pope Francis, who visited Lampedusa, Italy, last year to pray for people who died trying to migrate to Europe by boat.
During Tuesday's Mass, O’Malley and the bishops laid a wreath at the border wall in Nogales and called for Catholics to remember those who have died.
"We know the border is lined with unmarked graves," O'Malley said. "They call them illegal aliens. We are here to say they are not forgotten. They are our neighbors. Our brothers. Our sisters. … You cannot love God without loving your neighbor."
http://www.latimes.com/nation/nationnow/la-na-nn-bishops-arizona-immigration-reform-20140401,0,4292997.story#axzz2xn3LcHrz
April 1, 2014
by Cindy Carcamo
NOGALES, Ariz.—It had been years since Maria Miranda of Tucson attended Catholic Mass with her son Jorge Lopez.
Tuesday they finally did. But they were separated by the U.S.-Mexico border fence in southern Arizona.
"I'm just a couple of bars, a couple steps away from her," the 35-year-old said he told himself.
"There's a fence but it's the same ground."
"I'm just a couple of bars, a couple steps away from her," the 35-year-old said he told himself.
"There's a fence but it's the same ground."
At one point Lopez even forgot he was on the Mexican side. He forgot about his banishment from the U.S. He forgot about how immigration officials, he says, denied him an extension to his green card and finally caught up with him at work three years ago and deported him.
Lopez was one of an estimated 300 people who gathered at the border fence in Nogales to attend a transnational Mass led by Cardinal Seán O’Malley of Boston and bishops from across the West and Southwest, including Eusebio Elizondo, auxiliary bishop of Seattle; Gerald F. Kicanas, bishop of Tucson; Mark Seitz, bishop of El Paso; and Oscar Cantu, bishop of Las Cruces, N.M.
The Mass to celebrate the lives of those who have died crossing the U.S.-Mexico border is an attempt by the Catholic Church to call on President Obama to use his executive powers to limit deportations of people who are in the country illegally.
The move comes at a time when an immigration overhaul is at a standstill and thousands of people have died while crossing the Sonoran desert in Arizona.
The border fence, the backdrop for the outdoor Mass, became the center of attention when O'Malley and the bishops gave Communion to people gathered on the Mexican side, as hands reached through the gaps in the steel slats.
In the last few years, the Catholic Church has become increasingly vocal about immigrant rights — preaching from the pulpit about immigration reform as an "ethical and moral imperative."
Late last month, Bishop Elizondo, who also is chairman of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops' Committee on Migration, wrote to Department of Homeland Security officials asking them to limit deportations.
O’Malley, who took a weeklong tour of the southern Arizona border with several bishops from the Southwest, said he was inspired and emboldened by Pope Francis, who visited Lampedusa, Italy, last year to pray for people who died trying to migrate to Europe by boat.
During Tuesday's Mass, O’Malley and the bishops laid a wreath at the border wall in Nogales and called for Catholics to remember those who have died.
"We know the border is lined with unmarked graves," O'Malley said. "They call them illegal aliens. We are here to say they are not forgotten. They are our neighbors. Our brothers. Our sisters. … You cannot love God without loving your neighbor."
http://www.latimes.com/nation/nationnow/la-na-nn-bishops-arizona-immigration-reform-20140401,0,4292997.story#axzz2xn3LcHrz
Monday, March 17, 2014
U.S. Ordered to Disclose Border Fence Landowners
Courthouse News Service
March 14, 2014
by Jamie Ross
WASHINGTON (CN) - A professor won her bid for government records revealing the names and addresses of landowners whose properties might be affected by the Texas-Mexico border fence.
"Revealing the identities of landowners in the wall's planned construction site may shed light on the impact on indigenous communities, the disparate impact on lower-income minority communities, and the practices of private contractors," U.S. District Judge Beryl Howell ruled Friday.
The information was requested by Denise Gilman, a clinical professor at the University of Texas-Austin School of Law researching the human-rights impact of the border fence.
A federal law passed in 2006 ordered the construction of a fence or wall along portions of the U.S.-Mexico border. It mandated reinforced fencing along at least 700 miles of the southwest border, but left the specific location up to the Department of Homeland Security.
In 2009, Gilman filed a Freedom of Information Act request for records detailing where the government planned to build parts of the wall and what information it was using to decide where to build.
The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers released thousands of documents, but redacted certain information, including the names and addresses of landowners.
Gilman challenged the government's redactions, arguing that the public interest in how the wall would impact landowners outweighed any privacy concerns of private landowners.
She said the information would help the public understand the size of the wall and the agency's decisions about where to place it, including whether U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) was treating property owners fairly.
The CBP insisted that disclosure put the landowners' privacy rights at risk, and they faced unwanted contact from "the media, other members of the public, including other landowners involved in a similar process, and potential harassment."
Howell agreed with Gilman that "the public interest in learning how CBP negotiated with private citizens regarding the planning and construction of the border wall is significant."
"This public interest outweighs the privacy interest in landowners' names and addresses in CBP emails," she wrote.
However, she said the agency doesn't have to disclose emails relating to its assessment of the need for fencing, as information in the emails reveals areas that are patrolled by fewer Border Patrol agents due to their difficulty to patrol.
"Such information discloses the CBP's operations and vulnerabilities, which are not readily-accessible public information, the disclosure of which could risk appropriation to circumvent the law," Howell wrote.
Also, if Gilman seeks email attachments excluded from the records she received, she must file a new Freedom of Information Act request to receive them, the judge concluded.
"The schedule on which CBP was required to release records to the plaintiff is set out in the second clause and was thus a separate requirement from the scope of the responsive records set out in the first clause," Howell wrote.
http://www.courthousenews.com/2014/03/17/66225.htm
March 14, 2014
by Jamie Ross
WASHINGTON (CN) - A professor won her bid for government records revealing the names and addresses of landowners whose properties might be affected by the Texas-Mexico border fence.
"Revealing the identities of landowners in the wall's planned construction site may shed light on the impact on indigenous communities, the disparate impact on lower-income minority communities, and the practices of private contractors," U.S. District Judge Beryl Howell ruled Friday.
The information was requested by Denise Gilman, a clinical professor at the University of Texas-Austin School of Law researching the human-rights impact of the border fence.
A federal law passed in 2006 ordered the construction of a fence or wall along portions of the U.S.-Mexico border. It mandated reinforced fencing along at least 700 miles of the southwest border, but left the specific location up to the Department of Homeland Security.
In 2009, Gilman filed a Freedom of Information Act request for records detailing where the government planned to build parts of the wall and what information it was using to decide where to build.
The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers released thousands of documents, but redacted certain information, including the names and addresses of landowners.
Gilman challenged the government's redactions, arguing that the public interest in how the wall would impact landowners outweighed any privacy concerns of private landowners.
She said the information would help the public understand the size of the wall and the agency's decisions about where to place it, including whether U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) was treating property owners fairly.
The CBP insisted that disclosure put the landowners' privacy rights at risk, and they faced unwanted contact from "the media, other members of the public, including other landowners involved in a similar process, and potential harassment."
Howell agreed with Gilman that "the public interest in learning how CBP negotiated with private citizens regarding the planning and construction of the border wall is significant."
"This public interest outweighs the privacy interest in landowners' names and addresses in CBP emails," she wrote.
However, she said the agency doesn't have to disclose emails relating to its assessment of the need for fencing, as information in the emails reveals areas that are patrolled by fewer Border Patrol agents due to their difficulty to patrol.
"Such information discloses the CBP's operations and vulnerabilities, which are not readily-accessible public information, the disclosure of which could risk appropriation to circumvent the law," Howell wrote.
Also, if Gilman seeks email attachments excluded from the records she received, she must file a new Freedom of Information Act request to receive them, the judge concluded.
"The schedule on which CBP was required to release records to the plaintiff is set out in the second clause and was thus a separate requirement from the scope of the responsive records set out in the first clause," Howell wrote.
http://www.courthousenews.com/2014/03/17/66225.htm
Monday, March 3, 2014
Arizona soldiers, US CBP unite to secure border hot spot
Arizona National Guard Public Affairs
March 3, 2014
TUCSON, Ariz. – As overseas contingencies and deployments for U.S. armed forces taper off, Arizona’s citizen soldiers are shifting their focus to domestic missions to gain real-world experience and maintain readiness.
The Arizona Army National Guard’s Tucson-based 2220th Transportation Company found a creative way to hone their skills and help secure the Arizona-Mexico border in the process. Working with U.S. Customs and Border Protection, the light-medium truck company moved 193 tons of concrete barriers from El Centro, Calif., to Naco, Ariz., over drill weekend March 1 to fortify a porous section of the state’s border.
Army Guard and Customs officials called the convoy operation a success and said it was a model for future inter-agency coordination.
“We’ve been working on a solution for getting that border infrastructure into place in Naco for quite some time,” said Manuel Padila, Jr., the chief patrol agent for the Tucson sector. “When the Guard saw this as a training opportunity it became a win-win situation for everyone. This certainly highlights the long-standing partnership we’ve had with the Guard and it points to new ways we can work together.”
Where once a fence line was the only impediment for vehicles looking to illegally breach the border at Naco, now a robust barricade denies ease of entry.
In all, the Guard delivered 115 cement blocks – 15 more than originally requested by CBP. In a matter of days, 52 Arizona Guardsmen mobilized 26 vehicles to transport the load more than 400 miles.
“We used every section in the company to support the mission,” said Army Capt. Janek Kaslikowski, the company commander. “We have an operations section that planned the mission – estimated fuel, rest stops, and driver changes – and a maintenance section that kept us running. Our soldiers received invaluable experience with securing a load, off loading, vehicle recovery, and the importance of preventive maintenance checks and services.”
According to Kaslikowski, the mission was the perfect vehicle for bridging the gaps in experience between his junior soldiers and his combat-tested senior noncommissioned officers.
“It was interesting to see them work together on this mission because this is exactly what we would do in theater,” he said. “The NCOs led this mission and gave the junior soldiers plenty of opportunity to gain experience that they may not get without deploying.”
“We paired experienced drivers with inexperienced drivers,” said Army 2nd Lt. Sha-raya Harris, first platoon leader on her third drill with the Guard. “I was one of the inexperienced drivers.”
Some of the most junior motor transport operators in the company had only 10 minutes behind the wheel from initial training, said Harris. Now they all have seven-to-eight hours of experience negotiating turns, hills, and stops with 16 tons in tow.
“It was great training, but I think this mission was equally important for building relationships. Everywhere we went people supported us. Border Protection employees, the ranchers in Naco, even other drivers on the Interstate – everyone found this mission interesting and wanted to help us along the way,” said Harris.
Read more: http://www.dvidshub.net/news/121445/arizona-soldiers-us-cbp-unite-secure-border-hot-spot#.UxVbQ7vn8-g#ixzz2uy50eN00
March 3, 2014
TUCSON, Ariz. – As overseas contingencies and deployments for U.S. armed forces taper off, Arizona’s citizen soldiers are shifting their focus to domestic missions to gain real-world experience and maintain readiness.
The Arizona Army National Guard’s Tucson-based 2220th Transportation Company found a creative way to hone their skills and help secure the Arizona-Mexico border in the process. Working with U.S. Customs and Border Protection, the light-medium truck company moved 193 tons of concrete barriers from El Centro, Calif., to Naco, Ariz., over drill weekend March 1 to fortify a porous section of the state’s border.
Army Guard and Customs officials called the convoy operation a success and said it was a model for future inter-agency coordination.
“We’ve been working on a solution for getting that border infrastructure into place in Naco for quite some time,” said Manuel Padila, Jr., the chief patrol agent for the Tucson sector. “When the Guard saw this as a training opportunity it became a win-win situation for everyone. This certainly highlights the long-standing partnership we’ve had with the Guard and it points to new ways we can work together.”
Where once a fence line was the only impediment for vehicles looking to illegally breach the border at Naco, now a robust barricade denies ease of entry.
In all, the Guard delivered 115 cement blocks – 15 more than originally requested by CBP. In a matter of days, 52 Arizona Guardsmen mobilized 26 vehicles to transport the load more than 400 miles.
“We used every section in the company to support the mission,” said Army Capt. Janek Kaslikowski, the company commander. “We have an operations section that planned the mission – estimated fuel, rest stops, and driver changes – and a maintenance section that kept us running. Our soldiers received invaluable experience with securing a load, off loading, vehicle recovery, and the importance of preventive maintenance checks and services.”
According to Kaslikowski, the mission was the perfect vehicle for bridging the gaps in experience between his junior soldiers and his combat-tested senior noncommissioned officers.
“It was interesting to see them work together on this mission because this is exactly what we would do in theater,” he said. “The NCOs led this mission and gave the junior soldiers plenty of opportunity to gain experience that they may not get without deploying.”
“We paired experienced drivers with inexperienced drivers,” said Army 2nd Lt. Sha-raya Harris, first platoon leader on her third drill with the Guard. “I was one of the inexperienced drivers.”
Some of the most junior motor transport operators in the company had only 10 minutes behind the wheel from initial training, said Harris. Now they all have seven-to-eight hours of experience negotiating turns, hills, and stops with 16 tons in tow.
“It was great training, but I think this mission was equally important for building relationships. Everywhere we went people supported us. Border Protection employees, the ranchers in Naco, even other drivers on the Interstate – everyone found this mission interesting and wanted to help us along the way,” said Harris.
Read more: http://www.dvidshub.net/news/121445/arizona-soldiers-us-cbp-unite-secure-border-hot-spot#.UxVbQ7vn8-g#ixzz2uy50eN00
Monday, November 25, 2013
Cornyn urges CBP to rethink border fence
El Paso Inc.
November 24, 2013
by David Crowder
U.S. Sen. John Cornyn, R-Texas, has weighed into the fray over plans to fill in the half-mile gap in the border fence at the historic site of the first Spanish crossing, Hart’s Mill and Old Fort Bliss.
U.S. Rep. Beto O’Rourke, D-Texas, has organized a last-minute campaign to persuade U.S. Customs and Border Protection, or CBP, to reconsider the project and to work with El Paso leaders and stakeholders before proceeding.
On Wednesday, Cornyn wrote to Thomas Winkowski, CBP’s acting commissioner, after meeting with O’Rourke.
“I understand that the project is near significant cultural and historical sites, and I would strongly encourage you to work closely with the El Paso community to ensure preservation of sensitive areas,” Cornyn wrote.
Construction of the 17-foot steel wall was to start last Wednesday and even though it didn’t, Border Patrol spokesman Doug Mosier said CBP has notified the contractor to proceed.
Called by some the epicenter of El Paso’s history, the site on West Paisano Drive is now in the midst of several large construction projects.
They include taking down the Yandell Street overpass while putting up massive concrete supports for the toll road that will complete the last leg of Loop 375.
In his letter, Cornyn noted that CBP “conducted Environmental Stewardship Plans to consider the impact of the proposed pedestrian fencing on significant historic sites in the Hart’s Mill area.”
The result of that survey was that “the project would not result in significant impacts to cultural resources in October 2011.”
“While I recognize the efforts of CBP to consider sensitive resources in the region I would urge you to coordinate closely with local stakeholders and consider any further action which may be necessary to balance project goals with historic preservation,” Cornyn’s letter concluded.
O’Rourke’s chief of staff, David Wysong, said Winkowski “is the only one who could, theoretically, halt it.”
Six signers
On Tuesday, Winkowski received a similar letter signed by O’Rourke and five more House members: Democrats Pete Gallego, Filemon Vela and Rubén Hinojosa of Texas, and from California, Democrats Tony Cárdenas and Eric Swalwell.
Their letter, stronger than Cornyn’s, refers to the site as the place where Spanish explorer Juan de Oñate crossed the Rio Grande in 1598, a rocky ford that came to be known as the Paso del Norte.
“The proposed fence construction is antithetical to Congress’ intentions in establishing Oñate’s crossing as part of the National Historic Trail in October 2000 and will hamper future development and improvements to this site that adequately reflect its historical and cultural significance,” their letter states.
They call on the Border Patrol to delay construction.
“Preserving the historic significance of this area should be our first priority and we strongly believe that a compromise can be reached,” the representatives’ letter continues.
It notes that the El Paso sector has a 93-percent level of operational control, which far exceeds other sectors on the U.S.-Mexico border.
“This has contributed to the recognition of El Paso as the safest city in America for the third straight year,” the letter reads. “It seems that there is little need to construct additional fence from a safety perspective when taxpayer dollars could be used more effectively in other areas of the border.”
Border Patrol spokesman Mosier said that while Congress has set aside some environmental and archaeological protections to speed the fence, CBP “has made a commitment to responsible environmental stewardship.”
In an email, Mosier said, “Specific to the Hart’s Mill area, in order to protect cultural resources, CBP conducted intensive cultural resources surveys and consulted with the Texas state historic preservation office, who concurred with CBP’s determination that no significant impacts to cultural resources would occur as a result of fence construction,”
The CBP has arranged to have an independent environmental monitor on-site during fence construction, Mosier added.
Although the site has never been developed as a tourist attraction beyond construction of historic markers, the Texas Historical Commission’s executive director Mark Wolfe, in a Nov. 19 letter, said the National Park Service has recognized it as a “high potential site.”
Wolfe, the state’s historic preservation officer, told El Paso Inc. that his agency agrees with CBP’s archaeological review that determined “no features of concern would be disturbed by the project.”
Property owner Chip Johns said he wonders when the archaeological review was conducted and by whom. He owns the acreage that takes in the Oñate crossing, the Old Fort Bliss officers’ barracks and the mid-1800s home of Simeon Hart, best known as the Hacienda Restaurant, which is now closed.
“If they came on the property, they never asked me,” Johns said, adding he finds it hard to believe there is nothing of historical or archaeological significance in the path of the fence, given that it was a very busy place for hundreds of years.
Wolfe sent his letter to state Sen. Jose Rodriguez, D-El Paso, who conceded that neither the city nor the county have done anything to protect or develop the site. But that’s no reason not to protect it, he said.
“The mayor and City Council ought to be involved in preventing the federal government from going forward,” Rodriguez said. “We can’t lose another one of our historic treasures.”
O’Rourke, he said, is doing everything he can “but it’s up to the federal government to step back and reassess the project.”
El Paso Mayor Oscar Leeser was ill and could not be reached for a comment, but city spokeswoman Juli Lozano released a statement from him saying O’Rourke has kept him up to date on the issue.
“I want to stress that at this time, the city is allowing Congressman O’Rourke to handle the issue and will rely on his diligence to do what is necessary to address the issues,” the statement says.
Johns was surprised last Thursday when two O’Rourke’s staffers, district representative Mario Porras and intern Dana Ramos, showed up at the site to see if construction had begun. “Hot damn, it’s amazing and kind of hard to believe that someone in Washington is actually doing what they say they’re going to do,” Johns said of O’Rourke. “He’s picked up the ball and run with it. How far he’ll get, who knows?”
http://www.elpasoinc.com/news/local_news/article_0768de4c-5611-11e3-9c5f-0019bb30f31a.html
November 24, 2013
by David Crowder
U.S. Sen. John Cornyn, R-Texas, has weighed into the fray over plans to fill in the half-mile gap in the border fence at the historic site of the first Spanish crossing, Hart’s Mill and Old Fort Bliss.
U.S. Rep. Beto O’Rourke, D-Texas, has organized a last-minute campaign to persuade U.S. Customs and Border Protection, or CBP, to reconsider the project and to work with El Paso leaders and stakeholders before proceeding.
On Wednesday, Cornyn wrote to Thomas Winkowski, CBP’s acting commissioner, after meeting with O’Rourke.
“I understand that the project is near significant cultural and historical sites, and I would strongly encourage you to work closely with the El Paso community to ensure preservation of sensitive areas,” Cornyn wrote.
Construction of the 17-foot steel wall was to start last Wednesday and even though it didn’t, Border Patrol spokesman Doug Mosier said CBP has notified the contractor to proceed.
Called by some the epicenter of El Paso’s history, the site on West Paisano Drive is now in the midst of several large construction projects.
They include taking down the Yandell Street overpass while putting up massive concrete supports for the toll road that will complete the last leg of Loop 375.
In his letter, Cornyn noted that CBP “conducted Environmental Stewardship Plans to consider the impact of the proposed pedestrian fencing on significant historic sites in the Hart’s Mill area.”
The result of that survey was that “the project would not result in significant impacts to cultural resources in October 2011.”
“While I recognize the efforts of CBP to consider sensitive resources in the region I would urge you to coordinate closely with local stakeholders and consider any further action which may be necessary to balance project goals with historic preservation,” Cornyn’s letter concluded.
O’Rourke’s chief of staff, David Wysong, said Winkowski “is the only one who could, theoretically, halt it.”
Six signers
On Tuesday, Winkowski received a similar letter signed by O’Rourke and five more House members: Democrats Pete Gallego, Filemon Vela and Rubén Hinojosa of Texas, and from California, Democrats Tony Cárdenas and Eric Swalwell.
Their letter, stronger than Cornyn’s, refers to the site as the place where Spanish explorer Juan de Oñate crossed the Rio Grande in 1598, a rocky ford that came to be known as the Paso del Norte.
“The proposed fence construction is antithetical to Congress’ intentions in establishing Oñate’s crossing as part of the National Historic Trail in October 2000 and will hamper future development and improvements to this site that adequately reflect its historical and cultural significance,” their letter states.
They call on the Border Patrol to delay construction.
“Preserving the historic significance of this area should be our first priority and we strongly believe that a compromise can be reached,” the representatives’ letter continues.
It notes that the El Paso sector has a 93-percent level of operational control, which far exceeds other sectors on the U.S.-Mexico border.
“This has contributed to the recognition of El Paso as the safest city in America for the third straight year,” the letter reads. “It seems that there is little need to construct additional fence from a safety perspective when taxpayer dollars could be used more effectively in other areas of the border.”
Border Patrol spokesman Mosier said that while Congress has set aside some environmental and archaeological protections to speed the fence, CBP “has made a commitment to responsible environmental stewardship.”
In an email, Mosier said, “Specific to the Hart’s Mill area, in order to protect cultural resources, CBP conducted intensive cultural resources surveys and consulted with the Texas state historic preservation office, who concurred with CBP’s determination that no significant impacts to cultural resources would occur as a result of fence construction,”
The CBP has arranged to have an independent environmental monitor on-site during fence construction, Mosier added.
Although the site has never been developed as a tourist attraction beyond construction of historic markers, the Texas Historical Commission’s executive director Mark Wolfe, in a Nov. 19 letter, said the National Park Service has recognized it as a “high potential site.”
Wolfe, the state’s historic preservation officer, told El Paso Inc. that his agency agrees with CBP’s archaeological review that determined “no features of concern would be disturbed by the project.”
Property owner Chip Johns said he wonders when the archaeological review was conducted and by whom. He owns the acreage that takes in the Oñate crossing, the Old Fort Bliss officers’ barracks and the mid-1800s home of Simeon Hart, best known as the Hacienda Restaurant, which is now closed.
“If they came on the property, they never asked me,” Johns said, adding he finds it hard to believe there is nothing of historical or archaeological significance in the path of the fence, given that it was a very busy place for hundreds of years.
Wolfe sent his letter to state Sen. Jose Rodriguez, D-El Paso, who conceded that neither the city nor the county have done anything to protect or develop the site. But that’s no reason not to protect it, he said.
“The mayor and City Council ought to be involved in preventing the federal government from going forward,” Rodriguez said. “We can’t lose another one of our historic treasures.”
O’Rourke, he said, is doing everything he can “but it’s up to the federal government to step back and reassess the project.”
El Paso Mayor Oscar Leeser was ill and could not be reached for a comment, but city spokeswoman Juli Lozano released a statement from him saying O’Rourke has kept him up to date on the issue.
“I want to stress that at this time, the city is allowing Congressman O’Rourke to handle the issue and will rely on his diligence to do what is necessary to address the issues,” the statement says.
Johns was surprised last Thursday when two O’Rourke’s staffers, district representative Mario Porras and intern Dana Ramos, showed up at the site to see if construction had begun. “Hot damn, it’s amazing and kind of hard to believe that someone in Washington is actually doing what they say they’re going to do,” Johns said of O’Rourke. “He’s picked up the ball and run with it. How far he’ll get, who knows?”
http://www.elpasoinc.com/news/local_news/article_0768de4c-5611-11e3-9c5f-0019bb30f31a.html
Border fence to be built at Juan de Oñate crossing, site of Hart’s Mill and the first Fort Bliss
Newspaper Tree
November 22, 2013
Alberto Tomas Halpern
The Department of Homeland Security or DHS, which oversees the U.S. Border Patrol and Customs and Border Protection or CBP, will build approximately 0.6 miles of additional border fencing near the historic Hart’s Mill area of El Paso.
Federal and local officials oppose the fencing, citing historical and environmental concerns.
The fence will be built at a site where Spanish explorer Juan de Oñate crossed the Rio Grande in 1598 as he and his band of settlers made their way north from Mexico City. Oñate’s path became a major trade route for the next 300 years, bringing livestock and trade goods into the U.S. The route also introduced new cultures to a westward expanding America.
In 2000, Oñate’s trail was added to the National Trails System and is called El Camino Real de Tierra Adentro National Historic Trail. It is noted for being the oldest route leading north out of Mexico.
The Secure Fence Act of 2006 amended a 1996 law, the Illegal Immigration Reform and Immigrant Responsibility Act, charging DHS to construct physical barriers and reinforced fencing along the U.S.-Mexico border. The amended law gives authority to the DHS secretary to waive environmental laws in order to build border barriers expediently.
The Secure Fence Act, in part, provided for fencing from five miles west of the Columbus, New Mexico port of entry to ten miles east of El Paso, though gaps in fencing exist in sections along the way.
According to Border Patrol and CBP spokesman Bill Brooks, the latest construction of fencing is a continuation of a previous fence project.
The fence that will be built is what CBP calls a “pedestrian fence,” meant to stop pedestrians and vehicles from crossing. Brooks said the fence will look similar to what already exists near the area, which includes layers of thick wires crossed over one another.
Brooks explained that the notice to proceed with construction was issued on Wednesday, November 20.
The fencing contractor is C3 Construction, an Arizona-based company. Newspaper Tree observed no construction activity at the area the day the notice was issued.
Construction is expected to be completed sometime next spring.
Brooks described CBP as committed to responsible environmental stewardship, despite the environmental law waiver. He added that CBP conducted an intensive cultural resources survey and consulted with the Texas Historical Commission. The historical commission, Brooks said, agreed with CBP’s determination that the fence construction would have no significant impact on cultural resources.
Mark Wolfe, the executive director and state historic preservation officer at the Texas Historical Commission, told Newspaper Tree that CBP contracted with Gulf South Research Corporation, a Louisiana environmental consulting firm, to conduct an archeological review of the area in 2011.
Wolfe said CBP’s study showed that no historical or cultural resources would be disturbed by the fence, nor would it have an adverse affect on the appearance of historic buildings. The study was reviewed by the historical commission’s archaeological, historical and architectural divisions, all of whom agreed that the fence would have no significant impacts.
“That’s the extent of our review,” Wolfe said, noting that his agency did not conduct its own independent study. “We don’t have the budget for that. Our decisions are based on the information provided (by CBP).”
Wolfe explained that the Texas Historical Commission does not have the authority to delay or halt federal projects, even if they disagree with the findings of federal agencies. If they do find that federal projects would negatively impact historic sites, the historical commission can work with agencies to mitigate those affects.
“What we do is we comment on the undertaking proposed by the federal agency,” Wolfe said. He added, “The whole purpose of it is for federal agencies to step back and think about the implications.”
In the case of the fence in the Hart’s Mill area, Wolfe says CBP did consider those implications. “So the process, I think, works.”
In 2009, the El Paso city council unanimously adopted a resolution opposing the construction of border fences. The resolution says in part, “Across the world, walls erected to divide peoples and nations are symbols of failed and repressive efforts to thwart human freedom and prosperity.”
Congressman Beto O’Rourke (D-TX 16) was a city representative in 2009 and joined in supporting the city resolution.
The recent news of the fence construction prompted him to write letters of opposition to CBP and Border Patrol officials, citing the historical and cultural value of the area.
In his letters, O’Rourke stresses the history of El Paso’s Hart’s Mill area, describing Oñate’s crossing near the area, the Hart’s Mill residence and the establishment of the original Fort Bliss in the area.
“[T]he historical significance of this area to our country, the state of Texas, and City of El Paso is immense,” O’Rourke said.
He described Oñate’s crossing in the area as the first Thanksgiving celebration in the United States.
“As a point of comparison, if the Border Patrol were to propose the construction of a fence at Plymouth Rock I am sure Congressional representatives and the surrounding community would object based on its importance as a symbol in American history,” O’Rourke said. “The proposed fence construction at Hart’s Mill should be viewed no differently.”
Joining O’Rourke in opposition to the fencing, in a November 19 letter to CBP commissioner Thomas Winkowski, are congressmen Pete Gallego (D-TX 23), Tony Cardenas (D-CA 29), Filemon Vela (D-TX 34), Ruben Hinojosa (D-TX 15), and Eric Swalwell (D-CA 15).
O’Rourke added that more fencing is unnecessary in El Paso, since the sector is at a level of operational control that exceeds that of other parts along the U.S.-Mexico border.
“It seems that there is little need to construct additional fence from a safety perspective when taxpayer dollars could be used more effectively in other areas of the border,” O’Rourke told Winkowski.
According to Border Patrol data, apprehensions of undocumented crossers in the El Paso sector are at their lowest level in 20 years. In 1993, the Border Patrol reported 258,781 apprehensions in the El Paso sector. In 2012, that number fell to 9,678 apprehensions (see chart “Total Illegal Alien Apprehensions By Fiscal Year” in slideshow, above).
In late September, during a visit to the border fence near Sunland Park, New Mexico, El Paso Border Patrol Sector spokesman Ramiro Cordero attributed the reduction in apprehensions and El Paso’s safety to the fence.
“Fences make good neighbors,” Cordero said. He added, “You have Ciudad Juarez in 2008, 2009, 2010 as the most dangerous city in the world, the worst in the world. And El Paso was what? And continues to be: the safest city in the nation. What a contrast.”
Cordero stated that critics of border fences are wrong in saying they divide communities.
“You don’t see people, cousins, coming up to the middle of the river to talk to each other,” he said. “This has nothing to do with dividing communities, absolutely nothing. This is to protect people.”
Cordero concedes that border fences, while designed to deter people from scaling them, can be overcome, but with much difficulty.
He asked rhetorically, “Can you climb it? Oh yeah.”
Still, he thinks the fences do slow down would-be border crossers and are an effective tool.
O’Rourke noted that several local officials, including State Senator Jose Rodriguez, County Judge Veronica Escobar, County Commissioner Patrick Abeln, Mayor Oscar Leeser and City Representative Cortney Niland, were also concerned about the construction of the fence.
Rodriguez said in a statement that he was opposed to a border fence when he was the county attorney and he continues to oppose it as a senator.
“This portion of the wall will harm historical resources of national significance. It’s extremely unfortunate that local concerns and even federal rules can be disregarded in order to impose this expensive and unnecessary wall on communities that don’t want it,” he said.
Mayor Leeser issued a statement to Newspaper Tree, saying that the upcoming construction of the fence is being monitored at the federal level by O’Rourke and that the congressman is keeping the city informed on the issue.
“I want to stress that at this time the City is allowing Congressman O’Rourke to handle the issue and will rely on his diligence to do what is necessary to address the issues,” Leeser stated.
Commissioner Abeln’s concerns were similar to O’Rourke’s and he thinks more thought should have been taken in considering whether a fence should be built in the area.
“To fence that off is like fencing off a piece of history,” Abeln said. “It is just a disappointment to me because it’s another place where we have failed to realize the history of our community.”
Abeln pondered how history could have been very different if border fences existed in the 16th Century.
“Had they put that fence in 1598, maybe Juan de Oñate would not have crossed,” he surmised.
Abeln made clear that he supports federal law enforcement officials, but thinks that they have been unduly burdened by failed immigration and drug control policies.
After considering the role of border fences from a larger perspective, Commissioner Abeln drew one conclusion, saying: “The fact is, when you think about it, they’re a failure of public policy at some level. You don’t build fences because something is working. You build them because something is not working.”
http://newspapertree.com/articles/2013/11/22/border-fence-to-be-built-at-juan-de-onate-crossing-site-of-harts-mill-and-the-first-fort-bliss
November 22, 2013
Alberto Tomas Halpern
The Department of Homeland Security or DHS, which oversees the U.S. Border Patrol and Customs and Border Protection or CBP, will build approximately 0.6 miles of additional border fencing near the historic Hart’s Mill area of El Paso.
Federal and local officials oppose the fencing, citing historical and environmental concerns.
The fence will be built at a site where Spanish explorer Juan de Oñate crossed the Rio Grande in 1598 as he and his band of settlers made their way north from Mexico City. Oñate’s path became a major trade route for the next 300 years, bringing livestock and trade goods into the U.S. The route also introduced new cultures to a westward expanding America.
In 2000, Oñate’s trail was added to the National Trails System and is called El Camino Real de Tierra Adentro National Historic Trail. It is noted for being the oldest route leading north out of Mexico.
The Secure Fence Act of 2006 amended a 1996 law, the Illegal Immigration Reform and Immigrant Responsibility Act, charging DHS to construct physical barriers and reinforced fencing along the U.S.-Mexico border. The amended law gives authority to the DHS secretary to waive environmental laws in order to build border barriers expediently.
The Secure Fence Act, in part, provided for fencing from five miles west of the Columbus, New Mexico port of entry to ten miles east of El Paso, though gaps in fencing exist in sections along the way.
According to Border Patrol and CBP spokesman Bill Brooks, the latest construction of fencing is a continuation of a previous fence project.
The fence that will be built is what CBP calls a “pedestrian fence,” meant to stop pedestrians and vehicles from crossing. Brooks said the fence will look similar to what already exists near the area, which includes layers of thick wires crossed over one another.
Brooks explained that the notice to proceed with construction was issued on Wednesday, November 20.
The fencing contractor is C3 Construction, an Arizona-based company. Newspaper Tree observed no construction activity at the area the day the notice was issued.
Construction is expected to be completed sometime next spring.
Brooks described CBP as committed to responsible environmental stewardship, despite the environmental law waiver. He added that CBP conducted an intensive cultural resources survey and consulted with the Texas Historical Commission. The historical commission, Brooks said, agreed with CBP’s determination that the fence construction would have no significant impact on cultural resources.
Mark Wolfe, the executive director and state historic preservation officer at the Texas Historical Commission, told Newspaper Tree that CBP contracted with Gulf South Research Corporation, a Louisiana environmental consulting firm, to conduct an archeological review of the area in 2011.
Wolfe said CBP’s study showed that no historical or cultural resources would be disturbed by the fence, nor would it have an adverse affect on the appearance of historic buildings. The study was reviewed by the historical commission’s archaeological, historical and architectural divisions, all of whom agreed that the fence would have no significant impacts.
“That’s the extent of our review,” Wolfe said, noting that his agency did not conduct its own independent study. “We don’t have the budget for that. Our decisions are based on the information provided (by CBP).”
Wolfe explained that the Texas Historical Commission does not have the authority to delay or halt federal projects, even if they disagree with the findings of federal agencies. If they do find that federal projects would negatively impact historic sites, the historical commission can work with agencies to mitigate those affects.
“What we do is we comment on the undertaking proposed by the federal agency,” Wolfe said. He added, “The whole purpose of it is for federal agencies to step back and think about the implications.”
In the case of the fence in the Hart’s Mill area, Wolfe says CBP did consider those implications. “So the process, I think, works.”
In 2009, the El Paso city council unanimously adopted a resolution opposing the construction of border fences. The resolution says in part, “Across the world, walls erected to divide peoples and nations are symbols of failed and repressive efforts to thwart human freedom and prosperity.”
Congressman Beto O’Rourke (D-TX 16) was a city representative in 2009 and joined in supporting the city resolution.
The recent news of the fence construction prompted him to write letters of opposition to CBP and Border Patrol officials, citing the historical and cultural value of the area.
In his letters, O’Rourke stresses the history of El Paso’s Hart’s Mill area, describing Oñate’s crossing near the area, the Hart’s Mill residence and the establishment of the original Fort Bliss in the area.
“[T]he historical significance of this area to our country, the state of Texas, and City of El Paso is immense,” O’Rourke said.
He described Oñate’s crossing in the area as the first Thanksgiving celebration in the United States.
“As a point of comparison, if the Border Patrol were to propose the construction of a fence at Plymouth Rock I am sure Congressional representatives and the surrounding community would object based on its importance as a symbol in American history,” O’Rourke said. “The proposed fence construction at Hart’s Mill should be viewed no differently.”
Joining O’Rourke in opposition to the fencing, in a November 19 letter to CBP commissioner Thomas Winkowski, are congressmen Pete Gallego (D-TX 23), Tony Cardenas (D-CA 29), Filemon Vela (D-TX 34), Ruben Hinojosa (D-TX 15), and Eric Swalwell (D-CA 15).
O’Rourke added that more fencing is unnecessary in El Paso, since the sector is at a level of operational control that exceeds that of other parts along the U.S.-Mexico border.
“It seems that there is little need to construct additional fence from a safety perspective when taxpayer dollars could be used more effectively in other areas of the border,” O’Rourke told Winkowski.
According to Border Patrol data, apprehensions of undocumented crossers in the El Paso sector are at their lowest level in 20 years. In 1993, the Border Patrol reported 258,781 apprehensions in the El Paso sector. In 2012, that number fell to 9,678 apprehensions (see chart “Total Illegal Alien Apprehensions By Fiscal Year” in slideshow, above).
In late September, during a visit to the border fence near Sunland Park, New Mexico, El Paso Border Patrol Sector spokesman Ramiro Cordero attributed the reduction in apprehensions and El Paso’s safety to the fence.
“Fences make good neighbors,” Cordero said. He added, “You have Ciudad Juarez in 2008, 2009, 2010 as the most dangerous city in the world, the worst in the world. And El Paso was what? And continues to be: the safest city in the nation. What a contrast.”
Cordero stated that critics of border fences are wrong in saying they divide communities.
“You don’t see people, cousins, coming up to the middle of the river to talk to each other,” he said. “This has nothing to do with dividing communities, absolutely nothing. This is to protect people.”
Cordero concedes that border fences, while designed to deter people from scaling them, can be overcome, but with much difficulty.
He asked rhetorically, “Can you climb it? Oh yeah.”
Still, he thinks the fences do slow down would-be border crossers and are an effective tool.
O’Rourke noted that several local officials, including State Senator Jose Rodriguez, County Judge Veronica Escobar, County Commissioner Patrick Abeln, Mayor Oscar Leeser and City Representative Cortney Niland, were also concerned about the construction of the fence.
Rodriguez said in a statement that he was opposed to a border fence when he was the county attorney and he continues to oppose it as a senator.
“This portion of the wall will harm historical resources of national significance. It’s extremely unfortunate that local concerns and even federal rules can be disregarded in order to impose this expensive and unnecessary wall on communities that don’t want it,” he said.
Mayor Leeser issued a statement to Newspaper Tree, saying that the upcoming construction of the fence is being monitored at the federal level by O’Rourke and that the congressman is keeping the city informed on the issue.
“I want to stress that at this time the City is allowing Congressman O’Rourke to handle the issue and will rely on his diligence to do what is necessary to address the issues,” Leeser stated.
Commissioner Abeln’s concerns were similar to O’Rourke’s and he thinks more thought should have been taken in considering whether a fence should be built in the area.
“To fence that off is like fencing off a piece of history,” Abeln said. “It is just a disappointment to me because it’s another place where we have failed to realize the history of our community.”
Abeln pondered how history could have been very different if border fences existed in the 16th Century.
“Had they put that fence in 1598, maybe Juan de Oñate would not have crossed,” he surmised.
Abeln made clear that he supports federal law enforcement officials, but thinks that they have been unduly burdened by failed immigration and drug control policies.
After considering the role of border fences from a larger perspective, Commissioner Abeln drew one conclusion, saying: “The fact is, when you think about it, they’re a failure of public policy at some level. You don’t build fences because something is working. You build them because something is not working.”
http://newspapertree.com/articles/2013/11/22/border-fence-to-be-built-at-juan-de-onate-crossing-site-of-harts-mill-and-the-first-fort-bliss
O’Rourke: No border fence at historic site
El Paso Inc.
November 17, 2013
by David Crowder
Construction is set to start Wednesday to close the half-mile gap in the border fence at the historic site of Don Juan de Oñate’s Rio Grande crossing, Hart’s Mill and Old Fort Bliss.
The site is generally known as El Paso del Norte, the river crossing point from which El Paso takes its name.
U.S. Rep. Beto O’Rourke, D-Texas, said he just learned of the start date.
“Given that this is arguably the most historic part of the entire U.S.-Mexican border, I feel very strongly that we must do everything we can to ensure that we understand the consequences of any action we take here and explore alternatives to putting up a wall.”
O’Rourke said he thinks the chances of stopping a project that has been in the works for several years aren’t good.
But, he said, he will do what he can in the coming days.
“I’ve spoken to other members of Congress who represent border communities, and they’re with us in this,” he said. “I’m going to look at other options politically, legislatively and administratively to ensure that El Paso’s needs are included in whatever decisions that are made.”
O’Rourke spoke with Thomas Winkowski, the acting commissioner of U.S. Customs and Border Protection, on Thursday and said he sought to impress upon him the importance of the site and the urgency of the situation.
“To cut to the quick, he and I are at an impasse,” the freshman congressman told El Paso Inc. “He feels that this is going to be very hard to stop at this point.”
O’Rourke wrote Winkowski a forceful letter Oct. 22 asking for a historic and cultural survey of the site and for “alternative fencing options.”
“I feel like El Paso has a very strong case to make,” O’Rourke said Thursday. “We’re going to renew that case with his team and explore what our options are and what the alternatives are.”
Historic crossing
The Oñate crossing site just off West Paisano is owned by rancher and businessman Chip Johns. It is in the midst of multiple construction projects – demolishing the Yandell Street overpass, improving West Paisano Drive and preparing for an overhead toll road to complete Loop 375.
Johns says he has been fighting the border fence project for more than three years, looking for support from local governments and historical groups to no avail.
He’s also hired a lawyer to help him negotiate a higher sale price for the right of way taken by the project.
“The government ‘eminent domained’ me and took that property behind Fort Bliss and the Hacienda Café along the river and now they want 20 more feet,” he said.
“That will put the fence very, very close to the historic markers back there.”
The standard 17-foot-high border fence would dominate the site, Johns said, but it could be significantly preserved if just 100 yards were left open or if another type of fence were built.
O’Rourke said Winkowski did tell him that the project calls for erection of a “removable barrier” to close the gap that measures about six-tenths of a mile.
“But I think we all know that once a wall goes up, whether it’s removable or permanent, it’s very unlikely that it’s going to be removed,” O’Rourke said.
“It just sets the stage for a more permanent structure and conditions the community to never expect to see something better in that location.”
http://www.elpasoinc.com/news/local_news/article_f0c6cd2c-4f9c-11e3-92cb-001a4bcf6878.html
November 17, 2013
by David Crowder
Construction is set to start Wednesday to close the half-mile gap in the border fence at the historic site of Don Juan de Oñate’s Rio Grande crossing, Hart’s Mill and Old Fort Bliss.
The site is generally known as El Paso del Norte, the river crossing point from which El Paso takes its name.
U.S. Rep. Beto O’Rourke, D-Texas, said he just learned of the start date.
“Given that this is arguably the most historic part of the entire U.S.-Mexican border, I feel very strongly that we must do everything we can to ensure that we understand the consequences of any action we take here and explore alternatives to putting up a wall.”
O’Rourke said he thinks the chances of stopping a project that has been in the works for several years aren’t good.
But, he said, he will do what he can in the coming days.
“I’ve spoken to other members of Congress who represent border communities, and they’re with us in this,” he said. “I’m going to look at other options politically, legislatively and administratively to ensure that El Paso’s needs are included in whatever decisions that are made.”
O’Rourke spoke with Thomas Winkowski, the acting commissioner of U.S. Customs and Border Protection, on Thursday and said he sought to impress upon him the importance of the site and the urgency of the situation.
“To cut to the quick, he and I are at an impasse,” the freshman congressman told El Paso Inc. “He feels that this is going to be very hard to stop at this point.”
O’Rourke wrote Winkowski a forceful letter Oct. 22 asking for a historic and cultural survey of the site and for “alternative fencing options.”
“I feel like El Paso has a very strong case to make,” O’Rourke said Thursday. “We’re going to renew that case with his team and explore what our options are and what the alternatives are.”
Historic crossing
The Oñate crossing site just off West Paisano is owned by rancher and businessman Chip Johns. It is in the midst of multiple construction projects – demolishing the Yandell Street overpass, improving West Paisano Drive and preparing for an overhead toll road to complete Loop 375.
Johns says he has been fighting the border fence project for more than three years, looking for support from local governments and historical groups to no avail.
He’s also hired a lawyer to help him negotiate a higher sale price for the right of way taken by the project.
“The government ‘eminent domained’ me and took that property behind Fort Bliss and the Hacienda Café along the river and now they want 20 more feet,” he said.
“That will put the fence very, very close to the historic markers back there.”
The standard 17-foot-high border fence would dominate the site, Johns said, but it could be significantly preserved if just 100 yards were left open or if another type of fence were built.
O’Rourke said Winkowski did tell him that the project calls for erection of a “removable barrier” to close the gap that measures about six-tenths of a mile.
“But I think we all know that once a wall goes up, whether it’s removable or permanent, it’s very unlikely that it’s going to be removed,” O’Rourke said.
“It just sets the stage for a more permanent structure and conditions the community to never expect to see something better in that location.”
http://www.elpasoinc.com/news/local_news/article_f0c6cd2c-4f9c-11e3-92cb-001a4bcf6878.html
Saturday, November 2, 2013
Sister of border agency leader pleads guilty to human smuggling charge
Center for Investigative Reporting
November 1, 2013
by Andrew Becker
The sister of the top-ranking U.S. Customs and Border Protection official in Arizona pleaded guilty Thursday to smuggling an immigrant through a Border Patrol checkpoint near Tucson in the car she was driving, her defense attorney said.
Tammy Leigh Stephens, 52, of Phoenix, admitted in U.S. District Court in Tucson to aiding and abetting an illegal entry. As part of a plea agreement, a second charge of transporting a migrant not authorized to be in the U.S. for financial gain was dropped, her attorney, Eric S. Manch, said in a telephone interview.
Stephens is the sister of Jeffrey Self, the commander of the agency’s Arizona Joint Field Command, which, under his control, unifies three major border operations in the state and includes one of the busiest smuggling corridors along the Southwest U.S. border.
Agency officials said they have no information that suggests any employees were involved or aware of the alleged criminal activity, including Self.
U.S. Customs and Border Protection “is fully cooperating with the U.S. Attorney’s Office and will refer all questions to them,” Melanie Roe, the agency’s assistant commissioner for public affairs, said in a written statement.
Stephens and a co-defendant, Jason Miles English, who pleaded guilty to the same charge Wednesday, were sentenced to 30 days each, said Cosme Lopez, a spokesman for the U.S. attorney’s office in Arizona. He declined to answer other questions related to the prosecution.
A 25-year veteran of the U.S. Border Patrol, Self has stepped aside from any involvement with his sister’s case, officials said. In the interim, he will be reassigned to Washington, where he will serve as the acting deputy assistant commissioner for the Office of Training and Development. In that role, he will lead efforts to implement recently announced changes to the agency’s use-of-force policies and practices.
The union that represents Border Patrol agents took issue with Self's reassignment.
“A normal Border Patrol agent who had a close relative arrested for alien smuggling would themselves be investigated by internal affairs and the Border Patrol, not rewarded and reassigned to a high-profile position within the agency,” said Shawn Moran, a vice president of the National Border Patrol Council.
Alan Bersin, then commissioner of Customs and Border Protection, appointed Self as the first commander of the Joint Field Command when it was created in 2011. Martin Vaughan, an official with the agency’s Office of Air and Marine, will serve as the Joint Field Command’s acting commander.
The offices that fall under the Arizona Joint Field Command – the U.S. Border Patrol, Office of Field Operations, and the Office of Air and Marine – include operations at some of the agency’s biggest Border Patrol stations, various border crossings and other ports of entry, and unmanned aerial vehicles and other aircraft.
Arizona is a major transit area for human and drug smuggling and has been a major focus for the agency and U.S. Department of Homeland Security. In fiscal year 2012, Customs and Border Protection apprehended 124,631 unauthorized border crossers in Arizona, the lowest number in 19 years, while capturing more than 1.1 million pounds of drugs between and at border crossings and other ports, according to the agency.
The family relation makes for an uncommon situation, but defense attorneys for Stephens and co-defendant English described the alleged smuggling attempt as nothing unusual for that area.
“There’s not really anything about the case that seems out of the ordinary,” said Manch.
Stephens was driving a white Mitsubishi Galant with two passengers Oct. 20 when she approached a Border Patrol checkpoint on State Route 85 near Why, Ariz, according to the criminal complaint signed by a Border Patrol agent.
When an agent asked the nationality of a passenger, Marlene Josefina Rodriguez-Fernandez, Stephens answered that the woman was a U.S. citizen, the complaint shows.
Rodriguez-Fernandez presented a U.S. passport that did not belong to her and eventually admitted that she was not a citizen or national of the United States and did not have documents that permitted her to be in the country.
She told the Border Patrol that she made arrangements to be smuggled into the United States and agreed to pay money for the use of a U.S. passport, the complaint shows. She was told to go to a gas station after crossing the border and board a car with a female driver, who turned out to be Stephens.
English later entered the car, asked for an identification document from Rodriguez-Fernandez and told her “to say that they were returning from partying in Puerto Penasco, Sonora, Mexico,” the complaint shows.
English admitted to the Border Patrol that he agreed to accompany Stephens to the border to “pick up a friend,” according to the complaint.
There's no indication Stephens has been involved in smuggling before, Manch said. He said there were "a lot of reasons" for her decision to be involved in the smuggling attempt, but it was complicated and he declined to give more specifics. He said she was aware of her brother's involvement in border security but did not know his specific role.
"She's embarrassed enough about this incident” and just wants to get back to her life, he said.
http://cironline.org/reports/sister-border-agency-leader-pleads-guilty-human-smuggling-charge-5493
November 1, 2013
by Andrew Becker
The sister of the top-ranking U.S. Customs and Border Protection official in Arizona pleaded guilty Thursday to smuggling an immigrant through a Border Patrol checkpoint near Tucson in the car she was driving, her defense attorney said.
Tammy Leigh Stephens, 52, of Phoenix, admitted in U.S. District Court in Tucson to aiding and abetting an illegal entry. As part of a plea agreement, a second charge of transporting a migrant not authorized to be in the U.S. for financial gain was dropped, her attorney, Eric S. Manch, said in a telephone interview.
Stephens is the sister of Jeffrey Self, the commander of the agency’s Arizona Joint Field Command, which, under his control, unifies three major border operations in the state and includes one of the busiest smuggling corridors along the Southwest U.S. border.
Agency officials said they have no information that suggests any employees were involved or aware of the alleged criminal activity, including Self.
U.S. Customs and Border Protection “is fully cooperating with the U.S. Attorney’s Office and will refer all questions to them,” Melanie Roe, the agency’s assistant commissioner for public affairs, said in a written statement.
Stephens and a co-defendant, Jason Miles English, who pleaded guilty to the same charge Wednesday, were sentenced to 30 days each, said Cosme Lopez, a spokesman for the U.S. attorney’s office in Arizona. He declined to answer other questions related to the prosecution.
A 25-year veteran of the U.S. Border Patrol, Self has stepped aside from any involvement with his sister’s case, officials said. In the interim, he will be reassigned to Washington, where he will serve as the acting deputy assistant commissioner for the Office of Training and Development. In that role, he will lead efforts to implement recently announced changes to the agency’s use-of-force policies and practices.
The union that represents Border Patrol agents took issue with Self's reassignment.
“A normal Border Patrol agent who had a close relative arrested for alien smuggling would themselves be investigated by internal affairs and the Border Patrol, not rewarded and reassigned to a high-profile position within the agency,” said Shawn Moran, a vice president of the National Border Patrol Council.
Alan Bersin, then commissioner of Customs and Border Protection, appointed Self as the first commander of the Joint Field Command when it was created in 2011. Martin Vaughan, an official with the agency’s Office of Air and Marine, will serve as the Joint Field Command’s acting commander.
The offices that fall under the Arizona Joint Field Command – the U.S. Border Patrol, Office of Field Operations, and the Office of Air and Marine – include operations at some of the agency’s biggest Border Patrol stations, various border crossings and other ports of entry, and unmanned aerial vehicles and other aircraft.
Arizona is a major transit area for human and drug smuggling and has been a major focus for the agency and U.S. Department of Homeland Security. In fiscal year 2012, Customs and Border Protection apprehended 124,631 unauthorized border crossers in Arizona, the lowest number in 19 years, while capturing more than 1.1 million pounds of drugs between and at border crossings and other ports, according to the agency.
The family relation makes for an uncommon situation, but defense attorneys for Stephens and co-defendant English described the alleged smuggling attempt as nothing unusual for that area.
“There’s not really anything about the case that seems out of the ordinary,” said Manch.
Stephens was driving a white Mitsubishi Galant with two passengers Oct. 20 when she approached a Border Patrol checkpoint on State Route 85 near Why, Ariz, according to the criminal complaint signed by a Border Patrol agent.
When an agent asked the nationality of a passenger, Marlene Josefina Rodriguez-Fernandez, Stephens answered that the woman was a U.S. citizen, the complaint shows.
Rodriguez-Fernandez presented a U.S. passport that did not belong to her and eventually admitted that she was not a citizen or national of the United States and did not have documents that permitted her to be in the country.
She told the Border Patrol that she made arrangements to be smuggled into the United States and agreed to pay money for the use of a U.S. passport, the complaint shows. She was told to go to a gas station after crossing the border and board a car with a female driver, who turned out to be Stephens.
English later entered the car, asked for an identification document from Rodriguez-Fernandez and told her “to say that they were returning from partying in Puerto Penasco, Sonora, Mexico,” the complaint shows.
English admitted to the Border Patrol that he agreed to accompany Stephens to the border to “pick up a friend,” according to the complaint.
There's no indication Stephens has been involved in smuggling before, Manch said. He said there were "a lot of reasons" for her decision to be involved in the smuggling attempt, but it was complicated and he declined to give more specifics. He said she was aware of her brother's involvement in border security but did not know his specific role.
"She's embarrassed enough about this incident” and just wants to get back to her life, he said.
http://cironline.org/reports/sister-border-agency-leader-pleads-guilty-human-smuggling-charge-5493
Tuesday, October 1, 2013
Ownership questions arise in 21 border fence cases
Brownsville Herald
September 30, 2013
by Mark Reagan
Five years after the U.S. government seized land along the U.S.-Mexico border between Los Indios and Brownsville for the border fence, it still isn’t sure who all the landowners were and who needs to be compensated.
Last Tuesday, U.S. District Judge Andrew S. Hanen had 21 border fence condemnation cases on his docket after the U.S. Attorney’s Office, Southern District of Texas, requested a status conference hearing to try to sift through some confusion in the cases.
The land involved in the cases is within Section 0-14 of the border fence, immediately to the east of the Los Indios Port of Entry, court documents show.
“The United States requests this status conference with the Court for the purpose of presenting its proposal to 1) identify the actual owners of the condemned tracts and the yet to be filed tracts in 0-14; 2) consolidate the tracts so that the entirety of the condemned land in question is in one case; and 3) sever the tracts from the consolidated case based on ownership boundaries in order to resolve title issues, just compensation and close the 0-14 cases on the Court’s docket,” court documents indicate.
Hanen ordered the USAO to draft a proposed order and have landowners and attorneys review it before presenting it to the court, according to docket text.
An attorney for one of the parties named in three of the suits agreed to speak to The Brownsville Herald about the hearing.
Lance Alan Kirby, who represents Robert B. Duncan in three of the cases, said the USAO used the status conference to explain to Hanen why the cases, most of which originated in 2008, were taking so long to resolve.
“His (USAO attorney E. Paxton Warner) explanation was that originally they were going to put the fence in a different place, but the berm wouldn’t support concrete so instead they had to use irrigation district property, which they purchased from the district but it turns out they didn’t own the property,” Kirby said of the irrigation district. “It was owned by landowners adjacent to it.”
Kirby said the Cameron County Irrigation District only had an easement, which was recently discovered and resulted in a title mess that the USAO is trying to clear up so it can proceed with condemnation actions and just compensation.
A spokeswoman with the USAO confirmed what Kirby told The Brownsville Herald.
“The judge’s take is he is ready to see this move and the landowners need to be paid for the condemnation since it’s been five years since the government has taken the property,” Kirby said. “The fence is there.”
He said that basically the USAO has to figure out who owns what and how much to compensate the landowners.
“They filed all these condemnation cases in 2008 because Paxton said they had a mandate to complete the border wall by 2008, and so they used appraisal district records to file condemnation actions instead of having the actual title work,” Kirby said. “Now they are getting title work and some people alleged to be owners are not owners and some of them, you know, there are new people still being added to the suit that they didn’t know about. So really what they have is a title mess that they are trying to clear up.”
The docket text also indicates that the court “has given the parties in the land condemnation cases, where the City of Brownsville is named, two weeks to write a letter if they intend to seek his (Hanen) recusal.”
The Brownsville Herald reached out to the city attorney’s office to request comment and was directed to file a public information request via the city secretary, Estela Von Hatten.
In an email responding to The Herald’s request for comment, Von Hatten replied: “In response to your public information request received on Sept. 24, 2013, the City has filed no motions to recuse the Honorable United States District Court Judge. Consequently, there is no document that would be responsive to your request.”
The Herald did not request documents so it’s not clear whether the city will seek to recuse Hanen.
As for the USAO’s pending proposed order on the 21 cases, Kirby said he wasn’t sure when it will be filed.
“They didn’t state when they are expected to get it,” he said of the proposed order. “So that’s something we’re curious as to when they are going to get it.”
http://www.brownsvilleherald.com/news/local/article_c024de7a-28af-11e3-bd3a-0019bb30f31a.html
September 30, 2013
by Mark Reagan
Five years after the U.S. government seized land along the U.S.-Mexico border between Los Indios and Brownsville for the border fence, it still isn’t sure who all the landowners were and who needs to be compensated.
Last Tuesday, U.S. District Judge Andrew S. Hanen had 21 border fence condemnation cases on his docket after the U.S. Attorney’s Office, Southern District of Texas, requested a status conference hearing to try to sift through some confusion in the cases.
The land involved in the cases is within Section 0-14 of the border fence, immediately to the east of the Los Indios Port of Entry, court documents show.
“The United States requests this status conference with the Court for the purpose of presenting its proposal to 1) identify the actual owners of the condemned tracts and the yet to be filed tracts in 0-14; 2) consolidate the tracts so that the entirety of the condemned land in question is in one case; and 3) sever the tracts from the consolidated case based on ownership boundaries in order to resolve title issues, just compensation and close the 0-14 cases on the Court’s docket,” court documents indicate.
Hanen ordered the USAO to draft a proposed order and have landowners and attorneys review it before presenting it to the court, according to docket text.
An attorney for one of the parties named in three of the suits agreed to speak to The Brownsville Herald about the hearing.
Lance Alan Kirby, who represents Robert B. Duncan in three of the cases, said the USAO used the status conference to explain to Hanen why the cases, most of which originated in 2008, were taking so long to resolve.
“His (USAO attorney E. Paxton Warner) explanation was that originally they were going to put the fence in a different place, but the berm wouldn’t support concrete so instead they had to use irrigation district property, which they purchased from the district but it turns out they didn’t own the property,” Kirby said of the irrigation district. “It was owned by landowners adjacent to it.”
Kirby said the Cameron County Irrigation District only had an easement, which was recently discovered and resulted in a title mess that the USAO is trying to clear up so it can proceed with condemnation actions and just compensation.
A spokeswoman with the USAO confirmed what Kirby told The Brownsville Herald.
“The judge’s take is he is ready to see this move and the landowners need to be paid for the condemnation since it’s been five years since the government has taken the property,” Kirby said. “The fence is there.”
He said that basically the USAO has to figure out who owns what and how much to compensate the landowners.
“They filed all these condemnation cases in 2008 because Paxton said they had a mandate to complete the border wall by 2008, and so they used appraisal district records to file condemnation actions instead of having the actual title work,” Kirby said. “Now they are getting title work and some people alleged to be owners are not owners and some of them, you know, there are new people still being added to the suit that they didn’t know about. So really what they have is a title mess that they are trying to clear up.”
The docket text also indicates that the court “has given the parties in the land condemnation cases, where the City of Brownsville is named, two weeks to write a letter if they intend to seek his (Hanen) recusal.”
The Brownsville Herald reached out to the city attorney’s office to request comment and was directed to file a public information request via the city secretary, Estela Von Hatten.
In an email responding to The Herald’s request for comment, Von Hatten replied: “In response to your public information request received on Sept. 24, 2013, the City has filed no motions to recuse the Honorable United States District Court Judge. Consequently, there is no document that would be responsive to your request.”
The Herald did not request documents so it’s not clear whether the city will seek to recuse Hanen.
As for the USAO’s pending proposed order on the 21 cases, Kirby said he wasn’t sure when it will be filed.
“They didn’t state when they are expected to get it,” he said of the proposed order. “So that’s something we’re curious as to when they are going to get it.”
http://www.brownsvilleherald.com/news/local/article_c024de7a-28af-11e3-bd3a-0019bb30f31a.html
Friday, September 6, 2013
The Complex Life of Border Towns
National Journal
September 5, 2013
by Elahe Izadi
EAGLE PASS, TEXAS—Sam Farhat grew up in this small south Texas town where he now owns Cowboy Corral, a clothing shop where customers peruse racks of jeans, belts, and shirts while Farhat—a big man of Palestinian heritage wearing a cowboy hat—answers their questions in Spanish.
Farhat's business depends upon the foot traffic that legally enters the United States from Mexico, just blocks from his downtown storefront. Outside, people leaving discount perfume, dress, and shoe stores carry shopping bags as they cross the bridge on foot, walking past cars lined up waiting to cross the border.
But talk in Washington of tightening border security in towns like Eagle Pass as part of broader immigration reforms has locals weary. "That's not going to help business, that's for sure," Farhat said. "It's already hard enough for people to come across the border."
For residents in Eagle Pass and other nearby towns, the border is not a political topic or an abstract concept—the Rio Grande River that separates Mexico from the United States is in their backyard. Many of the ideas under consideration, from border fencing to additional Border Patrol agents and even drones overhead, will have a direct impact here.
"Those of us who live along the border want to be just as safe and secure in our beds as anyone else does, but we want a solution that works," said Democratic Rep. Pete Gallego, whose district includes Eagle Pass. "We don't want a political solution, we want a practical solution."
That may not be easy. In many ways, Eagle Pass represents the complexity of living in small border towns, where life can be woven together tightly with those of neighboring communities in Mexico.
Residents here cross the border regularly into the town of Piedras Negras, Mexico, to visit families and friends. Lines can get long on both sides of the bridge around Christmas and Easter. Communities along the border often refer to their "sister cities" on the Mexican side, and mayors and local agencies have working relationships. What happens on one side often affects the other.
"Blood lines don't stop," said Laura Allen, the Republican county judge in nearby Val Verde County, which includes the town of Del Rio. "Relationships don't stop at the river."
Securing the Border
In terms of security, Border Patrol agents are a more common sight in town than local police, and they often help in responding to emergencies. And the town already has some border fencing; in 2008, Eagle Pass was the first town the federal government sued in its effort to increase border fencing, drawing fierce opposition from town officials and residents.
If Congress passes an immigration bill, many of the security elements could intensify. The immigration bill passed by the Senate essentially calls for instituting a military-like presence along the border, spending $46 billion to double the number of Border Patrol agents to 40,000, build 700 miles of border fencing, and bolster technology such as drones to increase surveillance.
Border-security legislation unanimously passed out of the House Homeland Security Committee, authored by Chairman Michael McCaul, R-Texas, takes a different approach. Before a dollar amount is dictated, the bill calls on the Homeland Security Department to first develop a border-security plan—subject to congressional approval—that would eliminate 90 percent of illegal border crossings within five years. Democratic Rep. Sheila Jackson Lee cosponsored the bill, and other Democrats have signaled they find the language easier to work with than the Senate border-security provision. It's expected to be one of the first pieces of immigration legislation that House takes up after recess.
The congressional district with the longest stretch of the Mexican-U.S. border includes Eagle Pass. It's a swing district that President Obama lost but Gallego won in 2012. Gallego says border security is not a partisan issue in his district.
"One of the frustrations that people along the border have is so many people who are trying to drive the debate on border policy and border security are people who don't live on the border, who've never been to the border, and yet they're trying to dictate the terms by which we do border security," he said.
Indeed, there is a widespread sentiment here that people making political calculations about the border don't have sense of what daily life is like in border communities.
"They use the border, they see the area as a sword and a shield in politics, but we're human beings, we live down here," said Democratic State Rep. Poncho Nevarez, whose home is on the banks of the Rio Grande, so close that he can point to Mexico from his porch. His wife is Mexican, and his children take classes across the border.
"We shouldn't be pawns in this game to see who can get themselves elected because they can beat their chest more about how they secured the border," he said.
Unlike other parts of the border where violence from Mexico makes headlines, officials here say problems are comparatively tame, partially due to the presence of Border Patrol and state of affairs in neighboring Mexican cities.
"We're kind of the unseen area of the border here. You can go to El Paso, you can go to Loredo, but they don't have the same issues we have," Allen said. "Ask me when was the last time we had to shut down our bridge because violence spilled over from Mexico. It's not happening."
Border Patrol officials say they do apprehend people who commit serious crimes in the U.S. and cross back illegally. In the Del Rio border sector, 50 pounds of cocaine and 63,485 pounds of marijuana were seized by Border Patrol in fiscal 2012.
One major public-safety scare took place here last year, when more than 130 inmates broke out of a prison just over the border in Piedras Negras. Authorities at the time were concerned that prisoners could cross over to Eagle Pass, but it turns out that a Mexican drug cartel was likely behind the prison break, a tactic cartels use to replenish their ranks. Authorities found one suspected escapee this summer hiding in a home in Eagle Pass, but there was no other fallout.
Nevarez, who can point to the prison area from his yard, recalled rushing home after hearing of the break. But his fears were quickly allayed as he reasoned that many of those prisoners weren't going to cross into American soil, but rather stay in Mexico to work for the cartels.
Gallego says that people in border communities are united behind wanting to do something about the cartels and drug trade.
"The people coming here, even if they're coming here illegally, they're coming here to work in agriculture or construction," said Shawn Moran, vice president of National Border Patrol Council, a union representing Border Patrol agents. "But there is a large group that is coming here to sell drugs or be part of criminal gangs and commit crimes. We shouldn't overlook that in any sort of immigration reform."
The Border Patrol
Border Patrol and other federal agencies often constitute the most visible law enforcement in border communities. About 55,000 people live in the town and its outlying areas in Maverick County; Eagle Pass's police department numbered 76 in 2012.
Authorities won't release figures on the numbers of border agents designated for particular towns, but Eagle Pass and Del Rio are the two major towns in the Del Rio Border Patrol sector, which includes 210 miles of border and nearly 60,000 square miles of territory.There were 1,665 Border Patrol agents designated for this area in 2012, a figure that doesn't include Customs and Border Protection and other federal agents.
Nearly 87 percent of the nation's 21,394 Border Patrol agents come from the nine southwest border sectors. The Del Rio sector ranks in the middle in terms of the number of agents.
While Border Patrol agents are accepted as members of the community and regarded with respect, Gallego said some locals get frustrated with the checkpoints. Border Patrol checkpoints on roads extend far beyond the border; all motorists have to stop and answer questions related to their citizenship. A dog trained to detect drugs sniffs cars, and checkpoint stations are equipped with cameras, equipment to detect radioactive elements, and temporary holding cells for suspected illegal immigrants.
In 2012, the Border Patrol apprehended 21,720 illegal immigrants in the Del Rio sector, the highest number in the sector since 2007 and much higher than the El Paso sector's 9,678 apprehensions.
Moran says the border can be secured with fewer than the additional 20,000 agents called for in the Senate bill. His group pushed for an amendment by Sen. Jon Tester, D-Mont., that would have revamped the pay system to allow flexibility for agents working overtime and covering shifts.
"It's usually during the busiest times, and when the smugglers know when we're in between shifts, and that's when they try to make their moves," Moran said.
The addition of more Border Patrol agents could have an economic impact in these communities, with an influx of jobs and dollars spent locally. Some ranchers and others living further from the border also want more agents to monitor those traversing their properties as they make their way inland. But many officials close to the border are skeptical that the federal government will be able to fully fund and sustain a doubling of Border Patrol agents.
"If you're telling me you're going to double the number of government jobs in my community and if you're going to allow these people to contribute to the economy, they're going to eat out at restaurants and shop at stores and buy homes—from an economic development perspective, I'm for that," Gallego said. "But that's not a border-security perspective. We haven't done anything for border security when we've done that."
Eagle Pass Mayor Ramsey English Cantu said that while there is a need to "have a great presence," he would like to see resources poured into Customs and Border Protection, which operate the official entry points into the United States and where lines can back up. "We continue to see ports of entries where people are smuggling drugs across because there isn't the necessary infrastructure," he said. "These are the things that need to be ultimately addressed."
Farhat and others in Eagle Pass would like to see more resources poured into shortening the lines at the official ports of entry, which are operated by Customs and Border Protection, not Border Patrol. Tolls collected at the town's two points of entry make up more than a quarter of Eagle Pass's budget revenues.
The Fence
The fence, which once drew outrage in these communities, now attracts a level of amusement.
In Eagle Pass, it's more than 10 feet high, cuts through a city golf course, and includes openings throughout. "If those folks in Ohio were to see this, they'd say, 'Is this what you're wasting my tax dollars on?' " Nevarez said.
In Del Rio, American land sits on the other side of an approximately 2-mile portion of the fence, and Allen asks whether the American government has created a Demilitarized Zone. It stops at a low, barbed-wire fence on private property. Locals point to the fence gates, with extra horizontal bars, as places people climb over.
"The fence was not a good thing," Allen said. "We would have liked to see that money put to use for other things because, like I said, I can very easily show you where people walk around it, so why did we spend all that money?"
Between 2006 and 2009, the federal government allocated $2.4 billion for construction of 670 miles of pedestrian and vehicular fences, with costs ranging between $400,000 and $15.1 million per mile, depending on the location, fence material, topography and kind of fence, according to a 2009 Government Accountability Office report.
But Border Patrol officials point to the fence as a useful tool in helping to manage crossings; agents can target their patrols better since they know where the entry points are. Moran says the fence has been very useful in slowing down the traffic across the border, particularly vehicular crossings.
"But no fence is going to stop people who are determined to get into this country. You can't have a fence with gaps if you want it to be effective," Moran said. "The technology is great and it's an asset, but no drone and no fence or whatever made an arrest. Those help us do our jobs."
There's also a sense in border communities that the fence makes them appear to be bad neighbors.
"If we take this militia approach to our border, what kind of message are we sending to our sister country? I don't like that message," Allen said. "Would we do that on the border with Canada? I really don't feel like we would."
http://www.nationaljournal.com//daily/the-complex-life-of-border-towns-20130905
September 5, 2013
by Elahe Izadi
EAGLE PASS, TEXAS—Sam Farhat grew up in this small south Texas town where he now owns Cowboy Corral, a clothing shop where customers peruse racks of jeans, belts, and shirts while Farhat—a big man of Palestinian heritage wearing a cowboy hat—answers their questions in Spanish.
Farhat's business depends upon the foot traffic that legally enters the United States from Mexico, just blocks from his downtown storefront. Outside, people leaving discount perfume, dress, and shoe stores carry shopping bags as they cross the bridge on foot, walking past cars lined up waiting to cross the border.
But talk in Washington of tightening border security in towns like Eagle Pass as part of broader immigration reforms has locals weary. "That's not going to help business, that's for sure," Farhat said. "It's already hard enough for people to come across the border."
For residents in Eagle Pass and other nearby towns, the border is not a political topic or an abstract concept—the Rio Grande River that separates Mexico from the United States is in their backyard. Many of the ideas under consideration, from border fencing to additional Border Patrol agents and even drones overhead, will have a direct impact here.
"Those of us who live along the border want to be just as safe and secure in our beds as anyone else does, but we want a solution that works," said Democratic Rep. Pete Gallego, whose district includes Eagle Pass. "We don't want a political solution, we want a practical solution."
That may not be easy. In many ways, Eagle Pass represents the complexity of living in small border towns, where life can be woven together tightly with those of neighboring communities in Mexico.
Residents here cross the border regularly into the town of Piedras Negras, Mexico, to visit families and friends. Lines can get long on both sides of the bridge around Christmas and Easter. Communities along the border often refer to their "sister cities" on the Mexican side, and mayors and local agencies have working relationships. What happens on one side often affects the other.
"Blood lines don't stop," said Laura Allen, the Republican county judge in nearby Val Verde County, which includes the town of Del Rio. "Relationships don't stop at the river."
Securing the Border
In terms of security, Border Patrol agents are a more common sight in town than local police, and they often help in responding to emergencies. And the town already has some border fencing; in 2008, Eagle Pass was the first town the federal government sued in its effort to increase border fencing, drawing fierce opposition from town officials and residents.
If Congress passes an immigration bill, many of the security elements could intensify. The immigration bill passed by the Senate essentially calls for instituting a military-like presence along the border, spending $46 billion to double the number of Border Patrol agents to 40,000, build 700 miles of border fencing, and bolster technology such as drones to increase surveillance.
Border-security legislation unanimously passed out of the House Homeland Security Committee, authored by Chairman Michael McCaul, R-Texas, takes a different approach. Before a dollar amount is dictated, the bill calls on the Homeland Security Department to first develop a border-security plan—subject to congressional approval—that would eliminate 90 percent of illegal border crossings within five years. Democratic Rep. Sheila Jackson Lee cosponsored the bill, and other Democrats have signaled they find the language easier to work with than the Senate border-security provision. It's expected to be one of the first pieces of immigration legislation that House takes up after recess.
The congressional district with the longest stretch of the Mexican-U.S. border includes Eagle Pass. It's a swing district that President Obama lost but Gallego won in 2012. Gallego says border security is not a partisan issue in his district.
"One of the frustrations that people along the border have is so many people who are trying to drive the debate on border policy and border security are people who don't live on the border, who've never been to the border, and yet they're trying to dictate the terms by which we do border security," he said.
Indeed, there is a widespread sentiment here that people making political calculations about the border don't have sense of what daily life is like in border communities.
"They use the border, they see the area as a sword and a shield in politics, but we're human beings, we live down here," said Democratic State Rep. Poncho Nevarez, whose home is on the banks of the Rio Grande, so close that he can point to Mexico from his porch. His wife is Mexican, and his children take classes across the border.
"We shouldn't be pawns in this game to see who can get themselves elected because they can beat their chest more about how they secured the border," he said.
Unlike other parts of the border where violence from Mexico makes headlines, officials here say problems are comparatively tame, partially due to the presence of Border Patrol and state of affairs in neighboring Mexican cities.
"We're kind of the unseen area of the border here. You can go to El Paso, you can go to Loredo, but they don't have the same issues we have," Allen said. "Ask me when was the last time we had to shut down our bridge because violence spilled over from Mexico. It's not happening."
Border Patrol officials say they do apprehend people who commit serious crimes in the U.S. and cross back illegally. In the Del Rio border sector, 50 pounds of cocaine and 63,485 pounds of marijuana were seized by Border Patrol in fiscal 2012.
One major public-safety scare took place here last year, when more than 130 inmates broke out of a prison just over the border in Piedras Negras. Authorities at the time were concerned that prisoners could cross over to Eagle Pass, but it turns out that a Mexican drug cartel was likely behind the prison break, a tactic cartels use to replenish their ranks. Authorities found one suspected escapee this summer hiding in a home in Eagle Pass, but there was no other fallout.
Nevarez, who can point to the prison area from his yard, recalled rushing home after hearing of the break. But his fears were quickly allayed as he reasoned that many of those prisoners weren't going to cross into American soil, but rather stay in Mexico to work for the cartels.
Gallego says that people in border communities are united behind wanting to do something about the cartels and drug trade.
"The people coming here, even if they're coming here illegally, they're coming here to work in agriculture or construction," said Shawn Moran, vice president of National Border Patrol Council, a union representing Border Patrol agents. "But there is a large group that is coming here to sell drugs or be part of criminal gangs and commit crimes. We shouldn't overlook that in any sort of immigration reform."
The Border Patrol
Border Patrol and other federal agencies often constitute the most visible law enforcement in border communities. About 55,000 people live in the town and its outlying areas in Maverick County; Eagle Pass's police department numbered 76 in 2012.
Authorities won't release figures on the numbers of border agents designated for particular towns, but Eagle Pass and Del Rio are the two major towns in the Del Rio Border Patrol sector, which includes 210 miles of border and nearly 60,000 square miles of territory.There were 1,665 Border Patrol agents designated for this area in 2012, a figure that doesn't include Customs and Border Protection and other federal agents.
Nearly 87 percent of the nation's 21,394 Border Patrol agents come from the nine southwest border sectors. The Del Rio sector ranks in the middle in terms of the number of agents.
While Border Patrol agents are accepted as members of the community and regarded with respect, Gallego said some locals get frustrated with the checkpoints. Border Patrol checkpoints on roads extend far beyond the border; all motorists have to stop and answer questions related to their citizenship. A dog trained to detect drugs sniffs cars, and checkpoint stations are equipped with cameras, equipment to detect radioactive elements, and temporary holding cells for suspected illegal immigrants.
In 2012, the Border Patrol apprehended 21,720 illegal immigrants in the Del Rio sector, the highest number in the sector since 2007 and much higher than the El Paso sector's 9,678 apprehensions.
Moran says the border can be secured with fewer than the additional 20,000 agents called for in the Senate bill. His group pushed for an amendment by Sen. Jon Tester, D-Mont., that would have revamped the pay system to allow flexibility for agents working overtime and covering shifts.
"It's usually during the busiest times, and when the smugglers know when we're in between shifts, and that's when they try to make their moves," Moran said.
The addition of more Border Patrol agents could have an economic impact in these communities, with an influx of jobs and dollars spent locally. Some ranchers and others living further from the border also want more agents to monitor those traversing their properties as they make their way inland. But many officials close to the border are skeptical that the federal government will be able to fully fund and sustain a doubling of Border Patrol agents.
"If you're telling me you're going to double the number of government jobs in my community and if you're going to allow these people to contribute to the economy, they're going to eat out at restaurants and shop at stores and buy homes—from an economic development perspective, I'm for that," Gallego said. "But that's not a border-security perspective. We haven't done anything for border security when we've done that."
Eagle Pass Mayor Ramsey English Cantu said that while there is a need to "have a great presence," he would like to see resources poured into Customs and Border Protection, which operate the official entry points into the United States and where lines can back up. "We continue to see ports of entries where people are smuggling drugs across because there isn't the necessary infrastructure," he said. "These are the things that need to be ultimately addressed."
Farhat and others in Eagle Pass would like to see more resources poured into shortening the lines at the official ports of entry, which are operated by Customs and Border Protection, not Border Patrol. Tolls collected at the town's two points of entry make up more than a quarter of Eagle Pass's budget revenues.
The Fence
The fence, which once drew outrage in these communities, now attracts a level of amusement.
In Eagle Pass, it's more than 10 feet high, cuts through a city golf course, and includes openings throughout. "If those folks in Ohio were to see this, they'd say, 'Is this what you're wasting my tax dollars on?' " Nevarez said.
In Del Rio, American land sits on the other side of an approximately 2-mile portion of the fence, and Allen asks whether the American government has created a Demilitarized Zone. It stops at a low, barbed-wire fence on private property. Locals point to the fence gates, with extra horizontal bars, as places people climb over.
"The fence was not a good thing," Allen said. "We would have liked to see that money put to use for other things because, like I said, I can very easily show you where people walk around it, so why did we spend all that money?"
Between 2006 and 2009, the federal government allocated $2.4 billion for construction of 670 miles of pedestrian and vehicular fences, with costs ranging between $400,000 and $15.1 million per mile, depending on the location, fence material, topography and kind of fence, according to a 2009 Government Accountability Office report.
But Border Patrol officials point to the fence as a useful tool in helping to manage crossings; agents can target their patrols better since they know where the entry points are. Moran says the fence has been very useful in slowing down the traffic across the border, particularly vehicular crossings.
"But no fence is going to stop people who are determined to get into this country. You can't have a fence with gaps if you want it to be effective," Moran said. "The technology is great and it's an asset, but no drone and no fence or whatever made an arrest. Those help us do our jobs."
There's also a sense in border communities that the fence makes them appear to be bad neighbors.
"If we take this militia approach to our border, what kind of message are we sending to our sister country? I don't like that message," Allen said. "Would we do that on the border with Canada? I really don't feel like we would."
http://www.nationaljournal.com//daily/the-complex-life-of-border-towns-20130905
Wednesday, July 24, 2013
Border Patrol considers putting razor wire on Nogales fence
Nogales International
July 19, 2013
by Kurt Prendergrast
Concertina wire could be installed on the border fence to the east and west of downtown Nogales, much to the chagrin of the city council.
The wire, made of razor-sharp blades attached to coiled metal strands, was installed on the fence separating San Diego and Tijuana five years ago and the Border Patrol is considering a similar action in Nogales.
July 19, 2013
by Kurt Prendergrast
Concertina wire could be installed on the border fence to the east and west of downtown Nogales, much to the chagrin of the city council.
The wire, made of razor-sharp blades attached to coiled metal strands, was installed on the fence separating San Diego and Tijuana five years ago and the Border Patrol is considering a similar action in Nogales.
The issue was brought up at Wednesday’s regular council meeting by Nogales Mayor Arturo Garino in response to a conversation he had with Leslie Lawson, patrol agent in charge of Border Patrol’s Nogales Station, who let him know about the proposed plan to install razor wire on the fence near Short Street on the east side of Nogales and near Hereford Drive on the west side.
The Border Patrol’s Tucson Sector “is considering a proposed deployment of concertina wire in the Nogales area,” spokesman Brent Cagen wrote in an email response to questions from the NI. The proposal is still under review, he wrote, adding “specifics concerning this proposal are unavailable at this time.”
During his meeting with Lawson, Garino said, she told him that rather than place the wire on top of the fence, the wire would be installed about 10 feet above the ground on the U.S. side of the fence.
Lawson told Garino that the wire would act as a deterrent to prevent people from jumping the fence, he said.
“There’s been a lot of injuries – broken ankles, hips, and different injuries – from people trying to jump,” he said, noting that the Border Patrol’s concern about injuries was “understandable.”
However, Garino said, he has “concerns” about the dangers of installing razor wire on the fence.
“If somebody at night was to jump the fence, not knowing that on the other side of the fence, 10-feet high, waiting for him is the razor wire. I don’t know what conditions we would find that person there,” he said. “Is it better for that person to break an ankle or is it better for that person to be tangled in that wire?”
Garino found support for his concerns among the other council members.
“It kind of gives me an image of Hitler coming back,” said Councilman John Doyle. “I think that it’s a little too strong. If somebody gets tangled up there, their eyes go or their legs get cut.”
Councilman Cesar Parada proposed that the council pass a resolution in opposition to the plan, which it could send to members of Congress. City Manager Shane Dille proposed a news conference to protest the plan.
After the discussion, Garino directed staff to draw up a resolution along the lines suggested by Parada.
On the razor’s edge
In 2010, then-Rep. Gabrielle Giffords requested funding from the House Subcommittee on Homeland Security for a border barrier in Nogales that would “incorporate double-wall fencing, concertina wire... and vehicle ditches.”
That request was pulled back after the NI called attention to the plan, and when the new fence was constructed in 2011, it was a single-layer, bollard-style fence without concertina wire.
However, razor wire was installed on the border fence that separates San Diego and Tijuana five years ago, according to a May 17, 2008 report in the Los Angeles. Times. In late April, news outlets reported that the San Diego Fire Department had to extricate a man who found himself entangled in the wire while trying to illegally cross the border.
The cost to the Nogales Fire Department for extricating illegal border-crossers entangled in the wire was a point of concern for the council on Wednesday.
Parada asked staff whether the city could hold the Border Patrol responsible for “picking up the tab” on healthcare costs for people caught in the wire.
City Attorney Jose Machado said that department heads could instruct their personnel to take care of the injured person without taking the person into custody, which would make the city responsible for the costs. He noted that the federal government is responsible for injuries sustained within 60 feet of the U.S.-Mexico border.
http://www.nogalesinternational.com/news/border-patrol-considers-putting-razor-wire-on-nogales-fence/article_b5bba22c-eb04-11e2-995b-001a4bcf887a.html
http://www.nogalesinternational.com/news/border-patrol-considers-putting-razor-wire-on-nogales-fence/article_b5bba22c-eb04-11e2-995b-001a4bcf887a.html
Saturday, May 11, 2013
Border wall issue divides Starr County leaders
Rio Grande Guardian
May 10, 2013
by Steve Taylor
RIO GRANDE CITY, May 10 - Opinion is divided among elected officials and business leaders in Starr County over plans to build border walls in Roma and Rio Grande City.
Starr County Judge Eloy Vera says his opinion on border walls has changed. He used to be strongly opposed to them.
“As you know, I was very negative about the border wall at one time but I have seen how the walls have worked. Even though people find it hard to admit, I will admit I was wrong. I think walls are effective in certain areas,” Vera told the Guardian.
Asked if a border wall in Roma and Rio Grande City would give the wrong impression to potential Mexican tourists, Vera said he did not think so. “Those that are coming here legally are coming over our bridge. At one time I thought it would be a negative thing, that we were telling our neighbors that we were building a fence to keep them out. However, I think a lot of that has smoothed out and they realize we welcome them with open arms,” Vera said.
Vera said Border Patrol makes a good point when it says it is difficult to apprehend someone in a city because it is easy to hide. “I think they have a legitimate argument,” he said. For that reason, he said, border walls may make sense in Roma and Rio Grande City.
Vera made his comments after participating in a stakeholder meeting with U.S. Sen. John Cornyn and other local leaders at the Starr-Camargo International Bridge last Monday. In all, Texas’ senior senator spent four hours in Rio Grande City, accompanied by his wife Sandy. He became the first sitting senator to visit the Starr-Camargo International Bridge.
Vera said Cornyn was asked what he thought about border walls for Roma and Rio Grande City and his answer was that he would leave that decision to the experts. “The Senator’s view was, if CBP feels it is good idea he will back it,” Vera said.
Rio Grande City Mayor Ruben Villarreal said his view is that a border wall is a “stigma” that reduces the attractiveness of a community to potential tourists. However, he said he is resigned to Customs and Border Protection building them, no matter what local opinion says.
“I would say opinion varies (about what to do to stop a border wall being built). Nobody wants to see it happen. Do I think it will happen? Probably, yes. I wish I could stop it. A fence is not going to fix anything,” Villarreal told the Guardian and Action 4 News. “Without a doubt if you have a border fence all of a sudden you have to deal with an added stigma.”
Villarreal said what he wants most of all is good communication with the federal government over the construction of a border wall. “Whatever the government is planning to do… do not catch us off guard. We want to prepare our people. We want to prepare our communities to be able to deal with a border fence. Let us know, keep us in the loop,” Villarreal said.
South Texas leaders can be partners with the federal government, if they are given a chance, Villarreal said. “We understand that perhaps their (CBP) solutions will not be the ones we are happy with but if we inform our people at least you will have the benefit of saying we can work with you towards a solution and not leave us out of the mix,” Villarreal said.
Villarreal said an example of bad communication from a federal agency came last September when the U.S. Section of the International Boundary and Water Commission called a public meeting on the border wall issue in Rio Grande City. “It was poorly organized. Information was scant, and the people making the presentation were ill-prepared. That is no way to do a meeting for the people. That was our first introduction to the border wall. It was a disappointment,” Villarreal said.
Like Judge Vera, Villarreal participated in the stakeholder meeting with Cornyn. “I was impressed with Senator Cornyn’s willingness to engage on the issues. He said no subject was off bounds. We have 26 million people in Texas. Senator Cornyn came to a region that is a little bit off the map for some but to us it is the entire world,” Villarreal said.
The mayor said that on the subject of immigration reform, Cornyn said nothing has been decided in Washington yet. “Senator Cornyn promised us he would pretty much let us know everything he could to make us as educated as he can. He said it is not about sealing the border it is about finding a solution that is multi-faceted. He is on the right track. It is not just one thing,” Villarreal said.
Villarreal added that Cornyn explained that he sometimes has a hard time conveying to other senators what a dynamic border is all about. “It is hard for one person. He is just one out of 100,” Villarreal said.
The owner of Starr-Camargo International Bridge is businessman Sam Vale, a former chairman of the Border Trade Alliance. The Guardian and Action 4 News asked Vale what he thought about border walls coming to Starr County.
“My view of the border wall is that it is a nice wrought iron fence. It is not as horrible as people said it was. I would not mind having it around my back yard,” Vale said. However, he questioned if it was the most cost effective way of securing the border. He speculated that it could be cheaper to have more Border Patrol agents.
“I do not think it is the horrible thing they say it is. On the other hand I think it is very inconvenient to get to property that is left on the south side of the wall. For those people who are left with significant property on the south side of the wall it is a big economic inconvenience,” Vale said.
Like Vera and Villarreal, Vale was at the stakeholder meeting with Cornyn. He said the point he wanted to get across to the Senator is that if more security personnel are to be deployed at border ports of entry they should be specialists that meet the demand. For example, Vale said, there is a need for more food inspectors because certain Asian vegetables are now being grown in Mexico and exported to the United States. “You have to have different types of inspection protocols. The imports must not be a threat to the U.S. food supply. We need more people trained in the agriculture identification process, more supervisors for cargo facilities, and more inspectors at the primary booths,” Vale said.
http://www.riograndeguardian.com/bordernews_story.asp?story_no=20
May 10, 2013
by Steve Taylor
RIO GRANDE CITY, May 10 - Opinion is divided among elected officials and business leaders in Starr County over plans to build border walls in Roma and Rio Grande City.
Starr County Judge Eloy Vera says his opinion on border walls has changed. He used to be strongly opposed to them.
“As you know, I was very negative about the border wall at one time but I have seen how the walls have worked. Even though people find it hard to admit, I will admit I was wrong. I think walls are effective in certain areas,” Vera told the Guardian.
Asked if a border wall in Roma and Rio Grande City would give the wrong impression to potential Mexican tourists, Vera said he did not think so. “Those that are coming here legally are coming over our bridge. At one time I thought it would be a negative thing, that we were telling our neighbors that we were building a fence to keep them out. However, I think a lot of that has smoothed out and they realize we welcome them with open arms,” Vera said.
Vera said Border Patrol makes a good point when it says it is difficult to apprehend someone in a city because it is easy to hide. “I think they have a legitimate argument,” he said. For that reason, he said, border walls may make sense in Roma and Rio Grande City.
Vera made his comments after participating in a stakeholder meeting with U.S. Sen. John Cornyn and other local leaders at the Starr-Camargo International Bridge last Monday. In all, Texas’ senior senator spent four hours in Rio Grande City, accompanied by his wife Sandy. He became the first sitting senator to visit the Starr-Camargo International Bridge.
Vera said Cornyn was asked what he thought about border walls for Roma and Rio Grande City and his answer was that he would leave that decision to the experts. “The Senator’s view was, if CBP feels it is good idea he will back it,” Vera said.
Rio Grande City Mayor Ruben Villarreal said his view is that a border wall is a “stigma” that reduces the attractiveness of a community to potential tourists. However, he said he is resigned to Customs and Border Protection building them, no matter what local opinion says.
“I would say opinion varies (about what to do to stop a border wall being built). Nobody wants to see it happen. Do I think it will happen? Probably, yes. I wish I could stop it. A fence is not going to fix anything,” Villarreal told the Guardian and Action 4 News. “Without a doubt if you have a border fence all of a sudden you have to deal with an added stigma.”
Villarreal said what he wants most of all is good communication with the federal government over the construction of a border wall. “Whatever the government is planning to do… do not catch us off guard. We want to prepare our people. We want to prepare our communities to be able to deal with a border fence. Let us know, keep us in the loop,” Villarreal said.
South Texas leaders can be partners with the federal government, if they are given a chance, Villarreal said. “We understand that perhaps their (CBP) solutions will not be the ones we are happy with but if we inform our people at least you will have the benefit of saying we can work with you towards a solution and not leave us out of the mix,” Villarreal said.
Villarreal said an example of bad communication from a federal agency came last September when the U.S. Section of the International Boundary and Water Commission called a public meeting on the border wall issue in Rio Grande City. “It was poorly organized. Information was scant, and the people making the presentation were ill-prepared. That is no way to do a meeting for the people. That was our first introduction to the border wall. It was a disappointment,” Villarreal said.
Like Judge Vera, Villarreal participated in the stakeholder meeting with Cornyn. “I was impressed with Senator Cornyn’s willingness to engage on the issues. He said no subject was off bounds. We have 26 million people in Texas. Senator Cornyn came to a region that is a little bit off the map for some but to us it is the entire world,” Villarreal said.
The mayor said that on the subject of immigration reform, Cornyn said nothing has been decided in Washington yet. “Senator Cornyn promised us he would pretty much let us know everything he could to make us as educated as he can. He said it is not about sealing the border it is about finding a solution that is multi-faceted. He is on the right track. It is not just one thing,” Villarreal said.
Villarreal added that Cornyn explained that he sometimes has a hard time conveying to other senators what a dynamic border is all about. “It is hard for one person. He is just one out of 100,” Villarreal said.
The owner of Starr-Camargo International Bridge is businessman Sam Vale, a former chairman of the Border Trade Alliance. The Guardian and Action 4 News asked Vale what he thought about border walls coming to Starr County.
“My view of the border wall is that it is a nice wrought iron fence. It is not as horrible as people said it was. I would not mind having it around my back yard,” Vale said. However, he questioned if it was the most cost effective way of securing the border. He speculated that it could be cheaper to have more Border Patrol agents.
“I do not think it is the horrible thing they say it is. On the other hand I think it is very inconvenient to get to property that is left on the south side of the wall. For those people who are left with significant property on the south side of the wall it is a big economic inconvenience,” Vale said.
Like Vera and Villarreal, Vale was at the stakeholder meeting with Cornyn. He said the point he wanted to get across to the Senator is that if more security personnel are to be deployed at border ports of entry they should be specialists that meet the demand. For example, Vale said, there is a need for more food inspectors because certain Asian vegetables are now being grown in Mexico and exported to the United States. “You have to have different types of inspection protocols. The imports must not be a threat to the U.S. food supply. We need more people trained in the agriculture identification process, more supervisors for cargo facilities, and more inspectors at the primary booths,” Vale said.
http://www.riograndeguardian.com/bordernews_story.asp?story_no=20
Wednesday, March 27, 2013
Southern Arizona in the Crosshairs
Tucson Weekly
March 21, 2013
by Todd Miller
Razor wire was coiled around a rudimentary wooden shelter. Under it, a hunched man concentrated, looking into his laptop. Cameras and radar were set up on a retractable mast behind him and could detect any activity at long range, day and night. Desert camouflage covered this large mobile surveillance machine, which was surrounded by sandbags and desert shrubs.
Dressed sharply in a suit and tie, the man was not in a militarized border zone. The DRS Technologies salesman was in the Phoenix Convention Center, trying, as the midsize military and electronics company's motto asserts, to draw "clarity from the clutter."
This "bring the battlefield to the border" scenario (as another sales representative put it), was in play throughout the spacious exhibition hall at the seventh annual Border Security Expo on March 12 and 13. Almost 200 companies big (Raytheon) and small (Tucson-based StrongWatch), were competing for the multibillion-dollar border policing pie.
The exhibition hall was a bustling mall for the surveillance state. Uniformed Border Patrol agents and other law enforcement personnel were among the civilians browsing the exhibitor booths. Products ranging from minisurveillance drones to self-heating meals (with a three-year shelf life) to semi-automatic weapons were on display. Overhead, a surveillance blimp kept an eye on everybody walking around. In the middle of the hall was a tower able to withstand a high-level blast. It looked like something from a military base in Afghanistan, but it's now envisioned for border control.
"It's as if the United States is pulling out of Afghanistan, and invading Arizona," said Dan Millis of the Sierra Club's Tucson-based Borderlands Campaign, which opposes any new border fencing along the U.S.-Mexico border.
In 2012, the U.S. government spent $18 billion on border and immigration enforcement agencies, more than on all other federal law enforcement agencies—including the FBI, DEA, Secret Service and several others'—combined. Tucson and Southern Arizona are front and center in this border policing bonanza, and it's one of the reasons the Washington D.C.-based DRS Technologies has also set up shop at the University of Arizona's Science and Technology Park on Rita Road.
The UA tech park has identified 57 border technology companies working in and around Tucson in what Bruce Wright, associate vice president for university research parks, called an "emerging industry cluster." Wright said that when you consider the international market for border technology, it is a booming industry approaching $20 billion in sales in 2013 and projected to reach $54.4 billion by 2018.
"Here we are living on the border—turning lemons into lemonade. If we are to deal with the problem, what is the economic benefit from dealing with it?" Wright said during a February 2012 interview. "Well, we can build an industry around this problem that creates employment, wages, and wealth for this region ... and this technology can be sold all over the world. So it becomes an industry cluster that is very beneficial to us in Southern Arizona."
The tech park is offering testing and evaluation services for border technology on its 1,345 acres, which includes a mockup with 18,000 linear feet of border fencing surrounding its solar farm. The tech park's business incubator helps startup border tech companies commercialize their products and gets them connected with the right people. At a March 1 event, when the tech park was showcasing DRS Technologies' integrated fixed-tower system (which included a command and control center), Wright said that "Southern Arizona could become the leading center in the world for the development and deployment of this technology."
This shouldn't be a surprise. Although in 2011 DHS canceled its contract with the Boeing Corp. for the previous technology surveillance plan known as SBInet, all eyes are still on the possibility of a virtual "wall" across Southern Arizona as part of an ever-expanding enforcement web. Many companies at the expo, including DRS, hope to make their debut in the Sonoran desert, outdoing Boeing's surveillance towers, which had difficulty with Arizona's rugged terrain.
At the expo, Mark Borkowski of U.S. Customs and Border Protection's Office of Technology Innovation and Acquisition assured anxious industry reps that the Arizona Technology Deployment Plan would happen. So expect to see more remote, mobile and fixed surveillance technology in the desert south of Tucson. Even with declining arrests of immigrants, Tucson continues to be the Border Patrol's busiest sector. The agency reports that there have been increased border-crossings in south Texas, where it also plans to concentrate new technology.
About the only thing dampening the upbeat mood of the border-protection industry was the sequester, the across-the-board federal budget cuts that went into effect March 1. However, according to Borkowski, the sequester touched very little of the money designated for technology. Companies at the expo were also enthusiastic about the improved prospects for immigration reform and the step-up in border policing that could come with the reforms.
Sarah Launius of the Tucson-based humanitarian aid group No More Deaths posed a question probably not widely considered at the expo: "When government and industry talk about 'border security' we have to ask 'security for whom?'" Since Sept. 11, the United States has spent $791 billion on homeland security, which outdoes the cost of the entire New Deal by (an inflation-adjusted) $300 billion. To answer one part of Launius' question: It certainly means a great deal of financial security for some of the companies selling cameras, sensors, drones, tanks and barriers in the buzzing exhibition hall in Phoenix.
http://www.tucsonweekly.com/tucson/southern-arizona-in-the-crosshairs/Content?oid=3668058
March 21, 2013
by Todd Miller
Razor wire was coiled around a rudimentary wooden shelter. Under it, a hunched man concentrated, looking into his laptop. Cameras and radar were set up on a retractable mast behind him and could detect any activity at long range, day and night. Desert camouflage covered this large mobile surveillance machine, which was surrounded by sandbags and desert shrubs.
Dressed sharply in a suit and tie, the man was not in a militarized border zone. The DRS Technologies salesman was in the Phoenix Convention Center, trying, as the midsize military and electronics company's motto asserts, to draw "clarity from the clutter."
This "bring the battlefield to the border" scenario (as another sales representative put it), was in play throughout the spacious exhibition hall at the seventh annual Border Security Expo on March 12 and 13. Almost 200 companies big (Raytheon) and small (Tucson-based StrongWatch), were competing for the multibillion-dollar border policing pie.
The exhibition hall was a bustling mall for the surveillance state. Uniformed Border Patrol agents and other law enforcement personnel were among the civilians browsing the exhibitor booths. Products ranging from minisurveillance drones to self-heating meals (with a three-year shelf life) to semi-automatic weapons were on display. Overhead, a surveillance blimp kept an eye on everybody walking around. In the middle of the hall was a tower able to withstand a high-level blast. It looked like something from a military base in Afghanistan, but it's now envisioned for border control.
"It's as if the United States is pulling out of Afghanistan, and invading Arizona," said Dan Millis of the Sierra Club's Tucson-based Borderlands Campaign, which opposes any new border fencing along the U.S.-Mexico border.
In 2012, the U.S. government spent $18 billion on border and immigration enforcement agencies, more than on all other federal law enforcement agencies—including the FBI, DEA, Secret Service and several others'—combined. Tucson and Southern Arizona are front and center in this border policing bonanza, and it's one of the reasons the Washington D.C.-based DRS Technologies has also set up shop at the University of Arizona's Science and Technology Park on Rita Road.
The UA tech park has identified 57 border technology companies working in and around Tucson in what Bruce Wright, associate vice president for university research parks, called an "emerging industry cluster." Wright said that when you consider the international market for border technology, it is a booming industry approaching $20 billion in sales in 2013 and projected to reach $54.4 billion by 2018.
"Here we are living on the border—turning lemons into lemonade. If we are to deal with the problem, what is the economic benefit from dealing with it?" Wright said during a February 2012 interview. "Well, we can build an industry around this problem that creates employment, wages, and wealth for this region ... and this technology can be sold all over the world. So it becomes an industry cluster that is very beneficial to us in Southern Arizona."
The tech park is offering testing and evaluation services for border technology on its 1,345 acres, which includes a mockup with 18,000 linear feet of border fencing surrounding its solar farm. The tech park's business incubator helps startup border tech companies commercialize their products and gets them connected with the right people. At a March 1 event, when the tech park was showcasing DRS Technologies' integrated fixed-tower system (which included a command and control center), Wright said that "Southern Arizona could become the leading center in the world for the development and deployment of this technology."
This shouldn't be a surprise. Although in 2011 DHS canceled its contract with the Boeing Corp. for the previous technology surveillance plan known as SBInet, all eyes are still on the possibility of a virtual "wall" across Southern Arizona as part of an ever-expanding enforcement web. Many companies at the expo, including DRS, hope to make their debut in the Sonoran desert, outdoing Boeing's surveillance towers, which had difficulty with Arizona's rugged terrain.
At the expo, Mark Borkowski of U.S. Customs and Border Protection's Office of Technology Innovation and Acquisition assured anxious industry reps that the Arizona Technology Deployment Plan would happen. So expect to see more remote, mobile and fixed surveillance technology in the desert south of Tucson. Even with declining arrests of immigrants, Tucson continues to be the Border Patrol's busiest sector. The agency reports that there have been increased border-crossings in south Texas, where it also plans to concentrate new technology.
About the only thing dampening the upbeat mood of the border-protection industry was the sequester, the across-the-board federal budget cuts that went into effect March 1. However, according to Borkowski, the sequester touched very little of the money designated for technology. Companies at the expo were also enthusiastic about the improved prospects for immigration reform and the step-up in border policing that could come with the reforms.
Sarah Launius of the Tucson-based humanitarian aid group No More Deaths posed a question probably not widely considered at the expo: "When government and industry talk about 'border security' we have to ask 'security for whom?'" Since Sept. 11, the United States has spent $791 billion on homeland security, which outdoes the cost of the entire New Deal by (an inflation-adjusted) $300 billion. To answer one part of Launius' question: It certainly means a great deal of financial security for some of the companies selling cameras, sensors, drones, tanks and barriers in the buzzing exhibition hall in Phoenix.
http://www.tucsonweekly.com/tucson/southern-arizona-in-the-crosshairs/Content?oid=3668058
Friday, March 22, 2013
Officials Concede Failures on Gauging Border Security
New York Times
March 22, 2013
by Julia Preston
More than two years after Homeland Security officials told Congress that they would produce new, more accurate standards to assess security at the nation’s borders, senior officials from the department acknowledged this week that they had not completed the new measurements and were not likely to in coming months, as the debate proceeds about overhauling the immigration system.
Both Democratic and Republican lawmakers were taken aback at a hearing on Wednesday in the House of Representatives when Mark Borkowski, a senior Homeland Security official, said he had no progress to report on a broad measure of border conditions the department had been working on since 2010. The lawmakers warned that failure by the Obama administration to devise a reliable method of border evaluation could imperil passage of immigration legislation.
March 22, 2013
by Julia Preston
More than two years after Homeland Security officials told Congress that they would produce new, more accurate standards to assess security at the nation’s borders, senior officials from the department acknowledged this week that they had not completed the new measurements and were not likely to in coming months, as the debate proceeds about overhauling the immigration system.
Both Democratic and Republican lawmakers were taken aback at a hearing on Wednesday in the House of Representatives when Mark Borkowski, a senior Homeland Security official, said he had no progress to report on a broad measure of border conditions the department had been working on since 2010. The lawmakers warned that failure by the Obama administration to devise a reliable method of border evaluation could imperil passage of immigration legislation.
“We do not want the Department of Homeland Security to be the stumbling block to comprehensive immigration reform for this country,” said Representative Candice Miller, a Republican from Michigan who is the chairwoman of the House Homeland Security subcommittee on border security. She told Mr. Borkowski that the lack of security measurements from the administration “could be a component of our failure to pass something I think is very important for our country.”
Representative Sheila Jackson Lee of Texas, a Democrat and strong a supporter of President Obama’s immigration proposals, was more blunt. “I would say to the department, you’ve got to get in the game,” she said.
Amid contentious discussions in Congress over immigration, one point of wide agreement is that an evaluation of border security will be a central piece of any comprehensive bill. A bipartisan group in the Senate is working to write legislation that includes a “trigger,” which would make the path to citizenship for more than 11 million illegal immigrants in the country contingent on measurable advances in security at the borders.
Lawmakers have been pressing Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano to devise a measure they can use to judge if the Obama administration’s claims of significant progress in border enforcement are justified. Republican senators in the bipartisan group have said a border standard is pivotal to their efforts.
“We need to have a measurement,” Senator John McCain of Arizona insisted at a hearing in the Senate last week.
“We need to assure the American people that we have effective control of the border and we have made advances to achieve that,” he said. “I need to have something to assure people they are not going to live in fear.”
Obama administration officials said on Thursday that they had resisted producing a single measure to assess the border because the president did not want any hurdles placed on the pathway to eventual citizenship for immigrants in the country illegally.
They also said security conditions could change very rapidly along the border depending on where smugglers tried to bring people and narcotics across, and where border agents were concentrating their technology and other resources.
“While border security is complex and cannot be measured in a single metric,” said Peter Boogaard, a spokesman for the Homeland Security Department, “in every metric available to measure progress, we’re heading in the right direction, including decreased apprehensions and increased seizures.”
Ms. Miller and Representative Michael McCaul of Texas, the Republican chairman of the House Homeland Security Committee, have said they are preparing legislation that would compel administration officials to produce border measurements if they do not come forward with them in coming weeks.
For several years before 2010, border officials used a measure known as operational control to describe the level of security along the southwest line. But in 2010, Ms. Napolitano said the department would drop that standard, arguing it did not reflect a substantial buildup of agents and detection technology in recent years, and it was insufficiently flexible to account for the varying terrain and fast-changing conditions along the nearly 2,000-mile southwest border, where most illegal crossings occur.
In a recent interview, David V. Aguilar, the commissioner of Customs and Border Protection, said he had first proposed the concept of operational control years ago when he was the chief of the Border Patrol. He said it was meant to describe immediate conditions in limited patrol sectors, and he lamented that it had become the broadest measure of security advances across the entire border.
“It was never meant to be applied that way,” Mr. Aguilar said.
Since 2010, border officials have reported their results to the public mainly in terms of apprehensions they make of illegal crossers. Those figures have declined sharply across the southwest line, in what many experts agree is a sign of sharply reduced illegal flows. But border officials acknowledge that apprehensions alone are an imperfect indicator.
So Mr. Borkowski, an assistant commissioner of Customs and Border Protection, and other officials have been working on what they have called the Border Condition Index. They advised Congress that it would assemble many different variables, including crime rates in cities and towns along the border, and daily flows of legitimate travelers and commerce through the ports of entry.
Officials said the index would provide a broad, easily understandable view of enforcement at the border and the sense of security of Americans living near it.
But as the immigration debate has gathered speed, even border analysts who praise the Obama administration’s enforcement efforts have grown frustrated with the Department of Homeland Security’s reluctance to produce data to assess them.
“By every available measure, the border is far more secure today than it has ever been,” said Edward Alden, a senior fellow at the Council on Foreign Relations who specializes in immigration. “But D.H.S. does not have a reliable set of performance measures with respect to border security, and it has been utterly remiss in releasing data that would help Congress make a serious assessment.”
At the hearing on Wednesday, Mr. Borkowski said the border index was still undergoing internal reviews, and he gave no time frame for when it would be ready. He also told Ms. Miller that the index would not be useful to assess border security as part of the negotiations over a comprehensive bill.
Ms. Miller and other lawmakers were stunned. “I’ve been operating under the assumption for the last several years,” she said, that the index would be something that “anybody or any other agency vetting this would be using as a measurement.”
Ms. Jackson Lee, the highest ranking Democrat on the subcommittee, blasted Mr. Borkowski for not offering a concrete standard. “You all have got to rise to the occasion,” she said.
Michael J. Fisher, the chief of the Border Patrol, who also testified, sought to respond to the lawmakers, saying he would provide figures on numbers of illegal crossers who were caught more than once, and estimates of the percentages of those crossers who were detained and of those who got away.
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