Hidalgo County judge launches investigation into conflict of interest

The Monitor
January 10, 2015
by Jacob Fischler

EDINBURG — After a year of battling with the county’s drainage director on various fronts, Hidalgo County Judge Ramon Garcia launched an investigation this week into drainage district subcontracts that went to a company owned by the wife of district Manager Godfrey Garza.

After learning late last year that drainage district contractors in 2007 hired Valley Data Collection Specialists, Inc., a company owned by Garza’s wife, Garcia sent a letter Monday to Garza’s company, Integ Corp., requesting an accounting of all contracts and subcontracts that went to the company since then.

“You, as the Drainage District Manager, are responsible to negotiate with the contractors we hire,” Garcia wrote. “On December 16, 2014, we learned that your wife is the owner of a company (Valley Data Collection Specialists, Inc.) that does subcontracting work for contractors you negotiate with… Therefore I believe there exists a serious conflict of interest in your part.”

In an interview, Garza said he would provide the judge with a response that answered his questions, but added that his wife did not own the company at the time it was subcontracted for county projects.

“We're going to respond back to him on the letter that he submitted to Integ,” Garza said. “And in response to the letter, we should be able to answer the questions that he has. Specifically, the question on Valley Data going back to 2007 — my wife was not the owner then.”

Garza declined to say when his wife did become the owner, saying he preferred to withhold that information until he wrote it in the letter.

But he added: “I never contracted with myself or my interests.”

The issue became public in a commissioners court meeting Dec. 16 when Garcia questioned Garza’s stewardship of public money — as has become routine at the drainage district portions of commissioners court.

“See, my concern is here you are representing us, entering into contracts with the contractors and then the contractors entering into contracts with your company — well, your family’s company,” Garcia said to Garza. “Don’t you really seriously believe that constitutes a conflict of interest?”

Garza said he needed to research the issue and could not answer at the time.

The two have butted heads continually since at least last January, when Garcia learned that an earlier contract with the county had paid Integ — Garcia believed erroneously — a 1.5 percent commission for work on the hybrid border wall-levee system.

Garcia and other commissioners soon thereafter sought to begin a transition to a new drainage district manager who could be ready to take over by the time Garza’s contract expires in February 2015. But commissioners have yet to settle on a job description for the new manager or an assistant manager who could one day replace Garza.

http://m.themonitor.com/news/local/hidalgo-county-judge-launches-investigation-into-conflict-of-interest/article_af2aa6f0-9932-11e4-a7b5-cba304796e84.html?mode=jqm

Congress discusses border fence, immigration policy

Valley Morning Star
June 25, 2014
by Ty Johnson

One Republican Congressman called for more border fence construction while another suggested suspending foreign aid to Mexico and Central America during a heated House Committee on Homeland Security hearing in Washington, D.C. Tuesday where lawmakers discussed the growing crisis in the Rio Grande Valley posed by an influx of unaccompanied child immigrants from Honduras, Guatemala and El Salvador.

Department of Homeland Security Secretary Jeh Johnson held fast amidst questioning of his agency’s handling of the situation. Other witnesses included Federal Emergency Management Director Craig Fugate and U.S. Customs and Border Protection Deputy Chief Ronald D. Vitiello.
While Republicans blame the immigration policies of President Barack Obama for the influx, the administration says it’s being exacerbated by slow immigration courts and misinformation spread by profit-hungry human smugglers in Mexico.

U.S. Rep. Mike Rogers, R-Alabama, said it’s a lack of fencing in the Rio Grande Valley that has made it the epicenter of the nation’s undocumented immigrant crisis.

Rogers suggested that fencing like that in San Diego would help keep immigrants from entering the United States illegally, though he seemed unaware of the amount of border fencing already in place in Cameron and Hidalgo counties.

“We don’t have a fence down there and that’s why,” he said in his second red-faced address in four days of talks about DHS and its role in combating the crisis.

On June 20, he angrily questioned whether terrorists could take advantage of the situation while Border Patrol agents are “changing diapers and warming formula” — language he again used Tuesday.

Amidst calls for more discussions and aid for the immigrants’ home countries from Democrats, including ranking member Bennie G. Thompson, D-Mississippi and U.S. Rep. Filemon B. Vela, Rogers said he would like for dialogue to center solely on deportation.

“Why aren’t we bussing them back?” he asked. “I think what you ought to do is ask Guatemala where they want these kids dropped off.”

Johnson reminded Rogers of a 2008 law signed by George W. Bush that made special requirements for unaccompanied and undocumented children encountered near the border, but Rogers brushed it off by commenting on how long implementation of the Affordable Care Act was taking.

Speaking later, U.S. Rep. Candice Miller, R-Michigan, pushed for a much more stern foreign policy response, calling for aid to be cut off to Mexico and Central America and for the United States to reassess or suspend its trade agreements with the countries.

Miller said Mexico was “complicit” in the smuggling of children across the American border as most immigrants trek across the country’s porous southern border and pay smugglers to reach the United States.

While she attempted to blame Obama’s Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals policy for the crisis, others at the hearing noted that order deferred action only for children who were already in the country.

Still, the misinformation along the smuggling routes is stoking rumors that the United States is offering some form of refuge to displaced immigrants and parents continue to send their children on perilous journeys to the north.

Border Patrol agents apprehend them when they cross the border — sometimes easily as immigrants run toward agents believing it is their best shot at amnesty — and children found to be without parents are screened by U.S. Coast Guard medical personnel.

CBP is legally obligated to hand over these unaccompanied children to the Department of Health and Human Services within 72 hours of finding they are alone — a benchmark that Johnson said the agency was not meeting.

DHSS sends those children off to live with relatives or others in the country with a notice to appear in immigration court — effectively an indictment requiring their appearance at a hearing sometimes scheduled more than a year away.

Those notices are likely the “permisos” that immigrants send word home about, their legitimacy bolstered by smugglers looking to profit off the false hope of desperate immigrants fleeing dangerous conditions in their home countries.

U.S. Vice President Joe Biden was in Guatemala to attempt to stem the tide of immigrants at its source on June 20, the same day the Obama administration announced half a dozen new programs in Central America to help those nations repatriate their citizens and enhance policing efforts to reduce crime.

Vela, who last week called for more aid in Mexico and Central America, said he saw the situation at the border as a trifecta of crises in Central America, within the U.S. immigration courts and with immigration reform efforts, which have ground to a halt since the U.S. Senate passed a comprehensive reform bill nearly a year ago.

Vela noted the sentiments GOP mega-donor and kingmaker Sheldon G. Adelson expressed in a recent op-ed in Politico Magazine where he called for the establishment of paths to citizenship for undocumented immigrants already in the United States.

Vela said those views — not the ones of tea party Republicans like Miller and Rogers — were signs that extremist views concerning border security and immigration reform were wilting.

“There are some tea party extremists in the Republican party who happen to sit on the committee that just have views that are very extreme,” he said. “Those are the voices that you’re hearing calling for more fencing, which we strongly object to, and ... for all practical purposes, eliminating our trading relationship with our nation’s second-largest trading partner.”

Vela was particularly critical of Rogers’ suggestion about fencing, explaining that reports he has heard have shown immigrants “walking straight through the bridge and turning themselves in,” throughout the Valley’s ports of entry.

Vela said while he believes CBP likely needs more manpower at its processing centers — the Fort Brown Border Patrol Station was at double capacity last week — the responses from Vitiello have him convinced that Border Patrol has enough resources to handle the situation.

http://www.valleymorningstar.com/news/local_news/article_b8832de4-fc1b-11e3-91dd-001a4bcf6878.html

Cuellar: We need to act now to avert a potential humanitarian crisis along border

Rio Grande Guardian
June 2, 2014
by Luis Montoya

LAREDO, June 2 - U.S. Rep. Henry Cuellar on Monday called for the establishment of a multi-agency processing center on the border to deal with a recent influx of immigrant apprehensions.
In a letter sent to the chairs and ranking members of various House committees, as well as Homeland Security Secretary Jeh Johnson, the Cuellar pointed out that since the beginning of this year over 145,000 undocumented immigrants have been apprehended in the Rio Grande Valley sector. This is more than a 65 percent increase over the same period of Fiscal Year 2013. If current rates continue, the Rio Grande Valley is expected to have over 240,000 apprehensions for Fiscal Year 2014, Cuellar wrote, in his letter. Cuellar said the Valley is currently at more than 190 percent of its temporary detention capacity. “We need to do a better job taking care of the children who are crossing the southern border unaccompanied and we must act immediately to avert a potential humanitarian crisis along the border,” Cuellar, D-Laredo, wrote. Cuellar sent a letter on the same day President Obama President Obama held a news conference at the White House to say there is an "urgent humanitarian situation" at the border. Obama referenced a surge of unaccompanied immigrant children crossing into the United States from Mexico. According to Kids in Need of Defense, a group that advocates for immigrant children and provides legal services during deportation proceedings, as many as 150,000 unaccompanied children could cross into the United States next. In fiscal year 2012 that number was 13,625, the group says. It rose to 24,668 in 2013. The government predicts as many as 60,000 children could enter the U.S. unaccompanied in 2014. Border Patrol cannot keep the children form more than 72 hours and so the numbers are overwhelming the agencies charged with catering for the children. Obama said he was placing Federal Emergency Management Agency Administrator Craig Fugate in charge of a group that will coordinate services among many federal agencies in order to better assist the minors apprehended at the border. The Office of Management and Budget says it will cost $2.28 billion next year to deal with minors caught at the southern border. This is more than the $868 million requested by the Obama Administration in March. The United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees, along with the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops, has urged cooperation between the United States, Mexico and several Central American countries on the issue of migrant children. Cuellar’s letter was sent to U.S. Rep. Harold Rogers, chairman of the House Appropriations Committee, and U.S. Rep. Nita Lowey, ranking member of the same committee. It was also sent to U.S. Rep. John Carter, chairman of the Subcommittee on Homeland Security, and U.S. Rep. David Price, ranking member of the same committee. Cuellar’s letter was sent also to U.S. Rep. Frank Wolf, chairman of the Subcommittee on Commerce, Justice and Science, and U.S. Rep. Chaka Fattah, ranking member of the same committee. It was also sent to U.S. Rep. Jack Kingston, chairman of the Subcommittee on Labor, Health and Human Services, and U.S. Rep. Rosa DeLauro, ranking member of the same committee. Here is Cuellar’s letter in full: June 2, 2014 In recent weeks, the Rio Grande Valley in South Texas has experienced an unprecedented influx of undocumented immigrant apprehensions and detentions, many of which are unaccompanied minors from countries other than Mexico. These crossings have created a resource crisis in the Rio Grande Valley that demands immediate attention from the federal government and the Appropriations Committee. Since the beginning of this year, over 145,000 undocumented immigrants have been apprehended in the Rio Grande Valley sector, a more than 65 percent increase over the same period of Fiscal Year 2013. If current rates continue, the Rio Grande Valley is expected to have over 240,000 apprehensions for Fiscal Year 2014. On average, over 70 percent of apprehensions are Other Than Mexicans (OTM) and a large percentage of them are Unaccompanied Children (UAC). Currently, the Rio Grande Valley is apprehending approximately 300 UACs on a daily basis. I represent much of this area in the 28th District of Texas, which stretches from San Antonio in the north to Laredo and the much of the upper Rio Grande Valley. I have had extensive personal conversations with the men and women of Border Patrol in the past few weeks about this ongoing issue and they have laid out the issues straining the resources and personnel of Border Patrol. Every undocumented immigrant that is apprehended while attempting to cross the border must be processed by Border Patrol. With this unprecedented surge in crossings, the Rio Grande Valley is currently at more than 190 percent of its temporary detention capacity. Those that are detained are then transferred to the custody of Immigration and Customs Enforcement. Many others are released with a notice to appear before an immigration judge at a future date. This resource crisis requires a multi-agency response involving the Department of Homeland Security, the Department of Health and Human Services, and the Department of Justice. Because of the massive influx of immigrants being apprehended at the border, it is necessary to create a central location in which all elements of the adjudication process can be completed. We need to do a better job taking care of the children who are crossing the southern border unaccompanied and we must act immediately to avert a potential humanitarian crisis along the border. I am committed to working with Chairwoman Kay Granger, Ranking Member David Price, and the State, Foreign Operations and Related Programs Appropriations Subcommittee to work with our partners in Mexico and other Central American countries. Thank you for your consideration. If you require further information, do not hesitate to contact me, my legislative director Megan Swearingen, or my legislative assistant Wendell White at 225-1640. Sincerely, Henry Cuellar, PhD U.S. Congressman Texas District 28

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

Border fence extension remains in Congressional limbo

KSAT San Antonio
May 8, 2014
by Jesse Degollado

MCALLEN, Texas - 
                
Funded by the Secure Fence Act of 2006, plans to extend the border fence, part of immigration reform, remain in Congressional limbo.

Critics of the fence in south Texas question spending more taxpayer dollars on a barrier that they said has had little effect.

 

“A border fence is a 14th century solution to a 21st century problem," said Rep. Henry Cuellar (D-Dist. 28).

 

Cuellar, who serves on the Homeland Security Appropriations subcommittee, said he supports “smart border security,” using technology.

 

“The wall here was $12 million a mile,” said Scott Nicol, one of its early opponents and founder of NoBorderWall.com. “It can be completely defeated by a couple of dollars worth of scrap wood."

 

Nicol has photographed makeshift ladders left behind by undocumented immigrants. He said most are seized by U.S. Border Patrol.

He also said the fence has done little to slow, much less stop, the current surge of Central Americans into the Rio Grande Valley.

“The walls are up and apprehensions are rising again, so I don’t see the wall doing a lot,” Nicol said.

William Alber, a retired General Motors worker from Michigan and a full-time winter Texan, said he agrees.

 

Alber said he watched the fence going up from his front yard at a mobile home park near McAllen.

“The wall didn’t do any good. They just come over the top of the wall,” Alber said.

 

He said they also often run across his driveway, but he’s never been threatened.

 

“It’s elderly ladies. It’s girls. I’ve seen little kids, 7, 8 years old running with them,” Alber said. “There’s no doubt in my mind they’re desperate.”

 

Alber said if Border Patrol is not there watching, many others simply go around the fence where it abruptly ends.

 

According to Customs and Border Protection, only 650 miles of fencing exists along the 2,000-mile southern border.

Daniel Tirado, a spokesman for U.S. Border Patrol, said the 54 miles of fencing in the Rio Grande Valley was strategically placed to give its 5,000-plus agents the tactical advantage.

 

Tirado said the border fence helps shift illegal activity to less populated areas, “decreasing the smuggler’s ability to exploit easily accessible routes through communities, increasing the possibility of apprehension.”   

 

However, those living between the fence and the Rio Grande have said they’re in a no-man’s land used by smugglers.

 

Tirado said that is why agents often patrol those areas, assisted by other means of detection such as cameras and sensors.

 

He said Border Patrol relies on a combination of technology, infrastructure and personnel to secure the south Texas border.  

 

http://www.ksat.com/news/border-fence-extension-remains-in-congressional-limbo/25886794

Local professor uses settlement for scholarships

Brownsville Herald
April 10, 2014
by Melissa Montoya

A battle waged against the federal government has paid off for Eloisa G. Tamez, a professor at the University of Texas at Brownsville.

One of Brownsville’s most vocal opponents to the border fence, Tamez took the federal government to task when it tried to condemn her land to build a swath of border fence there.
The federal government is expected to pay Tamez $56,000 for the land it took from her, according to court documents. Tamez said she will be establishing a scholarship for students at the university with a portion of her settlement.

The scholarship fund launches on May 3, her parent’s 80th wedding anniversary. Her parents are deceased, but Tamez said she wanted to honor them this way because, even though they left school at an early age, they were strong proponents of education.

“The reason this is important to me and for the community to know and everyone else to know, including the federal government, is that land was taken from me by the government — land that had been part of the outcome of how my mother and my father and grandparents before them carved a life for us because they were farmers,” Tamez said.

The scholarship fund ensures her parents will be remembered and makes a good situation out of a bad one. The scholarships are for graduate nursing students where Tamez teaches as an associate professor in the College of Nursing.

Tamez is one of a group of people who fought the seizure of their land for the fence. She said the government was reluctant to give information on why the border fence needed to be built.

“It was almost like we weren’t worth receiving an explanation,” Tamez said. “We are supposed to be quiet about it. I wanted to know why... That’s what education does for you; it helps you to verbalize.”

The land in dispute was .026 acres along the Rio Grande Valley. Tamez and her family have lived on the land since 1767 when a Spanish land grant gifted them the property. The litigation had been pending since 2008.

The protracted legal battle was worth it, Tamez said.

“I told them you can take my land, you can build a walk across it, but you’re not going to take my voice,” Tamez said.

Tamez is still uncertain how much money will go into the scholarship fund, but it needs to reach $20,000 in order for it to be ready for distribution. She said she hopes students will benefit from what was a bad situation.

“This converts something negative into a positive outcome for this community,” Tamez said.

http://www.brownsvilleherald.com/news/local/article_ce9ac5f0-c120-11e3-a221-001a4bcf6878.html

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.

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."

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

At Border Security Expo, companies keep eyes on lucrative U.S. market

Los Angeles Times
March 19, 2014
by Cindy Carcamo

PHOENIX — A fake barrel cactus with a camera mounted inside. An unmanned robot hardy enough to explore underground drug tunnels. Software that recognizes faces while tapping into federal databases.

"We give them a tasting here," said Steve Roser, vice president of Elbit Systems of America, who was hawking drones this week at the annual Border Security Expo, a high-tech bazaar aimed at those who police the criminal shadow lands along international frontiers. "We get them a little interested."

U.S. Customs and Border Protection last year spent more than $300 million for border security, fencing infrastructure and technology, and has requested appropriations totaling nearly $400 million for 2015.

But the border bonanza may only be beginning. An immigration reform plan debated in Congress last year called for raising the ante by several orders of magnitude, spending as much as $46 billion on heightened border security, including $3.2 billion on sophisticated surveillance equipment.

The legislation stalled, but that hasn't stopped the growth of the gadget-heavy industry on display here at what is billed as the largest exhibit of border security equipment in the world.

Attendees from 14 nations surveyed gizmos from nearly 100 manufacturers aimed at "disrupting and dismantling transnational criminal organizations" — and tapping into what is seen as an increasingly lucrative U.S. market.

With worldwide demand rising for security products, "there's more development in this field for devices that help people protect themselves," said Enrique H. Herrera Martinez, chief executive of TPS Global, which develops armored vehicles.

Men and women in suits and law enforcement uniforms milled around a convention hall during the two-day conference that ended Wednesday, ogling hundreds of high-tech instruments designed to detect humans — be they drug smugglers, immigrants or others — making their way into a country.

Gregory Schultz, who co-owns a Tucson-based business that manufactures clothing that stops electricity from penetrating a body, said his product, Thorshield, could help save border agents at risk of having their stun guns seized by assailants and used against them.

Schultz covered his hand in the cotton-like material, took up a stun gun and fired repeatedly.

"It's a highly conductive fabric that actually short-circuits stun guns and Tasers," he said without blinking.

Roser said his company's drones were in use along the Afghan and Israeli borders.

The unmanned aerial vehicle, which has a camera able to move any which way, is compact enough to carry in a backpack. It's light enough to launch by hand and can soar up to 3,000 feet.

Roser said expos such as the one in Phoenix were crucial, giving him the opportunity to meet the movers, shakers and purse-string holders in high levels of the federal government.

Matthew C. Allen, a special agent with U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, said government must improve its technological expertise because criminals were doing the same thing. "We have adaptable adversaries," he said.

But this festival of peddling and purchasing comes at a time when President Obama and congressional Republicans are at odds about a budget and already are ordering a $500-billion cut to defense spending over the next decade.

And it's exactly these types of surveillance gadgets that worry people like Chris Rickerd, policy counsel for the American Civil Liberties Union, who wonders whether criminals will be the only ones in these high-tech surveillance sights.

"It's creating a warlike setting. There is a real question of fiscal responsibility, but also quality of life in border communities," he said. "There's not enough oversight."

Rickerd said there needs to be a thorough evaluation of whether the technology now in place is working before purchasing more gadgets.

He pointed to the Secure Border Initiative Network, a $1-billion system with a high error rate that ended up covering only a 53-mile stretch of the Arizona-Mexico border with high-tech cameras, radar and vibration sensors.

In 2011, officials replaced it with the Arizona Border Surveillance Technology Plan, a $700-million high-tech effort to boost border security. The Government Accountability Office in a report this month found that the effort had no evaluation system, so there's no way to show whether new camera towers or motion sensors have helped Border Patrol agents.

"Rolling out projects like that is really concerning," Rickerd said. "It's a waste of money."

Still, there was no shortage at this week's expo of opportunities for spending money.

Kurt Ludwigsen held a faux tree stump in one hand and a fake small cactus in the other. These polyurethane concealments, some as tall as 7 feet, can be used for different purposes but mainly are designed to house spy cameras that can be wired to another location or send data to a smartphone.

"Specifically for the border what you're looking to do is … drop these every thousand yards all along the way and have that digital feed come back to you," Ludwigsen said.

Perhaps the most eye-catching exhibit was a bullet-riddled 2008 Jeep Grand Cherokee that used to belong to Minerva Bautista Gomez, security chief for the Mexican state of Michoacan. Drug cartel members attacked the SUV in 2010 with guns and grenades.

"It took 14 minutes of nonstop fire," said Patricio Canavati, manager of operations in Texas for TPS Global. There were 2,700 bullet shells found at the scene, Canavati said. "Thank God she walked away with only minor scratches and bruises."

The company, which is headquartered in Mexico, opened its first U.S. office about a year ago, Herrera Martinez said.

He's optimistic about tapping into the American market.

http://www.latimes.com/nation/la-na-ff-border-security-20140320,0,536970.story#axzz2wYfshQza

Deaths will continue with or without immigration reform

Cronkite News
December 6, 2013
Brittany Hargrave

For nine years, Steve Johnston has toted gallons of water, food packages, clothing and blankets up and down Arizona’s rugged border terrain, leaving the provisions on immigrant trails into the U.S. in the name of saving lives.

While bipartisan supporters say that the U.S. Senate’s comprehensive immigration reform bill, S 744, will solve the nation’s illegal immigration problems if passed by the House of Representatives, Johnston offers a stark, contrasting view.

“I’m convinced S 744 will kill more people,” he says.

Johnston, 68, is a volunteer for the Tucson-based humanitarian-aid group No More Deaths, which is among several humanitarian and immigrant-advocacy groups that oppose the immigration bill, in part, for what they call its lack of foresight.

Johnston says the bill will “stress (volunteer) capabilities” by increasing border-enforcement efforts in Arizona and further funneling migrants into the most dangerous routes in the mountainous terrain of the Sonoran Desert.

He bases his prediction on trends from the past. Border enforcement strategies have been linked to a migrant-death rate in Arizona that has dramatically increased since the state became the most common entry point for illegal immigration into the U.S. in 1998.

Johnston’s prediction is plausible but not inevitable, says Doris Meissner, director of the Immigration Policy Program at the Migration Policy Institute and former commissioner of the U.S. Immigration and Naturalization Service under President Bill Clinton.

“A straight-line analysis is that deaths have remained high in Arizona and the bill is unlikely to lower those numbers and may even increase them,” she says. “However, the whole premise of comprehensive immigration reform is to create a system whereby people come into the U.S. to meet labor market demands and would be able to do so in a safe and orderly fashion. That should reduce reasons why people try to cross the southwest border illegally and thus decrease the number of deaths.”

There are several components of the bill that could impact migrant deaths and humanitarian work.
Primarily, S 744 calls for spending tens of billions of dollars on greater border-enforcement measures. This includes doubling the number of Border Patrol agents at the southern border to more than 38,000; constructing 700 additional miles of border fencing; deploying aircraft; building watch towers; and mandating area-specific technology such as camera systems, ground sensors and drones.

Much of those resources would be targeted toward high-risk zones like the Border Patrol’s Tucson sector, which in the 2012 fiscal year made one- third of the arrests of undocumented immigrants and one-half of marijuana seizures nationwide. Arizona already has 318 miles of some kind of border fencing, according to the U.S. Border Patrol’s Tucson and Yuma sectors. The remaining 70 miles have environmental obstacles that act as natural barriers.

Arizona became the focal point for illegal immigration as the result of a concentrated border-enforcement strategy that began in 1993 when “Operation Hold the Line” beefed up security with manpower and technology in busy illegal immigrant corridors into Texas. The Clinton administration followed with “Operation Gatekeeper” in 1994, increasing enforcement in the busiest illegalimmigration entry point – San Diego, Calif.

The strategy was aimed at forcing those who hoped to cross into the U.S. illegally into mountainous terrain with weather that fluctuates from blistering hot in the summer to frigid cold and snow in the winter acting as a deterrent. But it didn’t.

Migrant crossings and apprehensions plummeted in California and Texas following those policy changes, but they dramatically increased in Arizona. In 1992, there were just more than 95,000 apprehensions in the Tucson and Yuma sectors combined. By 2000, that number jumped to more than 700,000.

The apprehension numbers have now dropped to pre-1994 levels, the product of increased enforcement, fewer jobs available in the U.S. and an improving economy in Mexico. Deaths have not.

According to the U.S. Border Patrol, death counts have fluctuated between 170 per year and 250 per year since 2005. During that same period, apprehensions in the Tucson sector have decreased by 73 percent. The bottom line: The death rate is rising compared to reported apprehensions.

Those numbers alarm people like Gene Lefebvre, who was active in the 1980s Sanctuary Movement and who co-founded No More Deaths.

“Whether enforcement is high or low, people will try to come across if they believe they have more opportunities here,” Lefebvre says. “Over the years, numbers (of apprehensions) have been driven by the U.S. economy and jobs, as well as poverty on the other side.”

He says an improving U.S. economy will lead to more illegal immigration and more deaths in the desert.

“(The government) projected that people would die, but what they didn’t project, what they didn’t count on, was the desperation of people,” he says. “People came anyway.”

Data indicate fewer people are trying to cross illegally through Arizona, but the desperation of the people who do come over explains why the death count remains high, says Raquel Rubio-Goldsmith, a professor at the University of Arizona and program coordinator for the Binational Migration Institute. Those who make the trip take more dangerous routes as enforcement blocks easier access points, she says.

“We’re talking about people who are looking at the risk in a very different way than you or I would,” she says. “You and I wouldn’t want to go through the desert. Being with family is an incredible push factor for people. Overriding the deterrents of going through the desert are factors people face in their hometowns – they can’t make enough money to buy food or medicine for their family. They’re willing to take that chance.”

The Pima County Office of the Medical Examiner has found more than 2,000 bodies of suspected migrants in its jurisdiction since January 2001. It handles more unidentified remains than any other medical-examiner office in the country.

Humane Borders, another humanitarian-aid group based in Tucson, has worked with the Pima medical examiner office to put together a map plotting coordinates of migrant remains using geographic information system (GIS) software. The map also provides information concerning common demographics of migrants who die while crossing the border.

Because of advanced levels of decomposition, not all bodies can be identified when found. Still, the bodies that are identifiable by age, gender and cause of death offer a picture of who the migrants are: Eighty percent are male. Exposure is the cause of death in nearly 75 percent of cases. More than 40 percent of bodies are found on the Tohono O’odham Nation reservation. Most of the dead were between the ages of 20 and 49.

According to Gregory Hess, the office’s chief medical examiner, the biggest problem working with hundreds of unidentified bodies per year is storage.

“The unidentified bodies don’t go anywhere fast,” he says.

After the investigation is complete and there is no positive identification, the office generally calls to have the bodies buried in the Pima County plot or cremated, Hess says. That can add up to thousands of dollars in costs per year to the county.

It’s tragedies like those that another component of S. 744 hopes to cut down. In addition to its focus on enforcement, the bill calls for construction of 1,000 distress beacons along nearly 2,000 mile-long U.S. – Mexico border.

Currently, there are 22 distress beacons in the Tucson sector and 24 distress beacons in the Yuma sector. Factors on where the distress beacons are placed include how remote an area is, how many agents are deployed in the area, number of immigrant deaths in the area and what technology is available to help patrol, says Nicole Ballistrea, a spokeswoman for the U.S. Border Patrol’s Tucson sector.

Distress beacons were first installed in Arizona in 2002 and consist of tall red posts equipped with buttons that can be pushed in emergencies to call for help. The towers are solar powered and lighted at night. Instructions for pressing the button and sending a distress signal appear in multiple languages. The instructions do not say the beacon is connected to Border Patrol. After being treated medically, border crossers without appropriate documentation are deported.

The Tucson sector beacons have been activated about 180 times “over the last few years,” Ballistrea says. Other than that estimate, there is little information on how effective distress beacons are.
Johnston, of No More Deaths, approves of the distress-beacon component of S 744, but says he believes it could be improved if the beacons were equipped with cell-phone towers, so migrants in distress could use their cell phones in areas with poor reception.

“That’s the thing that will save the most lives,” he says. “Right now, migrants have to climb to the top of the highest mountain to get reception, and that’s very difficult. If the beacons have a cell-phone tower and use that ability, I’ll be in favor. Otherwise, it’s just a PR thing.”

The U.S. Border Patrol and local Arizona humanitarian groups have a checkered history. In the past, Border Patrol agents have ticketed humanitarian volunteers for littering after volunteers left water bottles and food out for migrants. Videos also exist of Border Patrol agents destroying the water and other provisions left out by the humanitarian groups.

Right now, relationships between the aid groups and the Border Patrol seem better, Johnston says. He attributes the improvement to Manuel Padilla Jr., who became the Tucson sector Border Patrol chief earlier this year.

“At the moment, the sector chief is sympathetic to our cause,” Johnston says. “Still, water is being destroyed. Blankets are still being taken away.”

Rubio-Goldsmith, who has studied the interaction between U.S. Border Patrol agents and border communities, says the Border Patrol has the difficult task of balancing justice and mercy.

“Border Patrol doesn’t like people going through their land, yet Border Patrol is there and they are supposed to help,” she says. “How they respond is kind of a mixed bag.”

Ballistrea says the Tucson sector Border Patrol maintains an “ongoing dialogue with multiple humanitarian groups.”

In instances where migrants coming into the country illegally become distressed, Border Patrol agents must “first and foremost act as humanitarians,” she says.

“Employees who disregard (their oath) and instead choose to violate the trust of the citizens they swore to protect will be held accountable,” she says. “Although (Border Patrol and humanitarian groups) may originate from different backgrounds, we share a common goal in saving lives. Agents are often called upon to shift from law enforcement to rescue mode in a moment’s notice.”

The best way to reform immigration policy is to work on economic policies affecting migrant workers and focus on the root motivator for why so many Mexican immigrants come to the U.S., Lefebvre says.

“There has always been a flow between the U.S. and Mexico,” he says. “People accepted that as a fact of life. Until 1994, (policies) were loose most of the time. When there was a tough economy, there were restrictions. When we needed workers, we encouraged them to come.”

In the past, workers would come from Mexico to work in the agriculture, construction or hotel industries. They would work for six months to a year, send money home and then go home themselves, Lefebvre says. Some came back and some didn’t.

“They preferred to live in Mexico, but came to the U.S. to save money for their families and for farmland,” he says.

S 744 would reform worker visas, and that change in system could stem the flow of illegal immigration, says Meissner, of the Migration Policy Institute. The bill, if passed, could also lead to more migrant rescues by increasing air surveillance, she says. It could lead to more humanitarian efforts from BorStar. If enforcement continues to increase in Arizona, the bill could shift primary migration patterns to Texas. And yes, she says, it could lead to more migrant deaths in the Arizona desert.

“It’s probably some of all of the above,” she says. “But, Border Patrol is quite successful at this point. Adding more policy on border enforcement doesn’t make a whole lot of sense, because border enforcement alone is not a viable enough strategy.”

http://cronkitenewsonline.com/2013/12/deaths-will-continue-with-or-without-immigration-reform/

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

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

Valley Mayor Fears Proposed Immigration Border Fence will Clog City

FOX news RGV
September 4, 2013

Born and raised in Starr county, Mayor Ruben Villareal has seen Rio Grande City flow along immigration tides.

But a current issue affects a staple to his city.

“This type of construction is a huge building block of what this city needs to become,” says Mayor Ruben Villareal, Rio Grande City, TX.

Mayor Villareal is talking about a treatment plant that relies on the Rio Grande to supply 700 gallons of water a day to the city.

“Is this different than other cities, this pump? We are one of two pump stations in the entire Rio Grande Valley that I know about that actually draw water straight from the Rio Grande,” says Villareal.

The current senate immigration reform bill calls for around 700 miles of border fencing. Half of which is already in place.

Up until now Starr County has been free of this, but if passed, 18-foot steel columns erected along the banks of this section of the Rio Grande is a very possible reality. As well as a major concern.

“This isn’t a curveball; this is more of a sinker or knuckle ball. When we made the design for this project it was about six years ago, and the idea of having a border fence was so farfetched. It would be like me saying, ‘we’re going to take a trip to the moon and back,” says Villareal.

“With the Rio Grande about a half mile away, the city relies on several irrigation pathways like this to prevent flooding, but mayor Villareal says that with the border fence wedged in between pathways like this and the river, a major concern is that fence becoming a costly obstacle,”

“All of Rio Grande city’s water, it kind of slopes down, everything feeds towards the river. My running and constant worry is that you’ll have some sort of blockage against that fence, because all it is pipes,” adds Villareal.

“The hydraulic modeling that was performed for the proposed fence segments assumed some blockage due to debris build-up. However, CBP contends that from a practical perspective the likelihood of occurrence is small.”

In response, customs and border protection acknowledged the risk for debris build-up but say “the likelihood of occurrence is small.”

“Historically, border fencing installed within the Rio Grande river floodplain has had no debris build-up issues or adversely impacted the floodwaters during a flooding event.” -CBP southwest border
That border fencing currently in place has not, “adversely impacted floodwaters during a flooding event.” But mayor Villareal doesn’t agree with facts based on a terrain that is ever-changing.

“Rivers meander, constantly, the bank that you see here not too long ago was probably about 100 yards further north of us.”

Much like the Rio Grande that hugs south Texas, immigration reform is a constant evolution.
This mayor believes a solution with lasting power needs to have its eyes set on tomorrow.

“I have problems when people tell me that an antiquated, something from the 12th century, that has been tried before all over the world, and has failed throughout the world as well.”

Mayor Villareal has had several talks with senator john Cornyn about this issue. The senator’s office reached out to Fox 2, saying “Sen. Cornyn offered an amendment to the Gang of 8 bill that would require DHS to consult with local leaders before any plans for fencing moved forward.”

He has offered an amendment of the grand of 8 bill that would require department of homeland security to consult with local leaders before any plans for fencing moved forward.

While that was not ultimately adopted in the Senate bill, Sen. Cornyn will continue to work with his colleagues to ensure that his amendment is part of any border security legislation that is considered this Congress.”

That while it was not adopted he will continue to endure that his amendment is part of an border security legislation that is considered.

Those talks will continue tomorrow. Senator Cornyn will be in the Rio Grande Valley, meeting with local officials, including mayor Villareal, about a smarter border strategy.

http://www.foxrio2.com/86891/valley-mayor-fears-proposed-immigration-border-fence-will-clog-city/

As Wars End, a Rush to Grab Dollars Spent on the Border

New York Times June 6, 2013 by Eric Lipton TUCSON — The nation’s largest military contractors, facing federal budget cuts and the withdrawals from two wars, are turning their sights to the Mexican border in the hopes of collecting some of the billions of dollars expected to be spent on tighter security if immigration legislation becomes law. Half a dozen major military contractors, including Raytheon, Lockheed Martin and General Dynamics, are preparing for an unusual desert showdown here this summer, demonstrating their military-grade radar and long-range camera systems in an effort to secure a Homeland Security Department contract worth as much as $1 billion. Northrop Grumman, meanwhile, is pitching to Homeland Security officials an automated tracking device — first built for the Pentagon to find roadside bombs in Afghanistan — that could be mounted on aerial drones to find illegal border crossers. And General Atomics, which manufactures the reconnaissance drones, wants to double the size of the fleet under a recently awarded contract worth up to $443 million. The military-style buildup at the border zone, which started in the Tucson area late in the Bush administration, would become all but mandatory under the bill pending before the Senate. It requires that within six months of enactment, Homeland Security submit a plan to achieve “effective control” and “persistent surveillance” of the entire 1,969-mile land border with Mexico, something never before accomplished. For military contractors, that could be a real boon. “There are only so many missile systems and Apache attack helicopters you can sell,” said Dennis L. Hoffman, an Arizona State University economics professor who has studied future potential markets for the defense industry. “This push toward border security fits very well with the need to create an ongoing stream of revenue.” Since 2005, the number of Border Patrol agents has doubled to 21,000, and the stretches protected by pedestrian or vehicle fencing have grown to 651 miles as of last year from 135. But there are still large swaths where people trying to enter the United States illegally have good odds of success, particularly in rural Texas. And with budget cutting in the past two years, money for surveillance equipment along the border has been pared back. “The main gap in our ability to provide a more secure border at this point is technology,” Mark S. Borkowski, the head of acquisitions for Homeland Security’s Customs and Border Protection, told participants at a border security industry conference in March. Military contractors have not played a significant role in lobbying for the passage of the immigration legislation, which includes $4.5 billion to bolster border security over the next five years. But teams of lobbyists, including former Senator Alfonse M. D’Amato, a New York Republican, and Benjamin Abrams, a former top aide to Representative Steny H. Hoyer, a Maryland Democrat and House minority whip, have already been pressing Homeland Security officials and lawmakers on behalf of their clients, efforts that have been backed up with millions of dollars of industry campaign contributions. Homeland Security would have to decide, in consultation with Congress, how to divide the money — on long-range cameras, radar systems, mobile surveillance equipment, aircraft or lower-tech solutions like more border agents or physical fences — decisions that would determine how various contractors might fare. “It has been a tough time for the industry: people have been laid off or furloughed,” said James P. Creaghan, a lobbyist who represents a small Texas company, Personal Defense, which is trying to sell more night-vision goggles to Homeland Security. “This could help out.” Northrop has won some important allies on Capitol Hill, including Senator Thomas R. Carper, Democrat of Delaware, the chairman of the Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee, who is urging the department to invest more in Northrop’s drone-mounted surveillance system, called Vader. General Atomics, which Mr. D’Amato represents, has so much support in Congress that it has pressed Homeland Security in recent years to buy more Predator drones than the department has the personnel to operate, so they often sit unused, according to an agency audit. The specific requirement in the legislation now before the Senate is that Homeland Security must install surveillance equipment or other measures that would allow it to apprehend or turn back 9 out of 10 people trying to illegally enter across all sectors of the southern land border. The department would be prohibited from moving ahead with the “pathway to citizenship” for immigrants already in the United States until this new security strategy is “substantially operational.” The bill is scheduled to be taken up for debate on the Senate floor next week, and certain Republicans have already drafted amendments that would make the requirement even more demanding, explicitly mandating that the 90 percent standard be achieved before the pathway to citizenship can proceed. The Tucson area, for years the busiest crossing point for illegal immigrants, has served as the testing ground for the federal government’s high-technology border effort, although even senior Homeland Security officials acknowledge it got off to a poor start. Boeing was selected back in 2006, when the last major push by Congress to rewrite the nation’s immigration laws was under way, to create a “virtual fence” that would use radar and video systems to identify and track incursions, information that would then be beamed to regional command centers and border agents in the field. But the ground radar system at first kept shutting down because of faulty circuit breakers, audits found, while the towers installed for the mounting of radar and advanced long-range cameras swayed too much in the desert winds. Even rainstorms snarled things, creating countless false alerts. “It should have been pretty simple,” Mr. Borkowski said in a recent speech of the troubled $850 million project. “We weren’t frankly smart enough.” Critics say the government often is too fixated on high-technology solutions. C. Stewart Verdery Jr., a former Homeland Security official who now runs a lobbying firm, said federal officials should instead focus their limited resources on making it harder for illegal immigrants to work in the United States, an approach that would serve as an effective deterrent. “Where are you going to get the biggest bang for the buck?” Mr. Verdery said. “Enforcement of the workplace is probably the best area to invest more dollars.” But the technological solutions still have many advocates in Arizona, where Border Patrol officials contend that the equipment Boeing installed, despite its flaws, has fundamentally changed the cat-and-mouse game that plays out every day. One recent afternoon, as the temperature in the Arizona desert hovered near 100 degrees, Border Patrol agents stationed inside a command center in Tucson were notified that a ground sensor had gone off. The command center, built under the Boeing contract, resembles the set from the Hollywood movie “Minority Report,” with Border Patrol agents sitting in front of banks of computer terminals and oversize screens that allow them to virtually fly over huge expanses of open desert 70 miles away. Using his computer, one agent pointed the long-range, heat-seeking camera at the location where the sensor had gone off. Within seconds, black-and-white images of a group of men and women walking rapidly through the desert heat appeared on his screen. “One, two, three, four, five,” the agent called out, counting until he reached 15 people in the group. He also carefully scanned the images to see if any of the people were carrying large sacks, a sign of a possible drug delivery, or had any rifles or other weapons. The Border Patrol radios lit up as he directed nearby agents on the ground to respond and called for backup from one of Customs and Border Protection’s helicopters based in Tucson. “What you see today is like night and day compared to what we had,” said Cmdr. Jeffrey Self of the Border Patrol, who oversees the Tucson region. The Boeing system, along with the surge in Border Patrol agents, has resulted in a major drop in attempted illegal crossings, he said, with apprehensions dropping 80 percent since their peak in 2000, considered a sign of a drop in overall traffic. But the system’s weaknesses are still apparent. The computer terminal crashed while the search was under way, cutting off one agent’s video feed. And on that recent afternoon, no air support was immediately available. The one helicopter nearby that was on duty was running low on fuel, so it did not arrive on the scene until 90 minutes later. Meanwhile, the Border Patrol agents at the Tucson command center lost the border crossers as they dropped into a ditch, taking them out of the line of sight of the camera and radar. Apparently seeing Border Patrol trucks and the helicopter, the group realized it had been spotted and retreated back south, an agency spokesman said. The 15 were marked down as “turn backs.” Homeland Security has been preparing for more than a year to expand this system, under a new contract that would rely on proven surveillance technology. That is why the military contractors vying for the job will be asked in coming weeks to demonstrate their gear. The department also wants to identify a mix of equipment — some on fixed towers, others on trucks for mobility — so that officials can tailor uses to the different needs along the border. Department officials said their choices would be driven by a determination of what the best available tools were for securing the border, not what the defense contractors or their lobbyists were pitching. Customs and Border Protection officials, said Michael J. Friel, a department spokesman in a statement, are “dedicated to continuing this progress towards a safer, stronger and more secure border.” http://www.nytimes.com/2013/06/07/us/us-military-firms-eye-border-security-contracts.html?ref=ericlipton&_r=0

Immigration bill might not lengthen border fence

Salt Lake Tribune
April 23, 2013
by Matt Canham

Washington • Immigration reform may not result in much, if any, new border fencing — despite $1.5 billion in designated funds in the Senate proposal, Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano said Tuesday.

Sen. Mike Lee, R-Utah, pressed the secretary on the issue, noting the proposal would give her the ability to certify when the border fence is complete. The fence plan is one trigger that would allow many of the 11 million immigrants in the country illegally to gain access to green cards.

"If you determine little or no additional fencing along the border is necessary, when do you think is the soonest that you might certify that that has been completed?" Lee, an opponent of the proposal, asked Napolitano.

"I think we would move very quickly," she responded. "We have not been sitting back waiting for immigration reform to pass to secure the border."

Napolitano, a former Arizona governor, noted a U.S. Border Patrol study determined a fence makes sense on 653 miles of the 2,000-mile southern border and so far some sort of fencing is up on 652 of those miles.

"I think what we would do if the bill passes," she said, "is go back and look at the type of fencing we have and say, ‘Do we want to make it triple what it is or taller?’ — or something of that sort."

In an interview after the hearing, Lee said he didn’t have the technical expertise to question the secretary’s analysis of border fencing, but added he’s worried that the legislation sets a low bar.

"It is not something that necessarily guarantees that the border is adequately fenced in the long run," he said.

Napolitano appeared before the Senate Judiciary Committee on a third day of immigration-related hearings. She was slated to appear last Friday but delayed her testimony because of the ongoing investigation into the Boston Marathon bombings.

The senators largely praised her and her agency for the work on the attack before jumping into the details of a broad immigration-reform plan that involves border security, employment verification of immigration status, and a process to grant legal status to immigrants here illegally.

Much of the questioning centered on border security and fencing, with Judiciary Chairman Patrick Leahy, D-Vt., expressing pessimism about building a longer fence, arguing that apprehensions of illegal border crossers are down.

"I question whether spending billions more on a fence between the United States and Mexico is really the best use of taxpayer dollars," he said.

Napolitano said she hopes to be granted flexibility to tap $1.5 billion now designated for border fencing on other border-security equipment, such as unmanned aerial vehicles.

Sen. John Cornyn, R-Texas, agreed with Napolitano on the point, but questioned how the government could claim to have "effective control of the border" unless it knew how many people slipped through undetected.

She argued that better surveillance technology will make that determination more accurate, but noted no number will determine the level of border security.

Sen. Orrin Hatch, R-Utah, and a potential swing vote on immigration reform, has credited President Barack Obama’s administration for doing more to boost border security than any past president and said the immigration proposal could be enough to settle the politically difficult issue, as long as everyone agrees that there is no reasonable way to create an impenetrable border.

Hatch, a Judiciary Committee member who was helping lead another hearing Tuesday, only temporarily attended the immigration discussion and did not ask Napolitano any questions.

The committee is now expected to debate and vote on potential changes to the bill in May. If passes there, Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., wants to bring it before the full Senate in June.

http://www.sltrib.com/sltrib/politics/56202892-90/bill-border-fence-fencing.html.csp

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

In Arizona, border security in spotlight amid immigration-reform efforts, sequester cuts

Washington Post
March 17, 2013
by Pamela Constable

NACO, Ariz. — With the winter sun’s glare bouncing off his old red pickup, John Ladd drives slowly along the 10-foot wall of iron stakes and steel mesh that crosses his 14,000-acre cattle ranch, dividing his great-grandfather’s land from the Mexican desert but not always keeping intruders out.

“Here’s where the drug smugglers cut through the wall in January,” Ladd says, pointing to a large jagged square in the metal that has since been rewelded. “They use blowtorches and hydraulic grinders. They can get a truck through in minutes, and as soon as they reach the highway they’re gone.”

Ladd’s ranch in the southeastern corner of Arizona is dotted with cameras on stilts, and U.S. Border Patrol trucks cruise the range daily, scattering his Herefords and Angus. Beyond the wall, Mexican soldiers patrol in Humvees. Before it was erected in 2007, illegal migrants constantly camped in his bushes on their way north. These days, fewer make the attempt, but a more sophisticated and dangerous threat has replaced them.

“There’s less people but more drugs,” Ladd says. “The cartels control everything that crosses. The Border Patrol has a huge presence, but it’s not enough, and it’s not the answer. No matter what they say in Washington, the border is not secure.”

The issue of border security — hard to measure but easy to manipulate — has long been a sticking point in the debate over illegal immigration. The Obama administration, hoping to win congressional support for an overhaul of immigration law, increased spending on customs and border enforcement to a record $12 billion in 2012, and it claims to have reduced infiltration of the 2,000-mile U.S.-
Mexico border to its lowest level in decades.

But now, with the across-the-board sequester cuts expected to take a $500 million bite out of the immigration enforcement budget and cut the equivalent of 5,000 jobs from a Border Patrol force of 21,000 agents, new concerns over border violence and drug smuggling are being raised by administration critics, immigration officers and some ­border-area residents.

Back at center of debate

Arizona, a Republican-led border state, has long played an outsize role in the immigration wars. It enacted the nation’s toughest law against illegal immigrants in 2010, has spawned vigilante border-watch groups and has elected officials such as Republican Gov. Jan Brewer and Maricopa County Sheriff Joe Arpaio, icons of a national movement to seal the border and fight “amnesty” for the undocumented.

Today, as the Obama administration seeks lawmakers’ backing for steps that would legalize millions of undocumented residents, Arizona’s conservative forces are rallying for another fight. This time, they have new ammunition from sequester cutbacks and reports of Mexican drug gangs muscling in on what was once a routine cat-and-mouse game between federal agents and poor migrants.

The new battle pits Brewer against another high-profile Arizona figure, Democratic former governor Janet Napolitano, now U.S. secretary of homeland security. Napolitano insists that the U.S.-Mexico border remains more secure than it has been in years, even as she warned that Border Patrol cuts would leave fewer agents to cover rugged rural areas where most illegal crossings take place. Meanwhile, Brewer has accused the White House of using the sequester for political gain at the expense of public safety.

Asked about Arizona and its most porous border segment, a 120-mile stretch that crosses ranches such as Ladd’s and the north-south highway between Tucson and Nogales, Napolitano asserted that once-heavy illegal traffic there had fallen to its lowest level in years. The government estimates that border-area arrests across Arizona, mostly in the Tucson-Nogales region, dropped 80 percent to 125,000 between 2000 and 2012.

But some members of the border enforcement community charge that officials in Washington have deliberately exaggerated the drop in illegal crossings and unfairly focused budget cuts on their mission. They warn that smugglers of drugs and of humans will take advantage of the sequester, which is expected to reduce thousands of hours of overtime and has already led to the release of hundreds of illegal immigrants from detention.

“The real truth is not getting out. The Border Patrol is only catching 5 percent of what crosses, and they are being told not to report getaways,” charged Zack Taylor, a Nogales resident and leader of the national association of former Border Patrol employees. “Arizona is already a lawless area, and with those cuts in manpower it’s going to be wide open.”

Several law enforcement observers said illegal migrants are starting to cross in larger groups, anticipating a more tolerant U.S. government policy to result from talks in Washington. “The numbers of illegals have really picked up since they heard amnesty is coming,” Taylor said.

Ranchers such as Ladd also remain skeptical of administration claims of success. They often mention violent incidents such as the 2010 shooting death of border rancher Robert Krentz and constantly swap stories of the latest fence cuttings, of drugs being abandoned by couriers and of smugglers using empty barns as hideaways and lookout posts.

Yet now there are voices in Arizona sending different messages on immigration. A growing Hispanic electorate is feeling new muscle, some police officials are disgusted with the state’s polarized politics, and a loose fraternity of liberal business and civic leaders, many of whom benefit from cross-border commerce, is expressing discomfort with extreme anti-immigrant rhetoric and the militarization of the border region.

One of those voices belongs to Nan Waldon, a lawyer and horse breeder who co-owns a 7,000-acre pecan farm south of Tucson that employs several hundred Hispanics. In a recent interview, Waldon denounced the controversial 2010 law as a “horrible and racist” measure. The law, the toughest aspects of which were upheld by the Supreme Court last year, requires police to report suspected illegal immigrants to federal officials.

“It’s wrong for people to stereotype Mexicans and Mexican Americans as criminals and drug smugglers and ignore the fact that they are the backbone of our economy,” Waldon said. “Many people in Arizona are still afraid to speak out, but there is a silent majority who have had enough of the rhetoric that plays on the fears of ignorant people.”

Roberto Villasenor, the Mexican American police chief of Tucson, said he worries about the upswing in drug smuggling but complained that the political hijacking of border security has made it much harder to find practical solutions.

“Making the border more secure needs to be a priority, but we keep getting into a political circus, with both sides making outlandish claims to advance their agenda,” Villasenor said wearily. “The issue has been so distorted that whatever you do, the other side screams it is political. Nobody knows what to believe anymore.”

In the border boomtown of Nogales, officials are cultivating close relationships with their Mexican counterparts and business leaders are lobbying for expanded inspection services to speed the passage of Mexican trucks. Industry officials said more than $6 billion in tomatoes, peppers and other produce from Mexico enters the United States each year, nearly half of it through Nogales.

“Things have changed since the last time Congress tackled this issue,” said Doris Meissner, a former federal immigration commissioner and a senior fellow at the Migration Policy Institute in Washington. “The border is not the same place it was five years ago, and the American electoral picture is different. I don’t think the Arizona mind-set is going to have the same traction it had in the past.”

An economic entry point

The scene at Ladd’s cattle ranch, with its stark evidence of severed steel bars and high-
powered invaders, is an ominous prism through which to view the border. But just a dozen miles east, at the busy, legal Port of Entry between Douglas, Ariz., and Agua Prieta, Mexico, the picture is more complex.
On a gray winter afternoon, hundreds of Mexicans hurried home through narrow inspection lanes after another day in the United States — schoolchildren, mothers with shopping bags, and men returning from long days in a tomato processing plant 80 miles from the border.

Heading through a separate maze of wide northbound lanes were a dozen tractor-trailers carrying refrigerated crates of Mexican tomatoes, peppers and squash to supermarkets across the United States.
To Daniel Ortega, the Mexican American mayor of Douglas, the border is not a menace but a crossroads of commerce and culture. Trade with Mexico provides 80 percent of the town’s commercial revenue, while federal jobs in border-related security have helped revive the community of 18,000 since its once-dominant employer, a copper mine and foundry, shut down in the 1990s.

“Our communities are very dependent on each other,” Ortega said, noting that Douglas is now an official “sister city” with Agua Prieta. He said his main concern is trying to streamline the border inspection process, something that sequester cutbacks could easily derail. “People in the East talk about how bad the border is,” Ortega said, “but here our future depends on it.”

At one point in the afternoon, a barred government bus crossed from Douglas to Agua Prieta and two dozen Mexicans straggled out. Most carried plastic bags labeled “Department of Homeland Security” that contained wadded clothes, water bottles and other remnants of their failed attempts to sneak into the United States.

The little group shuffled into a dingy little building, run by an American volunteer group, which said “Welcome Brother Migrants” in Spanish. Slumped dejectedly in plastic chairs, they said they had been caught soon after crossing into the United States in February, briefly jailed and then bused back to Mexico.

There were couples and ­middle-aged men and a weeping woman who said she might never see her children again. All had borrowed heavily to pay guides and protection fees to drug mafias, hoping to reach a construction job in Chicago, a grape harvest in California or a spouse and children in Nebraska.

Gabriel Sosa, a 47-year-old factory worker, said he had paid $2,000 for a guide who led him and two other men to the open border at Naco. The guide told them to climb the 10-foot fence and wait for a cellphone call, then vanished.

“We hid in the grass all night and nobody called. We could hear the cattle nearby,” Sosa said. “It got colder and colder. Finally we decided to walk to the highway, and as soon as we saw a Border Patrol truck we turned ourselves in.”

The thwarted travelers said they knew U.S. penalties for illegal entry were stricter now and that Arizona was especially tough on border crossers. They complained about the fees demanded by the drug mafia, the cold cells in U.S. jails and the dense Border Patrol presence in populated areas that forced them to risk dangerous desert crossings.

Still, all said their desperation to find a job with a living wage was stronger than any of those worries. Asked what would be the best way to stop illegal immigration, several people spoke up at once, saying they would much rather work legally, even for a few months of the year, than endure the expense and hazards of crossing on their own.

“If the Americans want to stop illegal immigration, why don’t they give us work visas?” demanded a young man named Julio, who had paid $2,000 and been caught almost as soon as he crossed into Arizona. “This way we are just bait for the mafia.”

Then he shouldered his plastic bag and followed his companions to the Agua Prieta bus station and the empty-handed trip home.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/local/in-arizona-border-security-in-spotlight-amid-immigration-reform-efforts-sequester-cuts/2013/03/17/d866858c-8801-11e2-999e-5f8e0410cb9d_story.html?wpisrc=emailtoafriend