Thread: Border Patrol plan for a permanent checkpoint criticized

Tucson Region
Sahuarita may oppose checkpoint
Border Patrol plan for a permanent site is criticized
By Tim Ellis
http://www.azstarnet.com/sn/border/196108
Arizona Daily Star
Tucson, Arizona | Published: 08.13.2007

Sahuarita's Town Council will consider adding its voice this week to the chorus of others calling on the Border Patrol to reconsider plans to build a permanent checkpoint on Interstate 19 south of Green Valley.
The council will consider a resolution on Saturday that would state its opposition to the checkpoint proposal, which already has generated strong criticism from area residents and businesses.

On Thursday, Vice Mayor Phil Conklin directed the town's staff to draw up the resolution after hearing a presentation on the issue by members of the Coalition for a Safe and Secure Border. The group is trying to persuade federal officials to build the checkpoint at the border and not, as area resident and businesswoman Carol Cullen said, "30 miles north of the border."

Nan Stockholm Walden, a Sahuarita businesswoman and a coalition member, said moving the checkpoint to Kilometer Post 50 would bring criminal activity northward, to even more heavily populated areas.
"This checkpoint will be five minutes from Green Valley and Sahuarita," Walden said.

Councilman John Sullivan suggested that the council should consider the checkpoint issue soon, before an Aug. 21 meeting of a citizens group assembled by U.S. Rep. Gabrielle Giffords, D-Ariz.

Conklin agreed that the Town Council should consider taking a stand on the issue, "particularly as it (the checkpoint) keeps moving farther north, until it's practically right on top of us."

Cullen, executive director of the Tubac Chamber of Commerce and a coalition member, said the group's members, like all area residents, believe something must be done about the rampant smuggling of drugs and illegal immigration through the area.

And while the group and area residents support the Border Patrol's efforts to accomplish that, Cullen said a permanent checkpoint at Kilometer Post 50 on I-19 would not solve the problem.

Instead, she said, it would subject residents and businesses around the checkpoint to criminal activity that occurs when smugglers try to get around the checkpoint.

High-speed car chases, shootouts, rip-offs between rival smuggling gangs and other related crime around Tubac rose sharply early this year. Area residents say the increase was caused by the Border Patrol's establishment of a semi-permanent checkpoint at Kilometer Post 42.
"There is a problem," Cullen said. "The problem needs to be dealt with. But we believe it's important to stop the permanent checkpoint and secure the border at the border."

Border Patrol officials say a checkpoint is needed north of the border because it's impossible to stop increasingly sophisticated smuggling operations at the border.

Officials say a checkpoint is needed in this area — and on Arizona 90 in Cochise County and Arizona 86 near Ajo — because the Border Patrol's Tucson Sector — with a 261-mile-long international border — is the only sector without a permanent checkpoint.

That is why the Tucson Sector, which contains only 13 percent of the U.S.-Mexico border, is consistently among the busiest, agency officials said.
Border Patrol officials announced last month that they will build an interim checkpoint at Kilometer Post 50 that will be used for three to five years, until the agency gets funding and permits for a permanent checkpoint.
They said Kilometer Post 50 is the agency's favored location for a permanent facility, which would accommodate up to 150 agents, sophisticated radar and vehicle X-ray equipment, several drug-sniffing dogs and a canopy over eight lanes of roadway for vehicle inspections.
Coalition members said that instead, the Border Patrol should beef up enforcement at the border and also make greater use of technology. That would include the sophisticated radar system now being tested in the Tucson Sector and unmanned aerial vehicles — small drones equipped with sensors.

Coalition members said the agency should deploy tactical squads of highly mobile agents to track and arrest smugglers. They also are proposing greater coordination between federal, state and local law-enforcement agencies, and increased federal funding to help local agencies bear the burden of dealing with smuggling-related crime.

Sahuarita Councilman Scott Downs told coalition members that "what you're saying makes absolute sense." But he also wanted to hear Border Patrol officials explain their views on the issue.

Barbara Dolan, Sahuarita's spokeswoman, said Friday that the town will invite officials from the Border Patrol and Giffords' office to Saturday's meeting.

Dove Haber, a Border Patrol agent and spokeswoman, said Friday that the agency didn't know about the council resolution, so she declined to comment on it. But she said agency officials "like to attend as many community meetings as we can."

Contact reporter Tim Ellis at 807-8414 or tellis@azstarnet.com.

When did we get 'Kilometer posts'?