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Ariz. governor critical of proposal for state barrier along border

By Paul Davenport
ASSOCIATED PRESS

12:50 p.m. August 17, 2005

PHOENIX – Gov. Janet Napolitano says she may move to provide law enforcement agencies with more money to combat immigration-related crime but she and a legislative critic are at odds over whether the state should pay for a new barrier along parts of the U.S.-Mexico border.

Napolitano declared an emergency in four border counties on Monday, and she and her emergency council approved spending $1.5 million from the state's disaster fund to help pay for law enforcement and other costs stemming from illegal immigration in those counties.

That funding to help cope with the effects of a "broken and underfunded" federal immigration system isn't a one-time fix, Napolitano said Wednesday during a news conference.

There's more money in the disaster fund, and her next proposed state budget may seek money for more Department of Public Safety officers and assistance for local prosecutors, she said.

"I'm not ruling anything out," she said. "We are looking at a lot of those types of options."

However, Napolitano rejected state Rep. Russell Pearce's still-developing proposal to have the state gradually erect a barrier along the porous international border.

"I think Arizona taxpayers are paying enough for illegal immigration," Napolitano said Wednesday during a news conference. "I do not intend to raise taxes to build a fence."

Pearce, R-Mesa, said he was drafting legislation to ask voters next year to approve financing for construction of a hard-to-climb barrier on state and private land along parts of the border.

He said the barrier wouldn't be everywhere along the Arizona portion of the border but that even just building it gradually in some areas would help combat illegal immigration by letting federal Border Patrol officers concentrate on other areas.

"It's obvious what the need is. We have an invasion going on in this country," he said in an interview. "We have a crisis just like the governor finally recognized."

Pearce said he's still working out cost, financing and construction details of the proposal, but he says providing a state tax credit of up to $500 for donations for the barrier's construction is a possibility.

The federal government has erected steel walls and mesh fences in and around Arizona communities along the border and also begun installing anti-smuggling vehicle barriers in other areas. Elsewhere, the only physical barrier along many miles of remote desert consists of a barbed wire fence.

Napolitano's emergency order covered all four counties along the border: Cochise, Pima, Santa Cruz and Yuma counties.

She issued her order three days after New Mexico Gov. Bill Richardson, a fellow Democrat, issued a similar one for four counties in his state.

Napolitano said she and Richardson had discussed the idea of declaring an emergency. "He went first," Napolitano said.