Jan 17, 2007 8:55 pm US/Central
Texas Border Mayors: Border Fence Won't Go Up
WASHINGTON (AP) ―
Texas border mayors who met with Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff on Wednesday said they are confident an 850-mile fence would not be built on the U.S.-Mexico border.
Texas border mayors who met with Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff on Wednesday said they are confident an 850-mile fence would not be built on the U.S.-Mexico border.
Laredo Mayor Raul Salinas said it's "highly unlikely" the fence called for in a law signed by President Bush would be funded.
"It's a turnaround here. It's the beginning of a new day to say, 'No wall,"' Salinas said.
The seven mayors and three Texas businessmen met with Chertoff at the office of Sen. Kay Bailey Hutchison, R-Texas. She voted for the fence, but wants the plan adjusted to address local concerns.
Chertoff said after the meeting there are parts of the border where a fence will work, and the agency wants to be "expeditious" in building it. But he said some border areas will need a mix of technology.
"In all cases, we need more boots on the ground," he said.
The mayors also met with Rep. David Price, a North Carolina Democrat who is chairman of the House Appropriations subcommittee on homeland security. The meeting was arranged by Rep. Ciro Rodriguez, D-San Antonio, an Appropriations Committee member.
Bush signed the law last year, and Congress provided money to start it. But Republicans worry that now they have lost control of Congress, they never will see the fence built. The Democrats now in charge generally oppose the fence.
Rep. Bennie Thompson, House Homeland Security Committee chairman, said he wants to see a plan for securing the northern and southern borders from Department of Homeland Security and hold a hearing on those plans instead of focusing only on fence construction and funding.
"My preference is to delay the construction of a fence until we have a plan," said Thompson, D-Ga.
Thompson and 130 other Democrats, including new House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and Majority Leader Steny Hoyer, voted against the fence last year. Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid of Nevada also voted against it, but Sen. Robert Byrd of West Virginia, chairman of the Appropriations Committee, was among 26 Senate Democrats in favor of the fence.
The fence law dictates one segment stretching east from El Paso, another from Del Rio to Eagle Pass and a third from Laredo to Brownsville. It also sets out locations in California and the entire Arizona border. Though the total fencing was believed to be about 700 miles, congressional researchers say it is closer to 850.
A separate law that funds the Homeland Security Department provided $1.2 billion for the fencing. But that law also withholds $950 million until the House and Senate appropriations committees approve the department's plan for spending the money, giving those committees say over the design, location and length of the fence.
Republicans are still pushing, though, restating their arguments for a fence and dashing off letters to President Bush seeking more money for the fence in his 2008 budget.
Supporters Rep. Duncan Hunter, R-Calif., and Rep. Steve King, R-N.Y., ranking Republican on the House Homeland Security Committee, criticized recent estimates of the cost as overblown.
"It's just a fence. It's the kind of fence we build in America every day," said Hunter, who sponsored legislation to build a fence in San Diego.
Hunter and King said the fence would cost $3 million a mile for a total cost of about $2.6 billion. That's the same estimate of the Congressional Budget Office.
But the Congressional Research Service said in a December report that the budget office did not explain what costs it considered to reach that estimate.
The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers estimated a double-layer fence would cost a little over $1 million a mile, not including buying the land on which it would be built, according to the Congressional Research Service. In addition, maintenance could run from $16.4 million to $70 million a mile over 25 years, the Corps said.
The Department of Homeland Security has contracted with Boeing for the Secure Border Initiative, consisting of a "virtual fence" of cameras, surveillance technology and new procedures for border agents. The first phase is to be completed in Arizona in June.
A recent audit report said that project could cost between $8 billion and $30 billion, after an original estimate of $2 billion.
NOTE: The fence law is Public Law No: 109-367. The Homeland Security Appropriations bill with money for the fence is Public Law No. 109-295
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