Dorgan asks for halt to land port construction in his home state
“On average, the ports see only five vehicles per hour and yet the proposed plan is to spend an average of $16 million per facility,” Dorgan. “It just defies common sense.”
The Trucker Staff
9/17/2009
WASHINGTON — You certainly can’t say that Sen. Byron Dorgan, D-N.D., was playing a game of politics Wednesday when he called on the Department of Homeland Security to suspend plans to demolish and entirely replace existing facilities at low traffic ports-of-entry on the northern U.S. border — plans that he said would result in spending hundreds of millions of dollars more than is necessary.
That’s because among those 22 land ports were nine in Dorgan’s home state of North Dakota — Antler, Carbury, Hansboro, Maida, Neche, Noonan, Sherwood, Walhalla and Westhope.
According to a release issued by the Customs and Border Protection, those nine border ports were scheduled to receive a total of just over $139 million for land port construction.
Only hours after Dorgan called for the suspension, Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano said she would halt any new border construction projects and would review how her department made funding decisions.
U.S. Customs and Border Protection had announced plans to spend $355 million in federal American Recovery and Reinvestment Act funding to build new ports-of-entry at 22 sites across the northern border.
Because of requirements established under the previous Administration, each facility is estimated to cost between $11 million and $25 million.
The two busiest ports in North Dakota were set to receive some $38.7 million.
The Neche ports was to receive $21.2 million and the Walhalla port $17.5 million.
According to federal data provided to The Trucker and taken from the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration Web site, the Neche port handled a total of 14,497 truck and bus crossings during 2008 and 107,095 passengers passed through the port.
The Walhalla port handled 14,404 truck and bus crossings and 92,117 passenger crossings.
The least busy port, located at Antler, was scheduled to receive $13.8 million and handled 543 truck and bus crossings in 2008 and 27,392 passenger crossings.
Speaking about all 22 ports, Dorgan said it didn’t make sense to spend that much money for new facilities at ports that see only a few vehicles per hour.
“On average, the ports see only five vehicles per hour and yet the proposed plan is to spend an average of $16 million per facility,” Dorgan. “It just defies common sense.”
“I support efforts are to boost security on our northern border, but we need to do it in a way that is fiscally responsible and follows some principles of common sense,” Dorgan said. “We can do some upgrades, but we don’t need to spend tens of millions of dollars to replace the existing facilities at ports-of-entry that see only a few vehicles every hour. That’s just nuts.”
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